Smart Money

After a long hiatus, life insurance companies are launching unit-linked pension plans. ICICI Prudential Life Insurance has launched Shubh Retirement plan, which one can opt for between age 35 and 70 years. The maximum maturity age is 80. A customer has the flexibility to choose his investment strategy — aggressive, moderate and conservative — with varying levels of equity participation based on his risk appetite. This would enable a consumer to build a corpus during his working years and receive assured regular pension after retirement. Similarly, Birla Sun Life Insurance has launched its non-participating unit-linked pension plan, BSLI Empower Pension. The plan can help a customer accumulate premiums and the investment returns into a corpus for his retirement. The plan offers a customer the choice to select the premium amount, vesting date and risk profile and the premium accumulated till the vesting period will be invested in equity or debt, depending on the risk appetite of the customer. Both the plans enjoy tax benefits under Section 80CCC and Section 10 (10A) of the Income Tax Act, 1961.

Max Bupa launches Health@Companion

In its revamped website, Max Bupa has launched Health@Companion, designed for individuals and families. The product offers tiered pricing based on the customers city of residence — customers living in non-metro cities pay a lower premium because of lower healthcare costs. The policy comes with sum insured of R2 lakh, R3 lakh, R4 lakh and R5 lakh and one can opt for a two-year

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