Preparing for Illnesses and Accidents

June 13th, 2008 by Peter Glaeser | RSS feed for comments on this post | TrackBack URI

I recently had a small bike accident. I hurt a shoulder and a thumb. It could have been much worse. Anyhow, I like being prepared for anything so I want to share with you some strategies to minimize your business and personal risks:

Put Money Aside

Any illness or accident will cost you time and money. You’re not able to work fully and you will need to reserve time for doctor appointments and such. Put some money from your regular income aside into a separate “emergency fund” that you touch when it’s needed. This gives you more security and reduces the worries while you’re handicapped.

Health Insurace

You need to get a very good private health insurance. It will definitely pay off in the long run because it gives you faster and better treatment. Doctors will make appointments available on very short notice and state-of-the art techniques and medication will be applied. Make sure that your insurance plan covers a daily allowance close to what you’re making when you work. Don’t be stingy when it comes to your health.

Accident Insurance

Pretty much the same: get a good one! In case you experience any permanent damages such as losing a hand, you want to get paid well. Also make sure you get a daily allowance that enables you to continue your current lifestyle.

Disability Insurance

It is possible that an illness or accident leaves you in a situation where you will never be able to work in your beloved profession again. Sometimes it can be as bad as not being able to work at all anymore. For both cases you want to have a good disability insurance that pays you a monthly allowance as a replacement for your old income.

Hospital Equipment

If you have an accident and need to spend time in a hospital you will need some things from home. Make sure you have a small bag with toiletries, underwear and some other basic equipment prepared so that it can be taken straight to the hospital.

You will also want to have your laptop computer with you. But in order to use it fully, get a wireless internet access contract from your mobile phone carrier. They don’t cost that much anymore. And have someone bring you your DVDs from home for entertainment.

Business Continuation

If you are a sole proprietor and nobody else has access to your stuff, your business would go down the hill. You need to find a co-worker, a good friend or a peer in your industry that you can trust 100%. He or she will be able to keep your business running when you become unavailable. These people need your logins and access to your bank accounts etc.. So you need to prepare powers of attorney for them and put your logins and stuff in a secret folder or a USB stick that you hide somewhere and encrypt with a password.