With waiver of premium benefit, we’ll waive your client’s premiums if they can’t work due to incapacity, caused by an illness or accident.

If your client is incapacitated, we’ll waive their premium payments after 26 weeks.

To be able to exercise this option, the following criteria apply:

• They must be accepted on standard rates,
• All premiums must be paid to date,
• The waiver of premium benefit starts before the client’s 55th birthday.

We’ll waive premiums after 26 weeks of incapacity and will continue to do so until the life assured:

• no longer qualifies for waiver of premium benefit,
• returns to work, or
• the policy term ends, whichever occurs first.

Definitions of incapacity

How we define incapacity depends on the client’s occupation and the product they have.

For occupation classes 1,2,3 and 4

The life assured must be unable to carry out their ‘normal’ occupation for 26 weeks and not doing any other gainful work.

For housepersons and those not in gainful employment at outset

The life assured must be unable to perform 3 or more of Functional Assessment Tests (FATs) definitions. These definitions are as follows:

• Walking - the ability to walk a distance of 200 metres with or without the aid of a walking stick and without stopping or experiencing discomfort.
• Bending - the ability to get into or out of a saloon car and the ability to bend or kneel to pick up an object from the floor and straighten up again.
• Communicating - the ability to answer a telephone  and to take a message.
• Reading - having the required eyesight (corrected if necessary) to be able to read a daily newspaper.
• Writing - having the physical ability to write legibly using a pen or pencil without aid.
• Climbing - having the ability to climb up a flight of 12 stairs without stopping or suffering severe discomfort.

For Income Protection Benefit the client must be unable to perform three or more of the Activities of Daily Living. These are:

• Bending - the ability to load and unload a standard front-loading washing machine.
• Communicating - the ability to hear (with aids) and speak with sufficient clarity to be able to hold a conversation in a quiet room in their first language.
• Reading - have the required eyesight to read a daily newspaper, using glasses or other visual aid if required.
• Fine motor control - have the ability to remove five paracetamol from a blister pack.
• Walking - the ability to walk 200 meters (on flat ground) to a local shop or bus stop for example, without stopping due to breathlessness or severe pain.
• Lifting and carrying - the ability to lift a 2.5kg bag of potatoes from mid-shin height to waist height and carry it five metres.

This option must be chosen at outset for all our protection products but is included automatically for Income Protection Benefit.