Your medical certificate is your career
To fly commercially you need a class 1 medical certificate, renewed at regular intervals by an aeromedical examiner. Conditions that many people live with quietly, such as a heart rhythm change, a mental health episode, diabetes or a problem with your eyesight, can lead to suspension of your medical while you are assessed.
When that happens you stop flying, and depending on your contract your pay may stop too. Some pilots return after treatment. Others lose their medical permanently and have to start again in a new career, often on far lower pay.
Insurers want to know how you fly
Airline pilots flying scheduled routes in large aircraft are usually viewed differently from private, display, crop-spraying or helicopter pilots. Insurers will ask what you fly, where, for whom and how many hours a year. Some may add an aviation exclusion or extra premium for certain types of flying.
Be clear about everything, including any private flying you do at weekends, gliding or instructing. An undisclosed hobby could cause problems if your family ever makes a claim, and the insurer can only price what it knows about. Your logbook makes these questions quick to answer.
- Airline, cargo or charter
- Fixed wing or rotary
- Commercial hours plus any private flying
- Routes and countries you fly into
Loss of licence and income protection side by side
Loss of licence insurance pays a lump sum or income if you lose your medical certificate. Airlines and pilot unions sometimes arrange group schemes. Income protection is broader: it pays if any illness or injury stops you working, and an own occupation definition judges you as a pilot rather than against any job.
Many pilots hold both. One gives a payment linked to the licence itself, and the other replaces income while you recover or retrain. Check how the two interact, because some income protection policies reduce the benefit if you receive other regular payments during a claim.
Airline benefits and what happens when you move
Airline employers often provide sick pay, a pension with death in service, and sometimes group loss of licence cover. Pilots also move between airlines, take contract work abroad or face redundancy when the industry has a hard year. Each move can leave a gap.
Personal life insurance stays with you whatever your employer or contract. Sizing it to your mortgage and family means your cover is not riding on the airline you happen to be flying for this year, and it carries on through a career break or a move abroad, subject to the policy terms on residence.
How Hi Tomorrow helps pilots
We gather the details insurers ask about, such as aircraft type, routes and hours, and present them to the insurers on our panel that take a fair view of aviation. Insurers group occupations into risk classes, and that affects both price and whether the claim test is your own occupation as a pilot.
We explain any aviation exclusions in plain terms so you know exactly what each policy covers on duty and off. If you already hold loss of licence cover, we look at how a new policy would sit beside it. Acceptance depends on each insurer's underwriting.