Shareholder protection insurance solutions today: Relevant Life Policy: A highly tax efficient way of offering life cover for company directors. Can now also cover illnesses with the optional employee significant illness cover. Written in trust to ensure tax free payouts. Key Person Income Protection Insurance: Long term illness of a key person can affect both the income of a business and also in many cases the employee also needs paying. Key person income protection can cover the business for loss of income whilst the employee is not working. Read extra info on Business Protection Insurance.
Who can have Key Person Insurance: Any business looking to protect their business from, life cover, terminal illness, critical illness cover (covering illnesses such as heart attack, stroke, cancer). As will as the typical limited company businesses key person cover can benefit sole traders and partnerships. As mentioned above it is important to get the right level of cover, set up in the most tax efficient manner to give peace of mind, protect the business profits and reduce business risk from the loss of a valuable employee. It gives a much needed cash injection to give cash flow by means of a lump sum payment.
The business itself can act as the proposer of this kind of policy if it’s set up in a Ltd format, or each individual owner can take individual policies if within partnerships and sole traders setups. It’s important for businesses to take this kind of measures into consideration when taking out large loans as it helps protect not only the people involved but also their investments should something go wrong throughout repayment period. Making sure everyone involved understands their responsibilities and is aware that there are ways to protect their finances should adverse circumstances arise will help provide peace-of-mind during stressful times.
Premium Equalisation: Shareholder Protection Premium Equalisation is an essential aspect of business trust policies. When a group of shareholders decides to take out an own life policy individually, they may need to equalize the premiums paid. This is done to prevent HMRC from considering unequal premiums as a “gift” or “wealth transfer” from those who are paying more to those who are paying less. If HMRC views this as a gift, there could be inheritance tax implications if there is ever a claim.
Shareholder Benefits: Above we looked at how the insured persons spouse or family would benefit but how about the remaining shareholders of the limited company? If we look at the above we mentioned that the insured person’s spouse now owning 33% of the shares that they cannot sell they might instead want to get involved in the business. For the remaining shareholders this can cause a problem as they might not get along with the spouse, the spouse might not have the experience, knowledge and might not be a good fit for the business. This situation can be a threat to the business success.
Insurance provides peace of mind to businesses that their investment will remain secure even if something unforeseen were to occur in regards to any important employees involved in the company’s operations. So should these employees become scarce due to critical illness or death, such policies can provide much-needed financial aid by paying an outstanding loan amount in full – something that would otherwise not be possible. As such, taking out an insurance policy when any major loans have been secured can act as both a form of protection for companies and for the individuals associated with them too.
Having key people in an organization can be beneficial in many ways. They offer valuable insight into operational decisions and can often times help problem solve difficult situations. Additionally, they can provide strategic guidance when it comes to reaching desired goals and objectives set out by the company. Key personnel are often seen as mentors across an organization that not only lead but inspire those around them. As such it’s important to identify and retain key personnel, otherwise costly mistakes may be made in the future if their absence is not adequately accounted for. Find even more information at Key Person Income Protection Insurance.