Identification

• Life insurance is a type of contract that provides beneficiaries with a death benefit or sum of money when the insured person dies. Group life insurance policies are provided through employers rather than purchased individually by employees.
  
  

Types

• In some cases, employers purchase group life insurance automatically for all of their employees who meet certain requirements, such as hours worked per year or tenure and do not require employees to contribute to the cost. Other times, group life insurance is voluntary and employees pay for all or part of the cost on their own, usually through deductions from their paychecks.
  
  

Features

• Most group life insurance policies are term policies, meaning that the coverage is good only for a specified amount of time disclosed in the policy contract. Self-purchased group life insurance may offer different death benefit amounts, with higher amounts costing higher premiums.
  
  

Benefits

• Group life insurance is typically less expensive than individual policies, reports the Insurance Information Institute. Additionally, group policies rarely require health examinations nor do they often reject people based upon health problems.
  
  

Considerations

• If you are laid off or terminated or if you quit your job, you may be eligible to convert your group life insurance policy to an individual policy.