It can be a thoroughly baffling business conducting your own motor insurance search for the best buy. Although it is a very competitive market, and this means that there is a clamour of providers all claiming to offer the best deals in motor insurance, the sheer number of insurers and the proliferation of different insurance packages makes choosing a potentially hit-and-miss affair. This is when an experienced, professional insurance broker can come to the rescue and help you make an informed and reasoned choice - ensuring you get not only the insurance cover you need, but also the best value for money into the bargain.

The first thing an insurance broker will need to establish is the best type of car insurance that best suits your needs. If the vehicle is old, worth very little and you simply cannot afford any better insurance, then the discussion with the broker can be kept very short as you opt for the cheapest possible, most basic, third party cover. This will ensure that you meet the minimum legal requirement for insurance - your liabilities for any injuries you cause others (including passengers in your own car) and damage to third party property will be adequately covered.

The search can be similarly short and straight forward if you need the slightly wider protection offered by cover against the risks of third party, fire and theft claims - which means that you would at least be compensated up to the value of your vehicle if it is lost or damaged through fire or theft.

The insurance broker will truly come into his own, however, if your search is for fully comprehensive motor insurance. Since there are more than a hundred companies offering comprehensive motor insurance, each with a number of different packages and each package offering various optional extras. A successful search, in this case, relies on your deciding just what elements you are likely to need.

The principal feature of comprehensive insurance, of course, is that it offers protection for a considerably wide range of risks, even when the loss or damage has been caused by the policy holder's own fault. Therefore, this will cover accidental damage to your own car, including the loss of or damage to any personal possessions left in the vehicle; personal accident benefit for serious injuries you might sustain in an accident; and cover for any medical expenses you incur.

Although these are the core benefits generally included in all forms of comprehensive cover, it is important to remember that insurers differ with respect to the maximum levels of benefit payable and to the additional features available under the policy. Some of these might be optional extras, for which an additional premium will be payable, and could include: no claims discount protection; the provision of a courtesy car if your own needs to be taken to a garage for repairs or following a theft; breakdown or roadside assistance; legal expenses cover or even an extension of the insurance cover while driving abroad.

With a selection from so many variables, therefore, a motor insurance search for the comprehensive cover that suits you, your car and your particular needs could well benefit from the advice of an experienced insurance broker.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=David_H_Thomson

There's a dark side to worldwide travel insurance - the fraud. The trouble is, it's notoriously hard to disprove fraudulent claims - especially in the travel sector and hundreds of people get away with it every year. Indeed, it's estimated to cost companies millions of pounds every year, and the extent of the problem is evidenced by this fact: there have been more worldwide travel insurance claims for Rolex watches, than have ever been manufactured. It's amusing on one level, but financially crippling on another - and damaging for all the honest types, who suffer higher premiums as a result.

Of course, there are far more risky instances of insurance fraud that have been taken - and often they've gone wrong in spectacular fashion. Here are 5 of the most memorable...

5. Mr Derek Nicholson

Derek Nicholson and his partner Jottie Nagle were accused of faking a drowning for a $1,000,000 insurance scam. Having taken out the life insurance policy just four days before the incident, it instantly seemed suspicious. After Nagle was told that she could not claim the life insurance policy for 12 years without a body, Mr Nicholson placed a call to the police claiming to have seen one matching his description, but this all unravelled when he was later found alive and well in New York. Despite pleading "not guilty" and claiming past confessions were not valid, they were convicted in 2004, and face a maximum 5 years imprisonment on the conspiracy charge and a maximum 6 years on the false distress charge.

4. Gaylan Sweet

This insurance scam is different from the others, as it actually is an inside job! Gaylan Sweet was a claims adjuster for Allstate insurance who concocted a scheme to share to defraud his company and pocket the money. Over 10 years, he pulled the same insurance scam twice, roping in two people to pose as parents of an imaginary child killed by an equally imaginary drunk driver and pocketing over $700,000 in the process. The case was a mixture of real and imaginary people: real deputy sheriffs' names were on police forms (though had never actually been involved in the case), real doctors had treated the fake children and there were various invented witnesses confirming the 'facts'. Sweet and his accomplices were eventually arrested in 2002 and jailed for five years for insurance fraud.

3. Mr John Magno

John Magno is currently awaiting trial for arson in relation to insurance fraud. In 2001, there was the biggest fire in Toronto's history at Woodbine Building Supply - due to its almost residential location, more than 50 families were forced to evacuate their homes on Christmas morning. Of the two individuals assumed to have committed the arson - Tony Jarcevic and Sam Paskalis - the former died and the latter was severely burned and left in a coma. Paskalis later admitted his involvement in the alleged scheme. Magno himself had increased his insurance two months before the incident and tried to cash in the $3,500,000 insurance policy shortly after the "accident".

2. Mr John Darwin

The most recent case in this list took the British media by storm when the full details were revealed. John Darwin went missing, assumed dead, after going canoeing in 2000. After a search turned up nothing, his wife claimed the insurance. Everything was quiet until December last year when the 'dead man' turned up in a London police station claiming memory loss and the belief that he was a missing person. This unravelled when a photo of the couple grinning together in Panama was revealed in the papers. Suffice it to say, the court found the couple to have lied to their children, their neighbours and police in aid of an insurance scam, and were both jailed for over six years for their scheme as their trial concluded last month.

1. Mr John Stonehouse, MP

But the most memorable instance of insurance fraud has to be the former Labour MP John Stonehouse. On November 20th 1974, he faked his suicide. Leaving behind only a pile of clothes on Miami beach, he was presumed dead - but actually heading to Australia to start a new life with his secretary Sheila Buckley. In an unlikely turn, he was found a month later by police who mistook him for the still illusive Lord Lucan! While awaiting trial in Brixton prison, he still remained a Labour MP, eventually resigning 3 weeks before his trial. This left the Labour party in a bind, as they were suddenly a minority government. They ended up forming a Liberal-Labour pact to stay in power until Thatcher's election victory 3 years later.

As for Stonehouse, he was tried on 18 charges of theft, forgery and conspiracy to commit insurance fraud. He was sentenced to 7 years in prison, serving 3 of them before being released early due to his poor health.

Quite a lot of "Johns" in the list - perhaps that's a clue for us, when looking at fraudulent worldwide travel insurance claims!

Of course, not everyone fakes their own death as part of an insurance scam - in 2007, Bosnian Amir Vehabovic staged his death to find out who his true friends were! After bribing undertakers to bury an empty coffin, he hid in the cemetery bushes to see how many of the 45 people invited appeared to show their respects. When only his mother showed up, Vehabovic was left sending angry letters to the missing parties!

As worldwide travel insurance scams are harder to prove, it's no surprise there have been fewer high profile cases. It's easier to explain the sudden appearance of a 'stolen ipod' than a man who died 5 years previously!



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Patrick_Chong

Imagine for a moment that you go into work and they tell you that at the end of the month you are becoming a victim of unemployment. Just four weeks and then you will not have an income. Your world of course would be turned upside down. How would you continue to pay your mortgage, your loan repayments and of course all the bills that come into the home that keep you living comfortably? Not a nice thought is it? This is why you need to give some thought to taking out unemployment income protection insurance to be prepared for such an eventuality.

With an unemployment income protection insurance policy behind you at least when it came to financial matters such as your mortgage and other payments there would not be a problem. Of course you would have to deal with many other issues such as getting over the shock and the huge change. You would also have to get back to job hunting and it could take many months to find suitable work depending on the type of work, your skills and age. However the policy would cover you for the period of time that it was set out which is usually between 12 monthly payments and 24 monthly payments. You would have to stand to a certain amount of time before the cover would begin to provide your income. Providers could ask between 30 and 90 days before you would be able to put in a claim and some offer to back pay to the first day you become unemployed.

Being able to pay your mortgage is essential. In the worst case scenario if you could not make an agreement with the lender to pay off any arrears and continue meeting the standard payment at the same time you could find them taking you to court. If the judge rules in favour of the judge and without an income coming in, this is more than likely, you would lose your home. You would then have so much time to pack up and move up, this would be set as the eviction date. At the very least you could struggle a great deal each month to keep up the payment and have to make many changes to your lifestyle to keep your head above the water.

Unemployment income protection insurance when taken out with an independent payment protection specialist is based on a monthly premium. This premium is decided by how old you are when you apply for the cover and the amount you want to protect of your income. All payment protection specialists will set a limit on the amount that you are able to cover each month and this is the sum paid back to you. If you take out a policy that is based on age this means that you can get cover far cheaper than someone older. However buying a policy with a standalone provider is always the cheapest way to take out protection, high street lenders often sell payment protection with high premiums.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Simon_Lance_Burgess

If you were to lose your income after becoming unemployed and had taken out unemployment protection you would be glad you had paid the small premium each month. You will get cover for a small premium each month if you choose to take it with an independent payment protection provider. However if you choose to take it out with the lender when borrowing then it is a different story and you will pay high premiums because lenders charge high premiums. This is to make £4 billion in profits each month and makes up for the low rates of interest they offer on special deal loans.

When taking out unemployment protection you have to first decide which policy you need for your needs. You are able to choose from income, loan and mortgage payment protection. Which policy you would be better off taking would reflect on what you have to payout each month.

Loan cover taken out as unemployment protection would provide you with the sum you insured against when taking out the policy. This would allow you to continue meeting any loan or credit card outgoings that you have to make each month. You would not have to worry about falling behind into arrears and the lender taking you to court to seek to get payment. The judge could order that bailiffs come to your home and this means they would take your possessions to sell. If you have taken out a secured loan then you could find the lender choosing to seek repossession of your property.

Mortgage arrears would also mean that the lender would take you to court if you cannot afford to catch up on your arrears. Of course at the same time you would also have to carry on meeting the normal payment of your mortgage each month. However if you do not have an income you would not be able to afford the mortgage payments and the lender would have no choice but to take you to court and repossess your home.

If you want to cover loan and mortgage payments together along with any other outgoings you have to make each month then income payment protection would be a more suitable protection policy. You would be able to insure up to a certain amount of your own income each month and then receive this sum back as a tax-free sum. You would be able to keep up with heating, lighting and such as food bills each month with no worries.

Unemployment protection might be an additional sum that you have to pay out each month but it is well worth the money when you face the possibilities that could happen if you do not have the money to pay your outgoings. With a standalone provider you would be charged a premium based on your age and how much you wanted to protect. With an age based policy even younger first time homebuyers with tight budgets can now afford to protect the roof over their head.



Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Simon_Lance_Burgess