If you have monthly loan repayments to make then you could be left with a serious struggle of where to find the money if you were to come out of work due to an accident, sickness or through unemployment such as redundancy. UK loan protection insurance can help to protect your loan repayments if you should come out of work, but it does have to be given some very serious consideration as it isn’t a suitable product for all circumstances due to the exclusions within it.

UK loan protection insurance would begin to payout once you had been out of work for a defined period of time and this can vary from provider to provider. Cover can begin to payout from the 31st day of being out of work but it can be as much as the 90th day. However the majority of UK loan protection insurance policies are backdated to day one. Once the policy has kicked in it would continue to give you the money to meet your loan repayments and keep you out of debt for up to 12 months and with some providers for up to 24 months.

There are exclusions in all UK loan protection insurance policies that could mean the cover wouldn’t be suitable for your circumstances and these are usually found in the small print of a policy. It is essential that you read the small print and the key facts and if you go with a standalone provider you are more than likely given access to these. Some of the most common reasons which could stop you from making a claim on your UK loan protection insurance include suffering from an illness at the time of taking out the policy, being of retirement age or only being in part time work.

UK loan protection insurance has been in the spotlight for all the wrong reasons when the Financial Services Authority began investigating the sector in 2005 following a super complaint by the Citizens Advice to the Office of Fair Trading. Fines were handed out to several high street names and then the sector was referred to the Competition Commission. They are currently conducting an in-depth review of the sector which is expected to reach conclusion in February 2009.

While still being under the watchful eye of the FSA the recent investigation which has focused on mystery shopping has revealed that some UK loan protection insurance cover is still being sold without being understood and the FSA will hand out fines now to the Chief Executives of those firms found to not have the consumer’s best interest at heart.

For now if you want UK loan protection insurance then stick with a standalone provider to make sure that you get the cheapest premiums and the correct advice needed to ensure that the product is suitable for your circumstances.