Protection
If something happened to you tomorrow, what would the financial consequences be? Not the emotional ones. The practical, numerical, immediate ones. Could your family maintain their home, their lifestyle, their children's education? Could your business survive losing you for six months, or permanently? Could your business partner's family be bought out without crippling the company?
Most people have some protection in place. A life insurance policy taken out when they bought the house. Maybe something through work. But circumstances change. Families grow, incomes increase, businesses become more valuable, and the cover that was right five years ago may bear no resemblance to what is needed now. The gap between what you have and what you need tends to widen silently, and you only discover it at the worst possible moment.
We review protection properly. Not a tick-box exercise, but a genuine look at what would happen financially if you died, became seriously ill, or could not work. Then we make sure the right cover is in place, structured efficiently, and reviewed as your life evolves. The peace of mind that comes from knowing your family and your business are genuinely protected is something you feel every day, even if you never need to make a claim.
Personal Protection
As your wealth grows, so does what is at stake if something goes wrong. A mortgage, school fees, a lifestyle your family has built around your income, assets that may attract inheritance tax if the proceeds are not structured properly. The protection you need today is unlikely to be what you arranged five or ten years ago.
Life Insurance
Your family's financial security should not depend on when you die. But without the right cover, it does. If your mortgage would not be cleared, if your family's income would drop, if your children's education would be at risk, then the cover you have is not doing its job. For those with larger estates, how the policy is structured matters as much as the amount. A policy not written in trust can end up forming part of your estate, meaning your family pays inheritance tax on the very money intended to protect them. We make sure your cover reflects what your family actually needs and is held in the right structure so the full amount reaches them.
Critical Illness Cover
You are statistically more likely to be diagnosed with a serious illness during your working life than to die during it. A cancer diagnosis, a heart attack, a stroke. Critical illness cover pays a tax-free lump sum when it happens. That money can clear a mortgage, replace lost income, fund private treatment, or simply give you and your family breathing room at the worst possible time. Not all policies are equal. What one insurer covers, another may not, and the definitions vary in ways that matter when you need to claim. We make sure you have the right policy, not just the cheapest.
Income Protection
If you could not work for six months, what would happen to your income? Most people have never properly worked out the answer. Statutory sick pay barely covers the basics. Employer sick pay, if you have it, runs out. And the mortgage, the school fees, the standing orders, none of them stop.
Income protection replaces your income if you cannot work due to illness or injury. It pays out until you recover, retire, or the policy ends. For higher earners and company directors, executive income protection provides the same cover with higher benefit limits and the ability to structure premiums through the business. It is the most underused form of protection and, for anyone whose family depends on their earnings, arguably the most important.
Business Protection
Your personal protection covers your family. Business protection covers your company, your partners, and the people who depend on your business for their livelihood. If you own or run a business, these are separate risks that need separate solutions.
Key Person Insurance
Every business has people it cannot afford to lose. The founder, the top salesperson, the person who holds the key client relationships. Key person insurance pays a lump sum to the business if that person dies or suffers a critical illness. It provides the cash to recruit a replacement, cover lost revenue, repay loans, or simply buy time to stabilise. Without it, losing a key individual can turn a personal tragedy into a business crisis.
Shareholder Protection
If a business partner dies, their shares pass to their estate. Without a plan, that can mean a spouse, a child, or an executor becoming a shareholder in your company with voting rights, dividend entitlements, and no interest in the business. A shareholder protection arrangement, funded by life insurance and supported by a cross-option agreement, gives the surviving owners the funds to buy back the shares at a fair value. The deceased's family gets cash instead of a stake in a business they do not want to run. The business continues without disruption. Without it, you are leaving both outcomes to chance.
Relevant Life Insurance
If you are a company director paying for personal life insurance out of taxed income, you are almost certainly overpaying. A relevant life policy does the same job but the company pays the premiums as a business expense, you pay no personal tax on them, and the proceeds go to your family outside your estate so no inheritance tax applies. It is one of the simplest and most effective tax efficiencies available to owner-managed businesses, and one of the most commonly missed.
When Did You Last Review Your Protection?
This is the question most people avoid. Protection tends to be something you arrange once and then forget about. But in the time since you last looked at it, you may have changed jobs, had children, increased your mortgage, grown your business, or accumulated wealth that changes the picture entirely.
We regularly find clients whose cover has not kept pace with their lives. Policies that were right at the time but are now inadequate. Cover written in the wrong structure, meaning the proceeds would be taxed when they do not need to be. Gaps that nobody noticed because nobody looked.
A protection review does not take long, costs nothing, and can reveal things that are worth addressing while you still can. We would rather tell you everything is fine than have you discover it is not when it matters most.
What our clients say
"BSG have always given us first class support and service, rightly tailoring our investment products around our short, medium and long-term needs, whilst also dealing promptly with any queries we may have or changes we may want. We would recommend them highly as an Financial Adviser."
Robert
How BSG Helps with Protection
Protection is the part of financial planning that people put off the longest. It means confronting uncomfortable questions about what could go wrong, and it is easy to tell yourself it will not happen to you. By the time something does happen, it is too late to arrange.
We take the thinking out of it. We look at your income, your family, your business, your assets, and we work out exactly what the financial impact would be if you died, became seriously ill, or could not work. Then we find the right cover, make sure it is structured so the money goes where it needs to without unnecessary tax, and build it into your wider financial plan so nothing sits in isolation. We review it as your life changes because what was right three years ago may not be right now.
The result is that you stop carrying the low-level worry of whether everything would be all right. You know it would be. Your family is protected, your business is protected, and you did not have to become an expert in insurance to make it happen.. If you are not sure whether your protection is still fit for purpose, or if you have never had it properly reviewed, we are happy to take a look. There is no obligation and no cost for an initial discussion.
FAQs
Q: How much life insurance do I need?
A: It depends on your circumstances. As a starting point, consider what your family would need to clear the mortgage, maintain their standard of living, fund children's education, and cover any other financial commitments. For business owners, there may be additional considerations around loan guarantees, shareholder agreements, and key person dependencies. We assess your specific situation and recommend a level of cover that reflects your actual needs rather than a generic multiple of your salary.
Q: What is the difference between life insurance and critical illness cover?
A: Life insurance pays out when you die. Critical illness cover pays out when you are diagnosed with a specified serious condition such as cancer, a heart attack, or a stroke. You can have both, and many people should. Statistically, you are more likely to be diagnosed with a critical illness during your working life than to die, which is why critical illness cover is often just as important as life cover.
Q: What is income protection and do I need it?
A: Income protection pays a regular income if you cannot work due to illness or injury. It is arguably the most important form of protection because it replaces the thing that pays for everything else. If you rely on your income to cover your mortgage, your family's living costs, and your financial commitments, income protection ensures those obligations can still be met if you are unable to work.
Q: What is key person insurance?
A: Key person insurance is a policy taken out by a business on the life of a person who is critical to its success. If that person dies or suffers a serious illness, the policy pays a lump sum to the business. This can cover lost profits, recruitment costs, loan repayments, or other financial consequences of losing a key individual. It is particularly important for businesses that depend heavily on one or two people.
Q: What is a relevant life policy?
A: A relevant life policy provides death-in-service style benefits for company directors and employees. The company pays the premiums as a deductible business expense, the employee pays no benefit-in-kind tax, and the proceeds are paid to the family outside the estate so no inheritance tax is due. For directors of owner-managed businesses, it is often the most tax-efficient way to provide life cover.
Q: How often should I review my protection?
A: At least every two to three years, or whenever your circumstances change significantly. A new home, a new child, a change in income, a growing business, or a change in your health can all affect what cover you need. Most people set up protection and forget about it. A regular review ensures your cover still matches your life.