Around half (43 per cent) of Britons do not buy life insurance because they do not see the need for it, according to research conducted by Swiss Re.
The study also revealed that 40 per cent of over 1,000 consumers questioned, believe the same of income protection (IP). The findings indicate an increasing "perception gap" between people's idea of their financial security and their actual circumstances, say authors of The Insurance Report, 'The Cost of Doing Nothing'.
Ian Etheridge, Swiss Re's head of account management UK and Ireland, said: "A growing number of people believe they are financially self-reliant, and yet clearly they are not. We call this the 'perception gap' and yet we as an industry are not doing enough to correct these false perceptions, nor are we adequately explaining what we can do to help."
He added that to narrow this gap, the industry must engage better with consumers by getting rid of the complex terminology surrounding products and services.




