I think many has confused about the topics.

The topic is about annoying insurance agent.

But many people here derailed it to the importance of insurance, and say it as though insurance company ONLY sell simple insurance.

Which is absolutely not true in Malaysia if you ask me.

First of all ... there is almost NO insurance company that sell only INSURANCE. Most of them is investment related. And agents get bigger commission if they push the investment related product ... but there's a catch here ... many financial planner actually go calculate if I put money in insurance that related with investment, and compare if I separate them ... the situation is actually it is better to separate them. So most authenticate financial planner actually will advise people not to buy those products.

The second thing is ... many people actually bought the wrong insurance or unnecessary insurance. Because the thing is ... insurance agents DID NOT study and recommend what type of insurance suitable for each people needs. So you will see some people end up have 5 life insurances, half of them is saving or investment related with ROI worse than fixed deposit. Or buy 3 medical insurance ... but when get serious illness ... none of them can cover. The insurance agents will only sell what the company want them to sell.

The headache part is ... with so many insurance agents around ... it is still required FULLY the consumers to self calculate, plan, and read what insurance is suitable for them ... the INSURANCE AGENTS actually didn't help most of the time ... their function is actually no difference from sales.

The purpose of insurance is actually cover your risk. What is the risk that worry you right now? If you are single, then life insurance is not that suitable for you. If you are the bread winner of the family, then life insurance is very important. But how many insurance agents will actually tell you this?

The main reason why insurance agents doesn't work well in Malaysia is because Malaysian are seeking someone who can give insurance advise and get the most suitable insurance plan that suitable for their financial situation. Which is a total disappointment for most Malaysians here.

This post has been edited by ReWeR: Sep 15 2013, 04:12 AM

The market NEED insurance advise, we don't need someone who keep pushing us to buy insurance.

Don't let people brain wash you, insurance is just a small part of financial planning, most financial planner only advise the max you can put 10% of your income in insurance depends on your risk.

The importance of insurance also very well depends on a country's health care system, basically countries like Malaysia and Australia can required less a bit on health insurance because the social health care system is quite affordable for their citizens.

If you are very good in earning money, sometimes you don't even NEED a single insurance at all ... because basically you're risk free. Think about it, if you die, you'll left a lot money to your parents and spouse, if you crippled, you have a lot of money for the rest of your life, if you get cancer/serious illness, you can pay it with no problem.

So insurance basically is risk assessment and prevention part of the financial planning. It is actually not wise if your money goes too much on risk prevention, and also not that wise if you go buy insurance when you're risk free.

A lot of time when insurance agents call me and explain the plan to me, I analyze back to them and tell them this plan is actually totally worthless and doesn't help the consumers at all. Example if you pay rm50 a month, then when you hospitalize you can get rm100 a day. But the problem is, if you are hospitalize, do you think rm100 will gonna help you? If it is a small injury, this insurance give you rm100 and you won't feel anything, if you are serious injured, rm100 will not cover much of your bills. At the end, this SUPER PREMIUM insurance plan just doesn't help me to mitigate my risk of staying hospital and get charged with expensive bills.

You can never give a proper financial planning advise if you are force to sell products for your company.

So an authenticate financial planner MUST be independence from any investment company, else it is just a sales agent and not financial planner.

So basically insurance agents who called themselves 'financial planner' are totally worthless.

If you are an agent from insurance company A, will you go advise people go buy company B products or invest in share or forex as investment?

Well ... unless you're freelance and you can give an clear guideline how to invest, save and plan the finance and get commission from your clients directly.

The thing is ... the agent ask me to pay rm50 a month, which is rm600 a year for that kind of insurance. I ask back do you aware this fee is very high compare to normal hospitalisation income, and is totally useless for normal people.

If I (assume many people like me) get hospitalize, I'll rather insurance pay me one sum amount of money, let's say 20k for some situation written in the insurance contract. If my medical fee less than 10k, I'll see that most people can actually handle it, they can use credit card, installation plan with hospital, borrow from friends and relatives, use saving money ... etc. So it is really not an issue for most people. We just want an insurance plan that will cover VERY EXPENSIVE medical fees.

If you'll be in deep trouble if not able to work for a few days, then I guess your income probably wasn't that good, and paying extra rm600 in insurance actually won't help you much either. Seriously people think rm100 a day can help how much?

Why is the insurance company design such a worthless plan in the first place and push the public to buy it? I can't deny I start to doubt the creditable of financial institutes such as bank and insurance company after seeing these kind of techniques to sell rubbish.

This line "香港巨富李嘉诚说： "别人都说我很富有，拥有很多财富。其实真正属于我个人的财富是给自己和亲人买了足够的保险"" is from some online shared articles which I personally don't really acknowledge it's accuracy.

The article stated why rich people buy insurances:

1. To avoid tax.

2. To show to business partner that they are capable to pay high sum of insurance premium, thus he/she is a trust-able man. (in layman term, "show off")


Which basically make poorfag like me roll my eyes ... , I think the rich people can do whatever they like and I doubt they will say such a stupid thing on some articles with no reference or source. I'm just some poor man looking for a practical insurance plan.

If today I'm too free and go in the insurance company and ask for it then it is totally my business.

But instead I get called by insurance agent told me a very critical plan and turn out to be such a stupid waste my time and money plan then it is totally different thing.

It is the way they sell it that bothers me.

BTW, thanks for the explanation. I do have a medical card.

The very good offer of rm600 per year allow you get rm100 per day as hospitalisation income plan.

I'm just giving out an example that I encounter with insurance agent that try to sell unnecessary plan to people.

Which I'm sure many forumers here encounter the same situation before.