Frequently asked questions
Got a question? Here’s what other customers have asked. If you still need help, contact us here.
Account and policy information
Membership changes refer to changes to employees insured. Please let us know about these, but how soon we need to know depends on your policy.
For schemes costed via a unit rate (typically those with 10 or more people)
We only need an immediate email if:
- There are significant changes to your business (such as a merger or acquisition, you sell part of your business, or the nature of your business changes)
- A member is discretionary
- There is a need for underwriting.
Otherwise, you can simply tell us when your policy is next due for renewal.
For schemes not costed via a unit rate (often those with fewer than 10 people)
Please email us when there are any membership changes in the policy year. We can then update our systems and will take the changes into account at the next policy review.
To add a new category or a new TUPE to your policy we will need:
- Category name eligibility
- Benefit basis (benefit levels, min/max ages, escalation rate, NI contributions, and pension fund contributions)
- Membership data (name, date of birth, gender, salary, occupation, workplace location and any stated benefits).
If you’re unsure of how to collate this information, you’re welcome to use our handy and straightforward Policy Renewal template.
Our Broker Services or Financial Underwriting team will then produce a quote. Once you accept it, we will add the new details to our system, and provide an invoice and the policy documents.
What is TUPE?
TUPE regulations protect employees' rights, which may include their rights to their existing insurance-based benefits, when:
- An organisation, or part of it, transfers from one employer to another; or
- A service transfers to a new provider, for example when another company takes over the contract for office cleaning
If your company name is changing, please send us a Companies House reference as confirmation (including any change to the company number).
Yes. The policy covering you is an employee benefit provided through your current employer. It will cease if you leave your current job.
Your cover is an employee benefit, arranged by your employer. The policy documents are provided to whoever manages employee benefits at your company. If you have any questions that we do not answer here, please contact your HR team.
We’ve tried to include a breakdown of everything that you’re paying for. This handy guide will help tell you what’s what.
Our handy and straightforward Policy Renewal template is quick and easy to use. It lists all the categories of information we need to be able to process the renewal.
Renewal invitations are issued to your broker 3 months ahead of your renewal date. If you have not heard anything about your renewal, please contact your broker in the first instance.
If you are an employer, please contact your broker. We aim to send invoices to your broker within 30 working days of receipt of Renewal Data.
In the unlikely event your broker is unable to help you, please see our 'Existing policy queries' section on our contact us page for the appropriate team.
If your policy is paid by Cheque/Bank Transfer please contact your broker.
If your policy is paid by Direct Debit, please allow 5 working days following the receipt of your invoice for money to be paid in to your account. If this is not received after this time, please contact your broker.
In the unlikely event your broker is unable to help you, please see our 'Existing policy queries' section on our contact us page for the appropriate team.
If you are an employer, please contact your broker. However, in the unlikely event your broker is unable to help you, please see our 'Existing policy queries' section on contact us page for the appropriate team.
Claims
Yes, you can return to work with your employer while we pay benefit, as long as the medical evidence supports that you are only able to do this on a part-time basis (in comparison to the pre-incapacity hours worked).
We will reduce the benefit in proportion to the new salary being received. For example if a claimant receives 40% of their previous salary we will reduce the benefit by 40%. We call this proportionate benefit.
So that a member is not penalised when we calculate proportionate benefit we will:
- Increase their pre-incapacity salary in line with inflation and
- We will not deduct state benefit.
Proportionate benefit can be paid at any time after the end of the deferred period.
For employees
Yes. We require a physical signature on normal writable PDFs.
For consent and claims forms, we can also now accept e-signatures, allowing you to sign documents virtually. If you would like to use this easy option, please get in touch with us directly or via your employer with your phone number and email address.
For employers
No, as long as you send the claim form to us via a work email so we have an audit trail. There are some documents where we will require a physical signature or an e-signature — we will let you know when this is the case.
Please let us know if you receive any other income as it may affect the amount of benefit we pay. We will not reduce our benefit if the income is:
- Contractual occupational sick pay during the first 12 months of incapacity
- Other income you were receiving before you became incapacitated
- A pension taken early by anyone over age 55.
During a return to work where you are working part-time or on restricted duties or in a lower-paid role, we may pay the benefit at a reduced rate. We call this proportionate benefit. Our benefit plus the income from your employer for the hours worked will provide a higher level of financial support than benefit alone.
If your illness or injury meets the policy definition, we will either pay a benefit for a fixed number of years or until you retire. Please check with your HR team for details of the specific policy covering you.
There are other reasons we will stop paying benefit. These include, but are not limited to:
- You return to work
- You no longer meet the definition of incapacity
- Your reach the expiry of a fixed-term contract of employment that was in force at the date your incapacity began
- You leave your employer’s employment, unless we agree to pay direct (see the FAQ above)
- Your death.
No. To complete a deferred period we can consider:
- Continuous absence
- Periods where a member is working, but in either a different occupation or in a reduced capacity due to illness or injury
- Shorter periods of absence (of at least 2 weeks) interspersed with periods at work (where the deferred period is fully met within a time span of twice the deferred period)
There are two scenarios:
If a member’s employment ends during the deferred period
Their membership also ends and we cannot consider the claim unless they are an equity partner, LLP member or barrister.
If a member’s employment ends after the deferred period
We can start paying direct where a member is an equity partner, Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) member or barrister, where an employer has ceased to trade and on pay direct group income protection policies. In all other cases we will normally agree to pay direct unless we think that the individual will recover or return to work within 6 months. We ask that we are given at least 14 days’ notice of the termination of employment.
If we do accept pay direct, there will be changes to the terms of payment, which may include changing the definition of incapacity. We will pay basic benefit only and we will deduct tax from it at the basic rate of 20%.
Moving to pay direct may also affect the individual’s entitlement to some state benefits. In all cases you should contact your Claims Assessor to discuss the individual claim circumstances.
ESA is one of the main state benefits people with a health condition or disability that affects how much they can work can apply for.
When it comes to the impact of ESA on benefits, this depends on which of the three types of policy that can be taken out with Unum, which are:
- Gross pay
- Fully integrated
- Net pay.
The fully integrated and net pay policies take into account what the individual actually receives from ESA benefits. We consider this within the pricing of the scheme, making for more expensive premiums.
Gross pay schemes provide a benefit that is either:
- a set % of salary with no deductible; or
- a set % of salary with a deductible.
This deductible is either be linked to state benefits rates (e.g. ESA or the old-style long-term disability benefit). It may also be a stated amount.
We take this deductible into account when pricing a scheme, reducing both the level of cover and the premiums accordingly. The deductible is therefore taken off the benefit paid regardless of whether ESA/another state benefit is actually received.
Customer feedback and complaints
We want you to be completely happy with our service, but we appreciate things can sometimes go wrong. Here’s what you can expect from us if you have a complaint, from the first time you make contact all the way through to referring your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman.
- First please get in touch with your usual or most recent contact here at Unum as we aim to resolve most cases immediately.
- However, if you feel you would like to raise the matter with someone else or make a complaint, please contact our Complaints Team using the contact details below. They will review and investigate your concerns before issuing a Final Response.
- While our Final Response ends Unum’s complaints procedure, we will co-operate fully with the Financial Ombudsman Service if you choose to refer the matter to them. Contact details for the Financial Ombudsman Service are below.
Here are the contact details for our Complaints Team:
Phone: 0345 600 6763
Email: complaints@unum.co.uk
Address:
Complaints Team Manager
Unum
Milton Court
Dorking
Surrey
RH4 3LZAs mentioned, after Unum issues our Final Response, you can choose to refer your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
The Financial Ombudsman Service is an independent complaints resolution service that is free to consumers. Please note that you must refer any complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service within 6 months of the date of the Final Response letter.
You can contact the Financial Ombudsman Service using the below details.
Financial Ombudsman Service
Exchange Tower
London
E14 9SRConsumer helpline: 0800 023 4567
For mobiles: 0300 123 9123
Email: complaint.info@financial-ombudsman.org.uk
Online: www.financial-ombudsman.org.ukOur full Guide to Customer Complaints is available here.
First please get in touch with your main contact as we aim to resolve most cases immediately. However if you feel you would like to raise the matter with someone else or make a complaint, please contact our Complaints Team. They will review and investigate your concerns before issuing a Final Response.
Data security
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Dental
For customers with both a Dental and Optical policy from Unum Dental, you’ll get two welcome emails after your policy start dates.
These will contain your policy numbers and Policy Schedule for your Dental and your Optical policy. Use the links in your welcome emails to register for the portal for both policies separately.
Please note, when you register you will need to use two separate emails, one for each policy, to create your account.
The amount you receive for a Dental claim depends on the level of cover you have, the type of treatment you’ve undergone and the amount of money we’ve paid you for that type of treatment so far in the policy year.
To see your level of cover, annual limits, and exclusions please refer to your Policy Schedule. You can find this by logging into the Unum Dental member portal.
It’s important to understand how much your dentist will charge and how much your policy will reimburse you towards this before you start dental treatment.
Your welcome email can take time to arrive depending on how long your application takes to process. Please allow up to 6 weeks from the start date of your cover for this to arrive.
If you still haven’t received your welcome email containing your policy number, please firstly check your junk/spam folders. If it’s not there, don’t hesitate to drop us a call on 0345 850 9439.
Thank you for supplying this. We aim to assess the additional information and reimburse you within 5-10 working days if we now have everything we need. If we still require further information, we’ll be in touch.
This is included in your welcome pack, which you would have received by email or post shortly after your policy started or renewed.
If you cannot find this, it’s also available in the Unum Dental Portal under the ‘My policy’ tab. There you’ll find your Policy Schedule under ‘Policy documents’. Log in to the Portal here.
When you select a Dental policy via your employer, your employer sends Unum Dental your details as part of a batch. Once we have your information, we work on getting you signed up and will send you a welcome email and policy schedule as soon as we can. This will include your policy number.
When you receive this policy number, you can use it to register to the Unum Dental Portal. This lets you make a claim and contact us securely to ask a question.
Please note that it can take up to 4 weeks to receive and process your details and issue your policy statement. If you don’t get your welcome email and policy schedule straight away, you are still covered. If you misplace or lose your welcome email, feel free to contact us using the ‘contact us’ button below.
You can submit your claim by logging in to the Unum Dental portal, which is the quickest and most convenient way to make a claim. However, if you’d still prefer to fill in a paper form, log in to the portal and hit ‘contact us’ to tell us.
Once we’ve received and processed your claim, we’ll let you know by email or by post. We aim to reimburse you within 5-10 working days once we’ve confirmed your claim payment.
Please note that you must submit all claims within 12 months of the treatment completion date. The treatment completion date is the date you received that treatment, or the final treatment in any course of treatment. If you submit a claim outside this timeframe, it may not be approved and you may not be reimbursed.
The amount you receive for a Dental claim depends on the level of cover you have, the type of treatment you’ve undergone and the amount of money we’ve paid you for that type of treatment so far in the policy year.
To see your level of cover, annual limits, and exclusions please refer to your Policy Schedule. You can find this by logging into the Unum Dental member portal.
The amount you receive for an Optical claim depends on the level of cover you have, the type of treatment you’ve undergone, purchases you’ve made, and the amount of money we’ve paid you for that type of treatment so far in the policy year.
To see your level of cover, annual limits, and exclusions please refer to your Policy Schedule. You can find this by logging into the Unum Dental member portal.
Group Critical Illness policies (GCI)
There is no catastrophe limit under our GCI policies. Our current standard GCI terms do not include a requirement to follow Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office guidance for business travel.
For a GCI claim to be valid, it must meet the terms of the policy, including:
- The definition for the condition outlined in the policy being satisfied; and
- The pre-existing conditions exclusion not applying to the member.
Group Critical Illness (CI) Insurance provides a tax-free lump sum if you, your spouse or partner (if covered), or your child survive a covered critical illness for 14 days. Unum CI is provided through your employer.
Group Income Protection policies (GIP)
There is no catastrophe limit under our GIP policies. Our current standard GIP terms do not include a requirement to follow foreign, commonwealth & development office guidance for business travel.
Group Income Protection (GIP) provides a monthly benefit if you are unable to work for a specified length of time due to illness or injury. Unum GIP is provided through your employer.
Group Life policies (GL)
There are no general exclusions under our Group Life policies. All causes of death are covered for eligible members. However, there is a restriction on travelling on business against advice from the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (please see below).
The FCDO Travel Advice service uses a traffic light system of:
- Red: Advise against all travel
- Amber: Advise against all but essential travel
- Green: Normal safety precautions.
Under the terms of our current standard policy, there is a restriction on travelling on business where the FCDO advises against all travel (red zone). Where the FCDO has advised against all travel to an area, our Group Life policies will not cover individuals subsequently travelling to that area on business. We will, however, cover any individuals who travelled on business to an area which was not a red zone when they travelled, but has since become a red zone.
Group Life insurance pays out a lump sum to your loved ones or another chosen recipient if you die. Unum Life insurance is provided through your employer.
A catastrophe means one or a series of originating causes or events which results in more than one death, irrespective of the period of time or area over which they take place.
The catastrophe clause could be invoked if the catastrophe provisions under the policy are met. The coronavirus pandemic would be considered as one originating cause.
However, as the catastrophe limit is usually at least £100 million per policy, it is very unlikely that the limit would be reached. Please check policy documents for the catastrophe limit applying to a particular policy.
Health and wellbeing support services
Unum Limited works with third-party experts to offer health and wellbeing services to Unum Group Risk and Dental policyholders. For regulatory details of third-party providers and contact information, please see below page for more information.
Support services
Medical underwriting
Medical underwriting is the term used when we consider a person’s medical history before deciding on insurance cover.
Our tele-underwriting service aims to make this process as easy as possible by taking this information over the phone in a relaxed, conversational manner.
Alternatively, you can fill in a Medical Health and Lifestyle Questionnaire and return this to us.
If a member of a scheme requires medical underwriting, they can find all the information they need here.
Rehabilitation
No, our Vocational Rehabilitation support is included as part of your Unum policy as a built-in, added value service.
These tools can be utilised through our Rehabilitation or Claims Teams at their discretion if there is evidence that this is appropriate to support your return to work.
Our Rehabilitation Team working with our Group Income Protection customers access these services as part of their case management toolkit. Where treatment will support a return to work, Unum will consider funding it.
These include:
- Functional capacity assessment — an assessment of an individual’s physical abilities and endurance for work-related tasks and postures using standardised measurement
- Ergonomic assessment — assessing how an individual’s workstation and equipment is set up
- Psychological assessment — an assessment of an individual’s cognitive capacity to function in the workplace.
- Cognitive behavioural therapy — mental healthcare from clinical experts to treat a range of mental health conditions that are preventing someone returning to work.
It’s easy for our Group Income Protection customers to make a referral to our vocational rehabilitation services.
- Discuss it with your employee (for more information on our offering, click here).
- Complete this absence management form to tell us more about your employee and their absence from work.
- Ask the employee to fill in this consent form. Or we can call your employee if you prefer. We need consent before we can proceed.
- Email both forms to us at RehabUK@Unum.co.uk.
You can make a referral at any time, whether it’s to support someone who’s in work but struggling or to help them return to work after a sickness absence.
In fact, the earlier you contact us, the quicker we can support you and your employee.
Wellbeing Checks
A Wellbeing Check is a personalised, 1-2-1 session with an in-house Unum wellbeing expert who can discuss any wellbeing concerns an employee may have and suggest practical solutions.
Employers can refer employees covered by a Unum Group Income Protection policy for a Wellbeing Check by selecting ‘Employee Wellbeing Check’ on this form and emailing it to RehabUK@Unum.co.uk.
Covered employees can also self-refer.
For quick, basic advice, you can also call our helpline 0345 600 6765.
Our Rehabilitation and Wellbeing team can help you with a range of services. They can:
- Discuss your absence management processes, including helping to identify trends or strategies to better manage absence
- Provide line manager or HR education and training via interactive workshops
- Offer employees ‘U-First’ courses covering topics such as wellbeing, resilience, burnout and thriving through change. Line managers can book employees in for these sessions here.
- Conduct a Workplace Health and Wellbeing Review to help identify potential gaps in your company’s wellbeing policies and implement changes
- Provide further information on specific conditions or signpost you to services to help you manage difficult situations.
We work with everyone – regardless of industry or size. We make sure we understand your business and the employee’s role to determine how best to support and achieve the desired outcome - whether it’s a return to their full role or an alternative role with reduced hours.
Our Vocational Rehabilitation Consultants can assist with all types of conditions — whether the condition is physical, mental or emotional. We’ll also liaise with both employer and employee to determine what support is needed to help your staff member return to work or stay at work.
Our Vocational Rehabilitation Team focus on providing a clear plan to support an employee to return to work after an illness or injury. They also support employers with easing an employee’s transition back to work, as well as offering advice and guidance on reducing certain risks that can lead to illness or injury.
We offer support for as long as it’s needed — before, during and even after the employee returns to work to ensure their return to the workplace is sustainable.
The exact services offered by an occupational health provider will vary. They may include medical assessments, health screening or emergency first aid and are separate from the services offered by our Vocational Rehabilitation Team.
However, they do complement each other in various ways. As such, we can work with an employer’s occupational health provider to ensure wraparound care for you and your employees.
Employers can refer an employee using our absence management and wellbeing referral form. Read more about the process and download the form here.
After receiving the form, we’ll provide recommendations to support that person in work, such as by helping manage any areas of difficulty, formulating coping strategies and highlighting where they can utilise their strengths.
For individuals who have (or think they may have) dyslexia, we also offer an online in-depth screening.
For companies looking to improve line managers’ understanding of neurodiversity in the workplace so they can better support neurodivergent employees, we also offer our Supporting Neurodiversity workshop. Available to Group Income Protection customers, it can be booked here.
Alternatively, find a more detailed overview of how we support with neurodivergence in the workplace here.
Our VRCs are part of an in-house, multidisciplinary team that includes a number of qualified medical professionals. They work with the claims team to provide truly seamless care for employees experiencing an illness or injury.
Having such expertise in-house can reduce referral delays and provide a smoother transition from a claim to a return to work. Find out more about what our VRCs do in this handy infographic.
Exactly how your VRC will support you will depend on the individual employee’s needs. We conduct an assessment with the employee to fully understand any barriers preventing them from returning to work or causing them to struggle at work.
Following this, our VRC will work with you and provide a report and recommendations on how best to help your staff member return to work.
Typically, our report and recommendations will include:
- A summary of the person’s condition
- Their symptoms and current treatment
- Suggested hours and tasks
- Any workplace adjustments and accommodations they need.
Experiencing financial difficulties
We are committed to helping customers as much as we can. If you are finding it hard to pay your premiums due to financial difficulties, then please get in touch to let us know so we can identify support appropriate to your needs.
You can find our contact details on our contact us page.
We appreciate that some employers may want to give their employees one-off payments or salary increases to support them with the rise in the cost of living.
Unum will therefore:
- Ignore one-off cost of living payments for the purposes of limitation of benefit
- Allow employers to provide cost of living salary increases by increasing the overall maximum benefit limit of income from all sources to rise in line with inflation.*
*Applies to new increases or payments only
We are committed to helping customers as much as we can. If you are experiencing difficulties paying your premiums due to the impact of the rising cost of living, then please get in touch to let us know.
You can find our contact details on our contact us page.
UnumOnline
UnumOnline is our intuitive, easy-to-use adviser/broker portal that lets you quote, buy, renew and service qualifying Group Risk policies entirely online. You can access UnumOnline via your PC or tablet between 7am and 7pm.
There are three main ways to learn more about UnumOnline:
- The UnumOnline handbook
- Our short video offering an overview of the portal
- Find answers to frequently asked questions surrounding UnumOnline here.