Ag, you know, at the end of the day all direct-linked brokers will tell you that their product is the best, beats everyone else hands down and will always be the cheapest / most comprehensive etc etc. The simple truth is that it depends. It depends on a lot of things. Which disability benefits are being used, which severe illness & income replacement products are being quoted and so on. The "integration trap" isn't nearly as bad as some non-discovery agents (like Liberty tied agents, momentum tied agents and other guys who are only licensed to advise on one particular brand) would have you believe, and the only time you'd be "trapped" in a policy is if you picked up some health problems along the way and couldn't apply for cover elsewhere. That's the same no matter where you go. I've got clients who have been on Blue status since the beginning of the policy (despite my best attempts to have them get to even silver) and they're still miles below the cost of what a comparative policy would be anywhere else. I've also got clients on the opposite side of the spectrum, for whom even being on Diamond status with zero health claims they were able to get a more cost-effective solution elsewhere, but those are rarer and it's very much a case of "it depends" Discovery's Severe Illness benefit IS one of if not the best on the market, as are PPS's Sickness & Permanent Incapacity benefits. Discovery's investment options, though.... no. Sometimes, there comes a client who fits the bill perfectly, but a very narrow set of criteria need to be fulfilled in order to get there, and in those cases they're excellent. But those are few and far between. Every life assurance company will deliver on what they promise. But sometimes there's a niggle in the client history (a diabetic not disclosing that, or someone not saying they had a malignant melanoma removed 3 years ago etc etc) and they need to do extra investigations into the client's history in order to see if the cover would have been granted had that info been disclosed upfront. Insofar as paying claims, though, I know that they all have to pay legit claims. That one recent Momentum case was an interesting one, but I think that the majority of horror stories against other providers has been created off rumour spread and intensified by tied agents of competitor companies, and people simply not knowing what they're covered for. Every person is different. You may not fit the Discovery brand, but it may be the best / most cost-effective solution once the analysis has been performed. The same goes for all teh other providers. And there are cases where a more expensive premium is actually advisable (as is the case with PPS's Sickness & Permanent Incapacity benefit, it's simply much better than anything else available, but only if you're a professional)
