There are so many avenues to research this on. I simply googled term insurance plans, which of course led to a barrage of different advertisements, but after scrolling through them, I went to Policy Bazaar (no this isn’t a paid ad here, I actually went to policy bazaar).

There are many things to consider here, lets go through them one by one:

1. How much cover do I choose?
   • The usual rule is that it should be around 15 to 20 times your annual salary.
   • It should cover any debt you have. This is so that your spouse/family isn’t burdened with your debt. I know it’s really grim, but think about this when you’re planning. Especially if your spouse isn’t working or is incapacitated or disabled in some way, you don’t want to add to their troubles.
   • Ensure that if you have plans for your children (future children), they are also considered in your term insurance plan.
2. Claim Settlement
   • Go for an insurance cover that has more than around 97% claim settlement
   • What does that mean – buy insurance that has a high rate of settling insurance claims, meaning big brands that you can immediately recognize.
3. Premium returned or no?
   • You need to decide if you want any sort of return on this “Investment”. My advice is to not treat this like an investment at all. The only return here is a safety net.
   • So some term insurance plans offer a premium returned, which is just the prinicipal amount that you have put in and is returned to you at the time of maturity.
   • Plans with ‘Premium returned’ are more expensive than the term insurance plans that don’t have any such guarantee.
4. Up till when do you want the insurance to cover you?
   • Very important. Some insurance plans only provide cover till a certain age (usually 65).
   • I would suggest to go for plans that last a little longer, with the advancement in medicine, our generation is going to last a lot longer than the previous generation.
   • A longer cover will cost you more, and it will be a different plan all together sometimes, so think about this before you jump in.
   • You could go for a cover till you’re 65 for now and then get another term insurance plan down the road which will cover you for longer. People have multiple term insurance plans against their name, so you could think about doing the same. At the end of the day, its important to get a term insurance plan as soon as possible (and as young as possible) because the monthly premium will be lower and you’re at least covered till you’re 60-65.
5. What type of payment plan should I go with?
   • So there are again many ways to pay your premiums.
   • One could be a monthly premium, then there’s quarterly, yearly and full amount at one go.
   • I suggest to go with the monthly/quarterly plan. Think about this, the money you pay today is worth more than the money you pay tomorrow. Thanks to inflation. So if you’re paying the same amount for months to come, it’s effectively costing you less and less as time passes by. Instead of locking in the FULL amount at once, which costs you more, you could split it out to a monthly/quarterly payment which saves you money.
6. Nominees
   • The most important part of your term insurance plan. All this is for them.
   • Most term insurance plans allow you to modify/add nominees even after you have bought the plan.Say you’re not married, the nominees are probably your parents/siblings.Don’t forget to update the nominees after you’re married or have children. This is vital.
     
     As a GENERAL RULE – Remember to update Nominees on all your assets/ investments/ insurance plans etc. It’s a huge headache and cause for stress and anxiety if this isn’t done and you’re not around.
7. Am I too old?
   • Hmmm. This is the one area where I think yes, its possible.
   • Sometimes if you’re over a certain age (50 or above), it might be prudent to invest that money instead of seeking a term insurance cover.
   • The premium will be high and the cover might not be much. You’ll have to do your research and decide if it is worth it.
8. Am I too young?
   • Nope. Get on it. Younger the better.
   • Also great if you’ve just started earning, that way the you get a good cover.