People buy life insurance to protect what is important to them. Whether used to fund a buy-sell agreement, as part of an estate planning strategy, or just to replace individual income in case of death, life insurance is designed to be here when you can't. But, what happens if you are unable to pay premiums as a result of a disability? The Disability Waiver of Premium (WP) may be your answer. (With regard to other riders, WP must be bought separately for individual insurance riders. For example, if someone has a whole life policy with an Increasing Premium Term Insurance (IPT) rider, that person would purchase two WP riders — one for the base whole life policy and one for the IPT rider. Also, other Covered Insureds (OCIs) are not eligible for WP. Only the base insured's disability controls. If the base insured has WP, a WP charge is assessed for the OCI, since the premium will be waived if and only if the base insured becomes disabled.)

The WP is a rider that can be attached to a life insurance policy. Like other riders, it is intended to customize the product for an individual's needs, to enhance the coverage of the policy to which it is attached. It does so by waiving the premiums on a policy when the owner has suffered from a debilitating disability that has lasted for at least six months.

Once proof of disability has been furnished, the rider is invoked immediately and retroactively. Provided the insured is older than five (and as long as the rider is in effect), all premiums due during the time the owner of the policy is disabled are waived. In fact, though the disability must continue for six months before the WP is invoked, its retroactive nature means that New York Life will refund premiums paid from the time of the onset of the disability.

• Did You Know...?
  
  • For whole life policies, if disability begins before the policy anniversary at age sixty and it does not end until after the policy anniversary at age sixty-five, then New York Life will — without asking for further proof of disability — waive all premiums until age 100.
  • For term policies issued since 1996, if disability begins before the policy anniversary at age sixty and does not end before the policy anniversary at age sixty-five, then New York Life will waive premiums on the policy until age eighty. At that point, New York Life will furnish the Insured with a whole life policy of an equal face amount to the existing Term policy with no further premiums due.

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