Understanding Life Insurance
With Living Benefits
Do you have the old kind of insurance or the new kind?
Life insurance can do more than pay a death benefit. With powerful riders you may be able to accelerate the death benefit due to a qualifying illness or injury and potentially provide a guaranteed source of retirement income if you live too long. Accelerated Benefits Riders6 are optional, no additional cost riders that can allow you to access all or part of the death benefit while you are living if you experience a qualifying terminal, chronic, or critical illness or critical injury. You can use the benefit for any purpose, with the exception that ABR proceeds for chronic illness in the state of Massachusetts can only be used to pay for expenses incurred for Qualified Long-Term Care services.*
Typical Qualifying Events
Terminal Illness
Generally, if you have been diagnosed with a terminal illness that will result in death
within 24 months (12 months in some states) of certification of the illness by a physician.
Chronic Illness
A doctor has certified, within the past 12 months, that you are unable to perform two
out of six “activities of daily living” for a period of at least 90 consecutive days without
assistance, or that you are generally cognitively impaired.
Activities of Daily Living:
• Bathing
• Continence
• Dressing
• Eating
• Toileting
• Transferring
Critical Illness
A doctor has certified, within the past 12 months, that you are unable to perform two
out of six “activities of daily living” for a period of at least 90 consecutive days without
assistance, or that you are generally cognitively impaired.
Activities of Daily Living:
• Bathing
• Continence
• Dressing
• Eating
• Toileting
• Transferring
Critical Illness
Critical Injury generally includes:
• Coma
• Paralysis
• Severe Burns
• Traumatic Brain Injury
Critical Injury
Critical Injury generally includes:
• Coma
• Paralysis
• Severe Burns
• Traumatic Brain Injury
Living Benefits could be used for, but not limited to:
• Household expenses
• Home modifications
• Nursing home care
• Adult day care
• Regular bills
• Quality of life expenses
• Lifelong dream vacation