Risk of Private Shield

I have seen several examples of the problems encountered by consumers when they change from Medishield to Private Shield or from one Private Shield to another plan. They encountered rejection of their claim due to failure to disclose previous medical conditions. In some cases, the previous medical conditions were quite trivial and are not material to merit rejection of the claim. However, the claim officer is "trigger happy" in rejecting the claims, so that they can make more profit for the insurance company.

The purpose of insurance is to pay claims, especially for legitimate claims. It is not to make excessive profit for the insurance company. In some countries, it is illegal for an insurance company to reject a claim for unjustified reasons. If they wish to cite "non-disclosure", they need to have reasonable grounds. As the situation seem to be quite bad in Singapore, it is best for consumers to avoid changing insurers or to avoid upgrading of Shield plans.

The behavior of the insurance company is bad in another respect. Even if they are entitled to reject the claim, it is still their duty to pay the Medishield portion of the claim, as this cover is supposed to continue from one insurer to another, and from one plan to another. By rejecting the claim, the insurance company is failing in its duty to treat its customer fairly.

If you are caught in this situation, and your claim is unfairly rejected, you have the following options:

• Lodge a complaint to FIDREC (www.fisca.sg) for your claim to be mediated or adjudicated
• Write a letter to the newspaper to complain about the unfair rejection

You can read several stories about unfair rejection of Shield claims in my website. Go to www.tankinlian.com/ask.aspx and search for 'Rejection" or "Shield".

Tan Kin Lian

Amazing Number cards

I have arranged the numbers into in a format that allows you to print them into small cards. You can print out the page, paste into a hard card and cut out the small cards. You can try the trick with your friends. Click here.

Ask Mr. Tan in www.tankinlian.com

I have now written about 100 articles on insurance, investment and financial planning in the Ask Mr. Tan section of my website, www.tankinlian.com. You can access this section directly from the "Ask Mr. Tan" button on the top of the right frame of my blog. When you are at the website, you can search for an article easily by entering a keyword, such as "health insurance" in the Search tab to get all articles on this topic.

In the past, I post these articles in my blog but they quickly disappear from the top of my blog after a few days.
By putting them in the TKL website, they can be easily retrieved in the future, using the search function.

I am a regular user of this Search function. When someone ask me a question, it is easy for me to retrieve the article or FAQ using this search and give a link as a reply. But I want to encourage my readers to search for the article on their own, rather than give me the additional burden of making the search.

SM Goh & NTU Forum [3]

More comments about the NTU Forum can be found at General Election Portal

Rechargeable torchlight

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The torchlight can be ordered here at $6.50 (Promotion: $20 for 4 pieces).

Managing personal risk

This article explains the importance of managing the risk of unemployment and inadequate savings for retirement and how to tell the difference between a good and bad life insurance policy. Read this article.

You can search for other FAQs and articles in www.tankinlian.com/ask.aspx or the link "Ask Mr Tan" on the right.

Buy financial planning book here.

Key tips for a new job entrant

When a graduate starts work for the first time, he or she is likely to be targeted by an insurance agent who will sell a life insurance policy to protect against the loss of future income. The life insurance policy is likely to give a poor yield for the future savings, and the protection need is not really necessary. But, it is easy for the job entrant to be misled by the well trained agent.

Read this article about the uncomfortable experience of a job entrant in being sold a policy that he does not really want, but find it difficult to say "no" to an agent who is his friend.

Read this article to find out about the insurance that you really need. And read this article about the importance of having personal savings that you are kept in flexible form - which you may need for a future emergency.