Save more taxes – Invest in IFCI Infrastructure Bonds!

I love to save Taxes and so do most people. And if you remember Finance Minister’s announcement in recent budget gave an opportunity to save taxes on additional Rs 20,000 by investing in Infrastructure bonds. In keeping with this IFCI has launched the first infrastructure bond recently. The subscription is open till 31st August 2010 and the interest rates are 7.85% to 7.95%, 

But the question is should you invest in them?

I know for some this doesn’t matter as most people just invest hearing that you can save tax and this clearly shows in the number of junk life insurance policies sold every year just to save tax. But for all those savvy investors who plan their taxes and investments lets see how much returns you would get!

How much time it takes to settle life insurance claim?

In the last post I wrote about the Claim Settlement rate for Indian life insurance companies.  This time I wanted to check how much time Life Insurance companies take to settle a claim! 

Claim settlement time also becomes an important factor in choosing any life insurance as you don’t want your survivors to wait indefinitely or run pillar to post to claim the insurance money, but obviously I would place time taken to settlement of claim second to actual claim settlement ratio.

Best Life Insurance provider in India – based on Claim Settlement Ratio

Deciding which company to choose for Life Insurance has always been tough and with so many new entrants customers are spoiled for choice. It’s always a dilemma which factors to look at while choosing your life insurance provider – cost, convenience, past performance, claim settlement rate, etc. 

I think the most important factor should be tension free claim settlement for your loved ones once you are not there. And in that case the recent Annual Report (2008-09) from IRDA shows LIC (Life Insurance Corporation) tops the chart. It has claim settlement rate of 95%, which is 5% higher than its nearest competitor Max New York Life with 90% settlement rate.  But if you have a look at the premium rates for term plans here LIC generally has the highest rate. 

So in all you can think of LIC as a costly but still the one with most hassle free settlement for your insurance.