During the last few weeks we have worked on dozens of life, long term care, disability and annuity cases working alongside our Advisors.
If you are not discussing these issues with your clients then who will?
We recently had a case where we looked at several Long Term Care strategies and recommended a MoneyGuard Solution as the one that was clearly in the client’s best interest. However the Advisor almost lost the sale to a keen Nationwide salesman with a strong conviction and salesmanship for the product he was offering and he focused on the benefits of Indemnity vs. Reimbursement. We helped save the case with Care and Reasoning and being more convinced in offering what was in the client’s best interest. The opposition was a Nationwide Salesperson offering CareMatters – a product very similar to MoneyGuard and in many cases a very viable and solid solution. We love both products.
However in this case we were trying to solve for the most long term care benefit and had to refocus the client on that goal and NOT that maybe her daughter might care for her 25 years in the future and she could pay her more easily through an indemnity based solution.
To the client…
Below are some additional thoughts to consider.
Reimbursement vs Indemnity should not be your focus. The main point is making sure your family is coordinating care and not having to provide care. When comparing apples to apples, MoneyGuard starts out at much more in monthly benefits and compounds to be a significant difference in monthly benefit available over time, especially at ages when a long term care event is likely to happen.
Below are some additional thoughts to consider about indemnity vs. reimbursement:
- Not many differences that will truly matter
- Your caretaker still needs to coordinate care and physically pay the bills each month and manage the claim and your finances
- You will have to be reassessed as needing care services at least annually for indemnity payments to continue.
- A reimbursement design allows for direct billing and direct payment, so a caretaker essentially supervises claim.
- Even though indemnity plans allow for direct compensation of a family member, this can affect quality of care and the quality of life for the caregiver. Are you are really considering and wanting a family member providing your care if you have insurance? If so,
- Is a family member going to be qualified to provide the type of care needed?
- Will they physically be able to provide care needed?
- Will they be around and available to provide the care when needed in the future?
- Will family members all be in agreement as to what is needed for your care?
- Will there be government requirements for caregivers to claim the income received from you or for you to provide workers compensation insurance, etc.?
- Will there be pressure to use funds for purposes other than your healthcare?
- What will payment and care coordination technology look like in 30 or more years.
NOTE: Women who cared for ill parents were twice as likely to suffer from depressive or anxious symptoms as non-caregivers.
Source: Press release (August 2002). “Reverberations of Family Illness: A longitudinal assessment of informal caregiving and mental health status in the nurses’ health study,” American Journal of Public Health, as quoted in Family Caregiver Alliance, “Women and Caregiving: Facts and Figures,” FCA, https://www.caregiver.org/women-and-caregiving-facts-and-figures (accessed December 16, 2016).
Other Concierge Care Bullet Points
- When you need to go on claim, you are assigned a case manager who is a single point of contact for the entire family to assist in all phases of the process (paperwork, care coordination, etc.- no call centers).
- Silver Brick Road – included with each MG contract, client and family can find providers based on geography, offerings, ratings, needs (what typically takes the average family 2-6 weeks takes 5-10 minutes!), articles, videos, Care Circle, Assessments, pre-planning.
- Care Circle – keeps family and friends in the loop – anyone named in the Care Circle by the owner of MG receives an observation report by the Caregiver. This Care post is an email blast sent to each member of the Care Circle each day care is provided, detailing what care was provided that specific day, what is going on, what they did, what to do now.
- Assessments – puts a baseline on what to do – can also be a cognitive screen. Insured can do on self or Care Circle member can do the assessment on insured, receive guidance and provide suggestions.
- Next steps – we provide a list of the right questions a family should be asking potential caregivers.
- Bill pay – a way to pay caregivers directly without the need of sending a check to the family who then has to deposit and write out more checks to caregivers.
- Pre-planning – a service that allows you to plan for your care, develop a plan choose your care provider prior to being on claim. Allows insured to fully develop a plan based on a future need because of a diagnosis that does not have immediate affect but eventually will (MS, Alzheimer’s, rheumatoid arthritis, etc. – debilitating conditions that can work slowly over time). We save the plan in our system and when time comes for pulling the trigger for benefits there is no crisis management, the plan is already to go.
- Family has White Glove Concierge Care and with the dial of a toll free number, they are put in touch with your Concierge Caregiver to guide everyone through a difficult time.
I sound like a salesman…
The only reason I would recommend Nationwide for you, is if you thought the slightly higher death benefit outweighed the loss of LTC Benefits. The Return of Premium Option is also better with Nationwide, but you are paying for this benefit and it is hardly ever invoked because you would have to give up your LTC Benefits and that almost never would make sense. And if you think you will need these funds back for some reason, then you are most likely committing too much of your portfolio today. Plus, this type of coverage would be more expensive to reacquire the same protections at older ages. Surrendering is also not recommended when there may be loans available from cash value. If you didn’t need care until your 90’s, then in hindsight the Nationwide product would be better, but you would have to carry that extra risk for more than 30 years.
If you decide to stick with Nationwide no hard feelings. It’s what you believe is best that matters and either Nationwide or MoneyGuard provide you and your family solid protection. Having helped you decide to put a protection plan in place is most important to me.
Sorry to carry on, but this is an important decision for you.
She agreed on the importance of the decision and with thoughtful consideration stuck with the recommendation for MoneyGuard.
Please do not hesitate to contact your Westland team any time. We are here to help.