Cancer survivor secures €1m payout

A woman who contracted cancer and survived was paid €1m by Irish life on a specified illness cover policy in 2012.

Ireland’s largest life assurance company paid out €125m to customers and dependants in 2012 and said signs are emerging of a new “super- claim” category with six death claims paid at least €1m, one of €5m last year.

However, the average claim for life insurance was just over €71,500.

Irish Life today disclosed that a payment of over €1m was paid out to a customer who contracted cancer but who “has happily recovered”.

The payment was made on foot of a specified illness cover policy (protection) which she had with the company.

The figures are being revealed today as part of the annual publication of claims statistics in respect of life insurance policies provided by Irish Life.

They show that in 2012 Irish Life paid out a total of €83.5m in life insurance benefits held by 1,168 customers, a further €41.5m was paid out to 606 customers in respect of specified illness cover plans.

Irish Life head of claims, Martin Duffy, said that the €5m life insurance payment is the highest made by Irish Life in the past seven years.

“There were a number of very high (€1m+) claims paid out in 2012 which reflects, in part, the higher value insurance which people acquired in the boom years.

“We did have a number of very large payments last year, but the fact that the average payment was just €71,500 suggests that the level of life insurance taken out by many Irish people is still insufficient to look after their dependants in the event of an early death, especially as the average age of adult claims is 62,” he added.

Mr Duffy said that cancer accounted for 46% of death claims and 63% of specified illness cover claims, while heart conditions accounted for 14% of death and 19% of specified illness cover claims.

Cancer was the cause of 56% of death claims involving females and 43% involving males, while heart conditions were the cause of almost one-in-five of claims involving males compared to just 7% involving females.

Accidents accounted for 135 life insurance claims — 12% of the total — and these were concentrated heavily among younger people, with 40% of all life insurance claims for customers under age 40 the result of an accident.