Critical Illness

Being diagnosed with a Critical Condition impacts both you and your family. Critical Illness insurance can help take away the worry of having to cover your day-to-day expenses while you undergo treatment or recover from surgery.

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What is Critical Illness insurance? 

Critical Illness insurance (also known as trauma cover) gives you a one-off payment if you suffer one of the specified Critical Conditions we cover.

There are two types of Critical Illness insurance available:

  • Critical Illness Standard: Provides benefits for the most common Critical Conditions with fewer additional options, at a lower cost
  • Critical Illness Plus: Provides benefits for an extensive range of Critical Conditions and additional options

With Critical Illness insurance you also have access to Best Doctors, a valuable free service that connects you to leading specialists who can provide a second opinion about your diagnosis and treatment plan.

Key features

Critical Illness Standard:

  • A one-off payment if you suffer a Critical Condition.
  • Cover for the most common Critical Conditions.
  • If we have paid a one-off payment of $100,000 or more, we’ll reimburse up to $5,000 for the cost of a financial plan from a qualified financial adviser.

With Critical Illness Plus you also receive:

  • Cover for an extensive range of Critical Conditions in addition to the common Critical Conditions.
  • Child Support Benefit – $10,000 benefit the first time your child has a Critical Condition or if your child dies, available with cover of $100,000 or more
  • Option to apply for additional cover when certain events occur without the need to provide further medical evidence
  • A death benefit of $5,000 should you die within 14 days of suffering a Critical Condition and don’t qualify for the full cover amount (Critical Illness stand-alone only)
Product overview

How does it work?

You can apply for Critical Illness insurance to suit your needs, up to $2 million.

We offer two different types of Critical Illness insurance, depending on your needs:

  • Critical Illness Standard – provides cover for five of the most common critical conditions, with a few additional options
  • Critical Illness Plus – provides cover for over 40 critical conditions, as well as additional optional benefits

You can choose Critical Illness insurance as a stand-alone policy or as an extension to Life Cover insurance.

Premium options 

You can choose to pay your premiums as:

  • Stepped – as you get older, your insurance premium will vary each year and your benefits will remain the same
  • Level – your insurance premium does not go up by age-related increases and your benefits will remain the same

Regardless of whether you choose stepped or level premiums, when you renew your insurance each year your premiums may vary due to rate increases, Consumer Price Index (CPI) increases, policy fee increases or if you add additional insurances to your policy.

Funding options

Critical Illness insurance is only available to purchase outside super.

Additional options

You can apply for these options at an additional cost:

  • Life Cover buy back (when Critical Illness is purchased as an extension to Life Cover): 12 months after we receive your valid Critical Illness insurance claim form, you can ask us to restore your Life Cover by the same amount as the benefit paid
  • Business safeguard option: under certain circumstances you can apply to increase your Critical Illness insurance for certain business purposes without further medical evidence 

The following are available as additional options with Critical Illness Plus only:

  • Double Critical Illness (Life Cover buy back with premium waiver): your Life Cover will be automatically restored up to the same amount as the Critical Illness insurance benefit paid if you live for 14 days after you receive your Critical Illness insurance benefit
  • Critical Illness buy back: 12 months after we've paid your Critical Illness insurance benefit, you can ask us to restore your Critical Illness insurance by the same amount as the benefit paid
  • Extra benefits option - partial benefits: you'll receive a partial benefit if you suffer one of the additional critical conditions listed in the product disclosure statement
  • Illnesses covered
    Critical Conditions  Critical Illness Standard Critical Illness Plus Qualifying Period
    Aorta Repair - excluding less invasive surgeries   check 3 months
    Aplastic Anaemia - of specified severity   check
    Bacterial Meningitis - of specified severity   check
    Benign Brain Tumour - of specified severity   check
    Blindness - of specified severity   check
    Cancer - excluding specified early stage cancer  check check 

    Standard: 6 months

    Plus: 3 months
    Cardiomyopathy - of specified severity   check
    Chronic Kidney Failure - requiring permanent dialysis or transplantation   check
    Chronic Liver Failure - of specified severity   check
    Chronic Lung Failure - of specified severity   check
    Coma - with specified criteria   check
    Coronary Artery Angioplasty*   check 3 months
    Coronary Artery Angioplasty – Triple Vessel   check
    		 3 months
    Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery - excluding less invasive procedures  check check
    		 3 months
    Deafness - permanent   check
    Dementia or Alzheimer's Disease - permanent and of specified severity   check
    Encephalitis - of specified severity   check
    Heart Attack - with evidence of severe heart muscle damage  check check 3 months
    Heart Valve Surgery - of specified severity   check 3 months
    HIV Contracted Through Medical Procedures   check
    HIV Contracted Through Your Work   check
    Intensive Care - requiring continuous mechanical ventilation for 10 days   check
    Loss of Independence - of specified severity check  check
    Loss of Speech - total and permanent   check
    Major Brain Injury - of specified severity   check
    Major Burns - of specified severity   check
    Major Organ or Bone Marrow Transplant   check
    Meningococcal Septicaemia - of specified severity   check
    Motor Neurone Disease   check
    Multiple Sclerosis - of specified severity   check
    Muscular Dystrophy - unequivocal diagnosis   check
    Open Heart Surgery   check
    Out of Hospital Cardiac Arrest   check
    Parkinson's Disease - of specified severity   check
    Paralysis   check
    Pneumonectomy - complete removal of entire lung   check
    Primary Pulmonary Hypertension - of specified severity   check
    Severe Diabetes - of specified severity   check
    Severe Osteoporosis - before age 50 and of specified severity   check
    Severe Rheumatoid Arthritis   check
    Stroke - in brain and of specified severity  check check 3 months

    *Coronary Artery Angioplasty - This benefit will only apply if your Critical Illness benefits is $100,000 or more. The benefit payable for Coronary Artery Angioplasty is 10% of your Critical Illness benefit up to $20,000 per event.

Do you need Critical Illness insurance?

You may want to consider Critical Illness insurance if you:

  • have a partner, family or dependants
  • have a mortgage or any other personal debt
  • have a business or you’re self employed
  • would need money to live if you were unable to work
  • don’t have adequate savings to cover unexpected expenses.

Download the Product Disclosure Statement

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