Life insurance for pilots

[JoeCaponeCHFC]

If you have ever flown a plane and then tried to acquire life insurance you may have found out that the pricing goes through the roof.

Just want to let everybody know that there are carriers that allow you to get the same life insurance at the same price as it would be otherwise by attaching an exclusion rider. With this exclusion rider they do not cover death if you crash while flying a plane. You are covered if you die in a commercial airliner that you purchased a ticket for or if you take over a hijacked plane.

Crazy stuff but turned out to be helpful for somebody that we just are working with now.

Pacific life and Lincoln are two of the carriers that will exclude this.

[Scott at MD Financial Services]

There are a number of carriers that will offer coverage to private pilots with no rate up and with the piloting to be covered.  Usually the pilot needs to have over 250 hours flight time, instrument rating, and more than 40 hours per year but not more than 100 hours per year.  If you don't meet those requirements you can always pick the max offering through AOPA and still have it covered.  In addition, we have had a number of people pick a policy with the pilot exclusion (keeps the rate the smallest) then go pick up an accident plan for next to nothing....plane goes down and you die it was probably an accident so you are then covered under that process as well.

[BeamOn]

I worked with PIClife (pilot insurance center) to get some layered term life policies recently. Different insurance companies have different flight time minimums to qualify for reasonable (no up-charge or rider) rates. I ended up with Minnesota Life, and they have a minimum total time of only 100 hours (with 25 in the prior year I believe) and no requirement for instrument rating. Another company had a 140 or 150 total time minimum, and there were many more with the qualifications given by Scott above (250+ total time, instrument rated, etc).

I also priced out a policy direct from the insurance company, but got the same rate as through PIClife, so I guess the commission or however they keep the lights on is baked into the price.

[JoeCaponeCHFC]

That is great. I am not familiar with them but will add them to the list of resources that we have for when we another pilot client.

The traditional carriers will typically add a rating of $3.50 per $1000 of insurance which for the client that we were working with brought the premium from $1,500 annual (approx) to over $10,000! Nuts and this was for someone that has only flown one time but intends to continue to fly.

"He would currently be considered a “student” pilot and assessed with a $3.50 per $1000 flat extra x 5 years until he has obtained his license, and at least 100 solo hours and expecting to fly between 0-300 hours per year."

Point being - there are options either to buy from PICLife like you mentioned or you can accept a rider where the rate would still be $1500 (for the example) but you have to agree that death caused by flying on your own would not be covered.

Another point - get your level term life in place before you start flying! They cannot change it after it is in force. (Same for any other hazardous activity as well).

 

[Scott at MD Financial Services]

Hey Beam you are correct, there are several different layers that one needs to look at when buying life insurance for pilots.  My point of 250+, 40-100 annual, instrument just gets you the very best in pricing.  As an example I had a 47 year old pilot that we got $1 million for at a cost of $665 annually with no exclusion but that was because of what he brought to the table with experience.  Minn Mutual is the carrier behind AOPA and will do between $200k to $1 million without any exclusion or rate up as well.  All I am saying is if you need a million or less then it is pretty easy to get, if you need more then the experience you bring to the table as a pilot can make a difference in the rate you receive.  As one thinks about it, the more experience you have the better you will be at handling issues that arise and thus less risk of a catastrophic outcome.  Not every carriers best rate is equal to the next carriers best rate, it is important to work with a firm experienced in these issues.  Same type of thing goes for those that do climbing, spelunking, competitive mountain biking, and more than 30 tanks of scuba annually.  Heck even those that smoke cigars/pipes/chew/dip vs. use cigarettes can have a rate 1/2 the cost of cigarettes if you know where to go.