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For aslong as I can remember I have been a ‘but what if’ kinda girl – I actually struggle with having that thought process as it really doesn’t help with my anxiety – it does stop me from doing a lot of things for myself but that has never EVER stopped me from doing something for someone else – family comes first.
About 5 years ago we remortgaged our house and the financial advisor we saw recommended that we should probably take out some life/critical illness insurance cover. We didn’t get anything too expensive, maybe I didn’t have half as much anxiety back then as I do now (two children later!) so we just signed up for something cover our backs should the worst happen. Zac had also just been born so where there had only been us two to take care of previously; we now had this little baby to look after too!
We had no issues with our then Vitality policy and fortunately didn’t have to claim but when we had this health and wellbeing event at work a few years back they were too promoting the the same type Pruprotect/Vitality policy only with benefits attached that I had no knowledge of; the minute I returned home I decided to actually look into in a little bit more depth at what I’m getting and whether the things they were promoting today was something that we should be getting with ours!?
We weren’t originally paying a lot and it was a policy that actually went down each year alongside our mortgage. Now I’m no financial advisor/broker and I know the man I spoke to probably just wanted a sale but he told me and I too believe it now that those aren’t really the best policies to take on. Yes they are ‘cheaper’ so if monthly payments are something you are more concerned with rather than what you are actually going to be covered for should the worst happen a few years down the line then it will probably be the type of cover for you. I ended up getting a no obligation quote, cancelling my current policy and having a solid £x-amount of life cover and critical illness instead of it decreasing through the years and although we are paying more than we were before we are certainly now getting excellent value for money!
Each policy is catered around your needs and/or requirements so I’m not going to go too much into our cover but just to give you an idea of our monthly payments that allow us to get the perks I am going to mention shortly we pay £46/month – not per person either this is for the whole family!
Now I’m pretty sure that everyone (unless your a gold digger!!!!) who takes out life insurance hopes they will never ever have to use it and I’m sure I’m not the only one who has thought that paying out £45+/month would be so much better in our pocket each month but that’s where I feel Vitality take away from you pretty sharpish those thoughts.
With Vitality we have access to so many perks that to be fair the month premium most of the time ends up nearly paying for itself! Now I do need to add that you don’t just get these things for ‘free’ – you do have to work for them. Vitality makes it cheaper and easier to get healthy through discounts and motivating rewards; for example when we took the policy out a few years ago one of the promos that the broker offered was a free Fitbit HR for both me and my husband so we have one of those each to rack up our steps in order to get some of these benefits. Such as the cinema tickets: you have to get so many points/steps in order to bag yourself the free cinema ticket/week which for some I accept might not work or be something you are interested in doing but for us it was a really massive incentive to get our finger out, rack up them steps and keep fit !!
You don’t have to get an expensive high end Fitbit though; you can link up to the free Moves app or if you already have a a Garmin, Polar or Fitbug you can use them too!
Here’s a list of the things we have access to as a part of our policy:
- Free cinema tickets
- Apple Watch for just £69 … we can fund the remainding cost with a direct debit over 24 months and given our points accrued per month we would actually be paying nothing more than the £69. The table below for more info:
- Free Starbucks drink every week
- Upto 40% Garmin and Polar devices
- 50% off monthly gym memberships at Nuffield Health and/or Virgin Gyms (my gym membership is just £21/month!) (DW Sports too but their contract with Vitality ends on 31 March 2017 so is probably not worth depending on this perk to be fair)
- Upto 50% cashback on a bike from Evans Cycles
- 50% off sports shoes at Sweatshop
- Get a Weight Watchers monthly pass for £30
- Upto 25% off healthy food at Ocado & free delivery!
- A trip to a quit smoking clinic worth £299!
- 75% off Champneys Health Spa
- 25% off Champneys spa products
- From 10%-50% quarterly cashback at a Lloyds Pharmacy
- Upto 40% off the Eurostar
- Upto 40% off British Airways European flights.
PLUS the higher your Vitality status as a result of you accruing your points at the end of a year the more you could save on your monthly premiums & potential of a higher cashback reward …. this year although our premiums stayed as they were and didn’t increase; we did infact get £150 cashback which will already pay for 3 months of this years premium if you look at it like that.
Now I will admit to it being slightly difficult to get your head around to begin with; particularly as without counting you probably have no idea how many steps you actually do in a day but as soon as you have something to work towards and get rewarded with such good perks it’s really easy to understand and is also quite motivating.
If you have any questions on how it works for us feel free to ask or give them a ring on 0345 602 6232 – happy to help if I can.
You don’t get much for free nowadays but Vitality are certainly making you feel like you are whilst also security your families future!
As I’ve already mentioned everyone’s cover is dependant on their own circumstances so I haven’t gone into the specific cover but they are certainly worth getting in contact with your requirements to see what premium you’d be looking at paying each month.
Hope this helps!
Kirsty
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