Buying insurance ONLINE? A must-read 7-point CHECKLIST

Do you think that buying term insurance online is a headache one must avoid? This 7-point checklist will help ease your anxiety.

With more and more people becoming tech-savvy, it is imperative that you would prefer buying financial products online. With an ease of getting yourself insured with the click of a mouse, you would always prefer to get that insurance policy within the confines the four walls of your house.

But it is important for you to understand the delicacies of such online contracts. You should be well aware of the procedure laid out by insurance companies for filing the online application and undertaking the entire procedure online so that you do not make a mistake. Such mistakes may not be informed to you immediately but would cost your dependents the claim amount.

Here's a 7-point checklist you ,ust ideally follow for a seamless online buying process.

1. Compare the premiums first. Go to websites of insurers of your choice and find out the premiums for your age, the term and the sum assured you desire. Alternatively, you can also visit online comparison portals and feed your data. The portal will throw results for the best matches based on the data you feed.

2. Find out the company you are interested in. Once you have shortlisted the insurer on basis of your affordability, compare their features and choose the plan with the widest cover based on minimum number of exclusion. You can get the bare minimum features from the comparison portals and then can visit the brochures of the ones which are more likely of your choice.

3. Once you shortlist the plan of your choice, register yourself online as a new user. Login and fill the online application very carefully. The application form will require you to fill your insurance history, your lifestyle, your personal and family history and your medical history. These questions are asked in order to seamlessly process your application and are asked for recording purposes. It is important that you provide complete information.

This is in your own interest as any suppression, withholding or misrepresentation of information may lead to non-issuance of policy or rejection of your claim. To keep your dependents away from any worries that may arise later down the road, it is advised that you should disclose your habits and lifestyle correctly.

In case of your adverse lifestyle and habits, you may be asked to pay extra premiums for the 'extra' risk that the insurer takes.

4. After you have filled all your details in the application form, you will be asked to make payment for the required premium. Check for the security of the platforms before making the payment. The address bar starts with 'https' for secured payment platforms instead of normal 'http'.

Another indication of secured platforms is that you will see a yellow coloured lock on the right bottom of the page. This shows secured access. Once you have made the payment, an acknowledgement receipt will be generated. The soft copy of the policy will also be generated for your reference.

Make sure to save it for yourself on your desktop and also take a printout of it for your reference in case of procedural anomalies.

5. Once your payment receipt is generated, you will be asked to book a slot for yourself for your medical examination, if required. You will be given an option to choose the time slot most convenient to you. Make sure to choose the early morning slot since you have to be on a 12 hour fasting before giving the blood and urine samples. Once you register a slot, you will get a confirmation call from the insurer of the designated diagnosis center.

The samples will be picked up from your home. In case you require to give a treadmill examination as well, which is required if you belong to the not-so-young category, you will be asked to visit the designated diagnostics laboratory closest to you residence.

6. After you are done with your health check-up, the next thing you would have to do is to scan all your supporting documents and upload them or mail them to the insurer at the e-mail ID provided by them at the time of your completion of payment. Make sure to save the page where the depiction of uploaded documents has been done.

Some insurers also provide you the flexibility of asking a sales agent to pick the documents from your home. You will have to ask the insurer whether the facility is available or not.

7. You will get the hard copy of your policy called the 'policy pack' within 10 to 15 days of completing the online formalities. Your free-look period starts from the day you get the hard copy. Free-look period is a 15-day period which is granted to you by the insurer and you are free to return your policy in case you find out that it does not suit you.

You will be returned the premium -- the only deduction that is made would be for health check-up, stamp duty and the cost of risk taken for the interim period starting from the time your policy is accepted up to when your application of return is accepted.

Process snapshot

The procedure for buying an insurance policy online is often termed as 'tricky' since you have to undertake the entire process yourself and there would be none other than the customer care executives to guide you, who in most instances are not very well aware of the process themselves. Thus, the responsibility of correct disclosure of all material information in the desired format lies completely on your shoulders. Take due care to save pages, acknowledgements, transaction IDs and other important numbers and text that throw up during the process of transaction.