If your school is like the ones in our area, every year the kids come home with a brochure for Student Accident Insurance underwritten by Old Republic/Reliable Life.
And every year, that brochure is intimidating. It folds out to like 3 feet long of very fine print in all technical insurance terms. Well, I exaggerate a bit - but there is more information in that brochure than most of us are going to want to read in one sitting. It’s hard to tell what’s covered, if it’s worth paying for what’s covered, and what’s not covered.
In addition, there are 6 different levels of plans (Basic, Plan 1,2 and 3, Super Plan, and Super Plan Plus). On top of any of those you can purchase an additional permanent disability option of $100,000 for $7 per child.
Being in the insurance industry (though I don’t provide this type of insurance myself) I have read the entire brochure and looked at the prices. And while the likelihood of a claim is small, the consequences can be severe. Plus, I figure that kids are relatively prone to accidents of just about any kind we can imagine. In addition, the costs for this insurance plan are relatively low - and upgrading to the higher amounts of insurance costs only a few dollars.
My recommendation? Purchase the Super Plan Plus for all of your school aged children. For our two children this cost $53.00 per year.
I did not purchase the Additional total permanent permanent disability option for $100,000 at $7.00 per student - but I recommend that you consider it. I felt that the premium was a bit rich in comparison to the rest of the coverage, but that’s not to say that $7 a year for $100,000 of total disability coverage is overpriced by any stretch.