She's On The Money - FRIDAY DRINKS: Have you watched the TinderSwindler?!

Episode Date: February 17, 2022

This week not only do we recap the week that was, but we answer a listener question about debt, and have a very important conversation about what we have learnt from the TinderSwindler that's trending at the moment - and no, it's not what you think. Thanks to Superhero for helping us bring this episode to life! Check them out at https://superhe.ro/pr/sotm22 and they'll shout you a FTEC ETF when you fund your account with A$100 or more in your first 30 days. The advice shared on She’s on The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She’s on The Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. Victoria Devine is an Authorised Representative of Infocus Securities Australia Proprietary Limited ABN 47 097 797 049 AFSL - AFSL 236523.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

She's on the money. She's on the money. Hello and welcome to She's on the money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. Today, friends, is Friday, which means it is time to sit back with George, Jess and I with a drink in hand, perhaps, to unpack our favorite moments of the week and, of course, to celebrate you, the incredible She's On The Money community. As always, we are going to be sharing our favorite money wins, we are going to be discussing what's making juicy news in the finance world, and we're going to be helping answer a money question today, which this week is all about insurances and potential exclusions. But before we get there, it is time to recap the week that was. Miss Jessica Ricci, talk to us about what happened on Monday's Money Diary this week.

Monday's Money Diarist took us through a little bit of a journey. She had very sadly lost her father a few years ago and unfortunately found herself in the position where his will wasn't up to date. And her family dynamic had shifted a few times over the years through separations and divorces and kids from different families, which is really common. And there's so many blended families out there nowadays, but something people maybe don't think about is the need to update your will when that situation arises. And unfortunately, she found herself in the position where her and her siblings and step

siblings were kind of disputing what was in the will because it wasn't accurate at the time of his passing. It's just a really hard situation to find yourself in when you're already going through a traumatic experience. You're obviously devastated by the loss. She said it came as a surprise, which is really hard in and of itself. And then on top of that, you have arguments, essentially, with your family. They went through lawyers.

There were huge fees. It was just a really messy process. So she explained to us a little bit about how that went down. And it was a really, really great reminder, I think, to make sure your will is in order. We've done a whole episode. If you want to know the how and the why, you might think you're too young. Spoiler alert, you're probably not. Get that will sorted because it's not just you.

it's all the people that you love as well that are impacted if it's not yeah and our money dara said something that i found really powerful and that's you don't do a will for yourself she said you do a will for your family like obviously there's quite i guess a self-centeredness to a will because it's my stuff that i'm allocating out so therefore it is very about me but in reality if you pass away it's actually about your family not having to go through the admin of going through the courts to dispute a will or even establish a claim. And this money, Darius, it wasn't just like 12 months, which we usually see that process taking. It was upwards of three years. And that's a long time to be going through a process while you're also grieving. It's just not something I

would want to put my family through. So, if you haven't thought about getting a will, I definitely would recommend it. And I promise it will give you a whole heap of peace of mind. Moving on from talking about wills and estate planning, which I could honestly talk about for ages, like if you let me, which in the office, sometimes you guys do appreciate it. But Georgia King, what happened on this week's Wednesday episode? Hello, ladies. This Wednesday, we spoke about the sharing economy and it got philosophical, didn't it, Faye? It did. It got a bit sappy. Like we just took it off road for a little bit. We did have to get back on track. We did. I feel sorry for our producer this week? Yeah, look, it wasn't the easiest record, but hey, it was super interesting. And

for anyone who has no idea what the sharing economy is, that is okay, because we did a whole episode on it. So, you can listen to that. But in sum, really quickly, it's basically the model where individuals share goods and services that are facilitated by some kind of platform or app. So, really common examples would be like Uber or Airbnb, and even like trading or rental kind of platform. So like release it, for example. So yeah, it was really interesting talking through kind of the pros and cons of the sharing economy. The pros being that it's like really good for the environment, but then the negatives, things like gentrification. What else would the negatives be? Oh, there were so many. Listen to the episode. Honestly, I feel like there were lots of

negatives, but lots of positives. And I feel like the sharing economy has come so far. like it used to be i don't know a little bit hippie a little bit left field people would be like oh that's a bit weird like as i said on the podcast george when dress rentals became a really big thing online i think that they really redefined what that looked like because do you remember when dress rentals used to just be the like ferrari down the street where you could get like some bridesmaids dresses or renter tux that probably smell like ciggies like that used to be dress rentals and now you've got these gorgeous companies like glam corner that you just go wow like that that definitely is for me but you know maybe the bridesmaids dresses and the

ciggy tux are probably not my vibe you know it's also really funny to think about trying to explain that concept to me as like a five-year-old child or my parents you know in the really early 90s when the internet was not what it is today imagine saying to someone hey you're gonna get on a telephone you're going to reach out to someone you've never met before and you're going to get in their car and they're going to take you somewhere like yep and you're going to trust them and it's totally okay so what will happen is they'll just turn up at your house they've got your address yeah um it's all good they know where you're going stranger danger alarm bells are going off like crazy so it's just wild to think about how far that has come i guess over the

course of not even 15 years and it's kind of crazy to think about where we're going in the future as well when it comes to the internet like we're now talking about like the metaverse and what the next version of the internet looks like for us and like I was even googling guys over the weekend I read up on you know the metaverse and people buying metaverse properties and I wanted to understand that a little bit deeper because I was like all right tell me the crux of this because there are people, people in our community, guys, who are buying properties or blocks of land in the metaverse for their kids as investments. And I just go, nah, sure, that doesn't exist. Surely, no. But like, it kind of makes sense the more you read into it and the more online our

lives are and the more you go, all right, well, I guess, you know, in 2008, how much of your life existed on the internet and it's kind of like nothing but now it's 2022 and my entire business is on the internet everything that we do is on the internet you guys are employed via the internet like it is crazy to think how like essential in our lives this has become so it makes sense that it would become a bigger thing so anyway turns out you can buy penthouses and uh i reckon we should buy a metaverse she's on the money hq what do you guys reckon would that not be sick i don't get it is this like you put on goggles and then you're in yeah it's kind of like that no yeah you could come to my house but on the internet uh i hate the future you wait you wait i'm gonna buy

my metaverse apartment it's gonna be the penthouse one and one day when i sell it for five million dollars you guys are gonna wish you didn't laugh at me not financial advice yeah not definitely not because i still don't fully comprehend anything that's going on nor do i even know how to transact like i've just googled metaverse apartments they're cute they're cute but let's move on before i sound like i'm pushing crypto georgia king what have you got from the facebook community this week. Some absolutely gorgeous wins as usual, girls. So, let us rip into it. Let me just pull it up. Okay. So, our first win for the week is from Ali. Money win. I was able to do the bulk of my month's grocery shopping at Aldi for a total of $140. $140 for a whole month.

That's insane. Anyway, while she was there, she scored collapsible dog steps for her sweet 12 year old chipu on sale for ten dollars uh two weeks ago that sweet chipu pulled a muscle jumping onto the couch so she was on the lookout for steps like these and aldi delivered as they so often do uh have you guys got steps for your little animals no steps no i i would i have a friend who has a sausage dog who has a ramp on their couch so like that's very cute can they jump in any way can they like i think they can but they shouldn't because it's bad for their little backs so he's got his name's frankie and he like trots up his little ramp and onto the couch and places himself and then when he wants to get off the couch he like walks down to the ramp and

goes down he's like i'm ready i'm tough frankie the same house has baby gates across the stairs because frankie's not allowed to go up and down the stairs on his own i like so much to think about when it comes to sausage dogs the next one here is from alex so she wrote money win i negotiated my salary as i was being headhunted but i didn't want to leave my employer my first pay at my new hire rate hit my account today and i'm taking home an additional one thousand dollars a month so i'll have my car paid off in 18 months instead of almost three years oh my god that's literally cutting it in half how good we love headhunters thank you well done alex no that's not what we like georgia you missed the point we love negotiating our salaries we love yes not

headhunters we love negotiating and knowing our worth exactly well done v you wrapped it up that's what you said that's what you said that's what i said um okay next one is from kiana she bit the bullet and paid off her zip pay in one go it was nine hundred dollars and she closed her account i've always had money owing on zip pay she wrote since 2017 so i'm pretty damn proud of myself oh my gosh yeah you would feel like a massive weight had lifted off your shoulders i just feel like people don't realize the emotional toll of carrying debt like it can be heavy and you you might not feel it you might be like it doesn't make sense but i promise the second you pay it all off you're like oh i didn't even realize i was carrying that way it's so good could not agree

more of a uh the next win comes from amber this is a long one so strap yourselves in i'm a big sewer who likes to use good quality fabric last week i went to a local op shop to donate a couple of boxes of old stuff and while i was there i noticed there were a few bolts of what looked like cotton fabric i asked the worker if they were donations hoping to find out roughly when they would be on the floor they said yes and asked if i was interested so when i said yes they offered me a whole bolt for free now a bolt i think is like the it's like a ream of material do you guys know what it is i'm not a sewer it's like the big cardboard thing that it's wrapped yes i'm pretty sure oh okay that's a lot like that's that's like not going and getting a

clipping that's like the whole damn thing it's the whole damn thing she said there's 15 meters on this bolt and she's estimated that would be 30 a meter so she got 450 worth of fabric completely free. The best bit, I'm starting up a business sewing bits and pieces and this fabric will be perfect for it. Oh, I love that. The next win is from Moira. I had to service my car and change the back brakes and discs. I had the money saved all throughout the year and didn't have to fork into my savings. And the final win for today, ladies, is from Lakeisha. My brother moved interstate so i bought his fairly new 65 inch tv off him for 450 seems pricey but that's okay and he gave me his air fryer for free hashtag oh that's a money win you're gonna love it i'm just

gonna say it you're gonna love it air fryers do you know what else you love jess uh air wraps if it starts with air jess is probably all over it really niche taste in this it's niche taste But you know what, actually, I'm going to share my sister's money win, Alexandra Devine. Her money win this week or this month was actually stealing her sister Victoria's Air wrap. So that was good for her. Is that why you have that roller in your hair and look like Elvis, mate? Yeah, I've been trying to deal without it.

All right, we are back with arguably the most exciting and juicy segment we have ever done. and that's mainly because I watched it on TV the other day and I am now in absolute shock, Georgia King, that Jessica hasn't seen it. Like, it's the only thing on TikTok. It's the only thing on Instagram at the moment. I cannot believe, Jess, you haven't watched this yet. George, we're talking about the Tinder swindler. The Tinder swindler. Oh, the juiciest of stories. George, for those of you who haven't watched, who obviously live under a rock what are we missing okay so essentially it's an old-fashioned catfishing story however the twist is that this man his name is or at least he claims it is simon leviev is that

right v have i got that right simon i think it was yeah something like that or something like that anyway it wasn't his real name so let's not look into it too no i think his name was simon or something like i think that was his real name shimon hayut i think yeah um anyway he basically conned three stunning and smart women into transferring him hundreds of thousands of dollars in the end sorry spoilers alert we should have said that maybe a little earlier spoiler alert oh yeah massive spoiler alert alert alert bye so basically he swindles them out of all of this money he meets them on tinder hence the tinder swindler name but it was really interesting to see how he convinced these women that he was he was he basically convinced them that he was a

diamond magnet's son made them all believe he was really rich and had these really scary enemies who wanted to kill him so he then asked them to transfer money rah rah rah does anyone want to see it now i feel like i've ruined it oh my gosh you've ruined it but it's wild to think that people believe this stuff like oh the amount of red flags that were flying for me and this is probably very well timed given it is or has been the week of valentine's day valentine's day was on monday and the tinder swindler do you reckon they timed that do you reckon they're trying to talk about it during valentine's day it would make sense that was they should have launched it on valentine's day that was a missed opportunity that's still how romantic everyone's talking about it so here

But it is wild. And I feel like there are so many lessons we can learn from it about dating, but also about money and fraud. And is it okay if people ask you to take out personal loans in your name? Jess, is it all right? You haven't watched the show. I haven't, but going off my intuition, I'm going to say no. No, it's not. So, I think that we did learn a few really important lessons from the tinder swindler and you know as somebody who met their partner on tinder and i watched this with steve i was like oh guys this is pretty wild like the idea that this guy swindled women out of money and obviously was doing that to a greater extent we only know about these three women because they've come forward and wanted to be in a documentary like if that was me i'm not gonna lie

even if you swindled me out of hundreds of thousands of dollars i don't know if i would want to go on a documentary to talk about it like i just i'd feel too uncomfortable i feel like it really goes back to what we were talking about earlier in the show around the internet and how we interact with things evolving because again once upon a time i think it was a little bit easier to spot you know a nigerian prince has emailed your grandma saying he wants to marry her if she will just send him some money it's a pretty glaringly obvious scam whereas nowadays people like old mate simon are preying on vulnerable women and i'm sure men as well getting in on their insecurities and having a little bit of insight into them as a person already because

your dating profile is like a pre-packaged show reel really isn't it like here i am this is what i like they kind of have all of the information they need to begin to establish that kind of relationship i feel like it's a bit of an easy in for some nefarious activities i feel like for me there were a whole heap of like super red flags in the show, right? So, it wasn't just that he asked for money, but there were these like super narcissistic traits, like this person love bombed them really early, which is where they say, I love you really early and like shower you with gifts and stuff too early. Cause it's like, you don't know this person from a bar of soap. And like, obviously the biggest red flag is that he was asking for money for something that was a

little bit left field. But I can also somewhat sympathize with the women because unlike catfishing, like they met the person, like they could see him, they could touch him, they could, you know, see the wealth around him. I mean, he wore a Rolex and he drove fancy cars and most of the women would meet him in luxury hotels as their first date. And the first woman that we were introduced to in the Tinder swindler, she met him for coffee and then he invited her overseas on his private jet like i would believe that he was wealthy as well like i wouldn't go oh this is all a scam because you don't just have a private jet on standby to woo women do you it sounds a lot like i don't know and this i think is another one that's on netflix but i

followed the story when it was in the news a few years ago anna delvey have you guys read about that yes yeah for anyone who hasn't i think it's impersonating anna is the documentary that's yeah it is really really interesting story haven't watched that one either but i followed along like i said the news a while back and the crux of it was that she also manipulated people into paying for massive massive massive debts of hers at hotels and restaurants and she infiltrated the new york upper east side lifestyle with a background and no money and she just left a trail of debt behind her and people who were stuck in these holes that they had to get themselves out of but it seems to be is that a bit of a red flag because she did something very similar i don't know

is that a red flag she did something really similar where she would spend you know pick up the bill they go to a really expensive dinner and she'd be like no no like i've got it or she'd be like oh come overseas with me i'll pay for the hotel she dropped a lot of money which sounds very similar to what this guy did to kind of establish early on that she was rich and then of course her friends who were also rich like oh well I'll get the next one and I mean nice lifestyle can't say I'm shouting any of my friends trips overseas but it kind of puts you in that mind frame of oh like this is how they live and then when someone like Simon comes along and goes oh I need help they go oh my goodness like he has his own money so it must be really bad yeah I am

very confused about it not because I don't understand the scam which I can as you were talking about Jess, Anna, she pretended to be a wealthy German heiress, right? Like, how do you just wake up and decide to be that person? Like, from my understanding, that would take a lot of money to begin with. Like, how did they initially get that cash? I feel like there's so much for me missing for the story. And the one thing that for me was missing from the Tinder swindler was how did he start? Like, he didn't grow up wealthy. So, how did he then acquire all of these really expensive things and manage to get this high up like how do you pretend to be the son of a diamond magnet like how does that happen where are the stepping stones not because I want to copy them

but because genuinely I can't comprehend that like what if I decided tomorrow to just wake up and I would like to be an heiress that would be good how do you do that I think you have to be a psychopath yeah because didn't he he like there was something in high school that he'd committed fraud or something like that like is it a bad egg if that's not already obvious so i feel like this kind of behavior is surely just ingrained in who you are as a person they're absolutely narcissists yeah yeah they absolutely would be but it just it's crazy how these things start like we spoke a couple of weeks ago i think just before christmas about elizabeth holmes and how that worked and what was going on there. And I just, I can't believe that these people can climb so high

with nobody questioning them. Like what? And no fear. Like how, how do you keep on doing that and just keep on ruining people's lives and then pushing on to the next person? It's so horrible. It's terrifying. And surely you're scared, but they, it must just be a symptom of psychopathy. That's George's diagnosis. Sounds a bit like a human Ponzi scheme, if you ask me. Get an initial investment and just go from the next to the next. That's how you keep it up. But I guess to bring it right back around to finance, V, what kind of steps or what kind of things should we be looking out for if we are in the dating game? If we're getting on Tinder, having a little swipe, what can women do to protect themselves to make sure they don't

find themselves in a similar position? Given Valentine's Day is this week, I think lots of people are thinking about dating. And the one thing that is really easy to dismiss at the start is red flags, right? And like, I've said this before, but red flags are going to be different for everybody, right? Like Jess, you might be like, he breathed funny. So I ended the date and I went home early and I'll be like, oh, I really liked the way he breathed on me. Like everybody has their different things. And to me, that's not necessarily a red flag. That's a personal one for you. But I think that there's a few big ones that we need to be aware of, especially if you're single and going on dates, asking for money is probably a really big red

flag if you're not in a relationship with that person. But then to further that, for me, it's a really big red flag, even if you are, because it means that they aren't able to manage their own money. And we've seen in our She's On The Money community, we have done money diaries on people who have been in financially abusive relationships where one of our diarists, they racked up massive amounts of personal debt because their partner made them take out loans or made them take out a car loan because they couldn't afford it or weren't fully employed and they promised to pay it back and then they broke up with them but the car's in that guy's name and she now has the debt it's absolutely crazy so anything to do with money and relationships I am really wary and that's why

it's also so important for you to be financially secure on your own because I'm not saying that you know if Steve was like hey babe I really need um to borrow 100 bucks to get to payday like of course I will carry that and that's a different conversation than can you please take on a car loan for me because I've got really bad credit. Like, oh, I don't care how in love with somebody you are. Like, a car loan is a definite no from me if it's not in their own name. Like, that's their responsibility. And I get that there probably is a lot of nuance to this because somebody listening might be like, um, I'm sorry, Victoria. Like, I got my partner's car loan and it was fine. I trust him. I get that. But we need to just be extra wary. The second thing was where

he was just like loving on them so hard like I said before love bombing and it's where they like become obsessed with you really quickly and buy you fancy presents or they say love too quickly or do you know what I mean because they're doing one of two things here they're either scamming you or they're obsessive and that's kind of weird to begin with like we've got to be a little bit more reserved because if you've just met some random on tinder how were you in love with them after 24 hours like how does that happen and I know a lot of people are going to listen and be like but I knew I get it same when I met Steve same but it did take a few months to settle in and become comfortable with one another and you know understand their love languages and who they

are as a person and just going on a date and understanding their career and what they're up to like that is not love that's infatuation and we need to understand the difference between those things because was i in love with steve on our first date absolutely not but i was bloody infatuated and that's okay i found the whole like when he was like sending them voice memos and facetiming them all the time like it was to outsiders it was super creepy but when you're swept up in that it was essentially like these little quasi relationships so you would just be completely swept up in it and especially like who doesn't love a billionaire you know what a life And I probably could easily get swept up. Like, if he was my type, I'd definitely be like,

okay. Like, would I have said no to getting on a private jet with Steve after 24 hours? No, I would have fallen on the jet. I would have gone on the jet. Like, it would have happened. But I think that we need to be really cautious of who we're meeting online. And I think that, you know, in 2022, it's becoming so much more prevalent that, yes, social media is our online highlights reel, but it's also a way that we could create a persona or change who we want to be into somebody else. And I've been getting really swept up recently on TikTok and Instagram, looking at other people's profiles and being like, oh, I wish I was more like them. Like, their highlight reels are really gorgeous or they create beautiful content or they're that girl.

And there's this idea of becoming that girl on TikTok at the moment. And it's just like, they're not, they're just good at content creating. And this guy was clearly good at it as well in terms of creating content that made you believe this farce. And you didn't ever feel like you needed to fact check this guy. None of the people dating him Googled him at the start of their relationships and tried to research him. And I don't think you should have to do that, but I think we do need to be super wary of not all that glitters is gold, especially when social media and building a perception is is associated with that right my creepy trick uh and i obviously haven't dated for many many years but even if i just meet god i know what you're gonna say

linkedin get on linkedin they if they tell you that they work somewhere because not again you can oh that's way less creepy than mine what were you gonna say oh i was gonna say you screenshot their tinder profile and the reverse google image search to make sure that it's not a catfish profile that is actually so much smarter um but yeah do your fact checking a hundred percent also i would add into this if you are in those early stages and maybe you're spending a lot of time together or maybe you're you know spending a few days a week living together or whatever that might look like just be really cautious around protecting your personal information as well i know that we can all be really trusting right yeah trusting is a really good word and you know you'll give

someone your phone password so they can open it and make a call or take you know use your camera or whatever i know that we're all good people and we just want to see the best in other people but i would encourage you to have an element of not paranoia but just a little element of reservation with giving that information away and you know it sounds really silly we're all guilty of it make sure you use different passwords for different platforms don't have your phone pin and your bank pin be the same just little tiny things that can protect your financial wellness overall in the worst case scenario that you find yourself in a situation where someone is maybe not approaching you with the best of intentions yeah and i think that self-preservation

is a really big part of dating as well like i feel like there are so many strong independent single women in our community at the moment and i speak to them every single day and i adore them but something that i do notice and you know what this happened when i was dating as well was you start to prioritize the relationship over your individual time like instead of going to parties with your friend on the weekend and going out for brunch and you know being quite social it becomes quite I guess sheltered and I think being really aware of the friends and family that are surrounding you and if you're becoming really tunnel visioned in your priorities maybe you need to have a think about why that would be because if you're putting your friends and your

family on the back burner for someone you've just met. Is that actually a good idea? Is that actually what life is about? I think there's a lot of conversation to be had around this, but I guess that for us, it's about that financial piece and being independent on your own and having an emergency fund and making sure that if somebody asks you to take a loan out on their behalf, we're not engaging in that. In fact, if somebody asks that question, I think the best way to actually help is like, hey, okay, no problems. Why? How? How do we get you out of this position? If they can't get a loan, no problems. Let's find a way to get you out of that sticky situation. Do they owe money to somebody? Do they owe money on a credit card or a personal loan? Like,

you guys know I am obsessed with our friends at the National Debt Hotline. Like, call them, have a chat to them. Even if you're just not sure and you want to run it by somebody, like, pick up the phone, talk to a financial counsellor and be like, hey, is this weird? Like, I don't want to ask my friends about it, but I mean, dating this guy and, you know, he has a car loan and he can't pay it because he's not employed at the moment. Like, and he's asked me if I can take a personal loan to pay it. Should I be doing that? In some situations, I feel like making that call is going to save you a whole lot of headaches down the track. Yeah. Really great points. Okay. I'm going to go watch the tinfoil swindler now. You've all convinced me. Please be safe. Honestly,

it is wild please watch jess and report back like it's insane and for anybody who's listened this far when you heard that i google searched my tinder dates no you didn't um but speaking of calls gee do we have a listener question to get to we certainly do my girls stand by let me whip it up hello vicky d and there she's on the money girls firstly i just want to say thank you for making such an amazing little potty. So since listening, I've been working on building up my financial security now that my partner and I have a mortgage together. So I've been going through the process of getting income protection and TPD cover on my super. No, it's super basic, but hey, baby steps to financial security. And so during this process, I've received a diagnosis for an

autoimmune condition called ankylosing spondylitis. Side note, massive money win because that medication for this is government subsidized and I can focus my money where it will make a difference. So big win. But I did disclose this to my prospective insurer and they won't offer me income protection and TPD cover because of this condition. So I'm just a bit stumped on where to go from here since it's not really an uncommon condition and I'm sure there'd be other people in a similar boat. I wanted to ask an expert. Thank you so much and much love from Tasmania. bye oh my gosh this is such a good question and you guys know how obsessed i am talking about income protection and trauma and tpd and literally all of those things but first things first i know

that this person was not dj tiger lily but god damn she sounds exactly like dara oh my god she actually does she actually sounded so much like dara i was like is this dara and then i was like know this this story is not Dara and I also know that she's got a financial advisor and would already have her insurance assorted so wouldn't be asking me that question but if that wasn't a like a doppelganger for a voice I don't know what was Dara if you're listening please confirm but very good question and I'm surprised at that process so I'm going to make some assumptions here so that I can have I guess a holistic conversation about this because I don't have enough pieces of the puzzle to be clear about this. And the first assumption I'm making is that

you did this yourself. You didn't go and get a financial advisor to give you a recommendation because if you had, that should have been taken into consideration in conversations between your financial advisor and the underwriter at the insurer should have been had around whether you would get an acceptance or a decline or whether they would allow you to have an exclusion. exclusion so an exclusion is a policy condition on an insurance policy that actually stops you from getting payment if you want to claim if you're unable to work if you have a particular thing happen to you so Jess I know that you have a bit of a bung knee they might go hey Jess like have you got any medical conditions and you'd be like oh no I don't but actually I have one

and it's my knee like I always throw it out when I'm at Frisbee and they might go okay no problems but because that's a pre-existing condition if you have to claim on insurance like it doesn't seem fair to us to have to pay for something that probably was going to happen or that has already happened so in that situation you can kind of go all right well she's already got a bung knee if she needs to take a few weeks off work why is that the insurer's responsibility because you kind of know what's already going to happen and an insurer's job is to make sure that they're managing risk so they need to have a look at risk and go all right using jess as an example and i don't even i don't think i've done your insurances you do not have any exclusion so it's just a

hypothetical but if we look at jess and go all right this is the circumstance this is the situation they're gonna go we're not gonna take risk where we have to pay out like we want to make sure that we are paying out for things that we didn't see coming whereas if we saw it coming i'm not going to agree to that. So, in this situation, what I'm assuming has happened is you've applied to an insurer after doing your own research and haven't actually looked into a lot of the other policies that might be a little bit more flexible on autoimmune conditions. Now, I say this because I've recently gone through the underwriting process with a client who actually has lupus and that is another autoimmune condition. And there were a few insurers that blanket said no,

They said, no, we would not touch that person with a 10 foot pole when it comes to autoimmune diseases. We just say no. Whereas we had to do some more research with some other insurers and go, would you accept it? Would you not? And this person or one of my clients has had their insurance policy accepted, but they have an exclusion on that policy for that illness. So if they have to take time off due to work, if they need to claim on income protection for lupus, they won't get it. However, if they're in a car accident, break their leg and can't go to work and stand in retail for the next eight hours every single day, they will be able to claim on it. So, it's not saying, no, you can't have insurance at all. It's saying you can have insurance for absolutely

everything except for that one thing. So, from my perspective as a financial advisor, I would recommend getting another opinion or even talking to our friend Phil, Phil from Sky Wealth, which we'll link in the show notes actually, because Phil is an insurance specialist and he has been doing all of our She's On The Money insurances. When you guys fill in the form on our website and say, I want to talk to someone to sort out my IP, Phil is the one that we usually send you to. So, Phil would be able to have a chat with you about what your options are and why you are potentially declined. But from my perspective, I would be getting another opinion. Yeah. So, for our friends with autoimmune diseases or fung knees or anything that

might give them an exclusion. We've spoken before about mental health being a big one. Is there a step that we could take to protect ourselves in the sense of if that particular thing becomes an issue? Because obviously, our listener is trying to put herself in the best position. And of course, we hope that your autoimmune disease is never going to become overwhelming or become an overarching problem. Should that happen, are there other options of things that she could maybe look into to protect herself in that instance? So, because the condition already exists, you're kind of in a rock and a hard place. Because from my perspective, an insurer isn't going to want to insure you for that condition. So, I would be making sure that

everything else is set up so that you are okay and you have good emergency funds and all of that. But this is why, Jess, I am so passionate about getting insurance early. Because if she had gotten insurance earlier before this had even come up, she would have been covered for it. And a lot of things actually come up as we get older. So you might not have that at 20 when you have your first full-time income and you might go, what's the point of income protection? The point is to get a policy that doesn't have any exclusions so that you're looking after future you. But there's actually not a whole heap that you can do personally when it comes to getting cover for a pre-existing condition. It's like health insurance. If you've already had a cancer, they're not going

to cover you for that particular cancer because the probability of you having to claim is crazy. It's really frustrating, but guys, this is why I want you to prioritize getting insurance early. But the second thing, Jess, and I cannot believe I didn't say this before, is check your superannuation. There are insurances inside your superannuation and if you have a default policy, it is very probable that that policy doesn't have any exclusions on it. So, what you're going to do Is it going to work out what that policy is and how it works and what benefit it is to you? And you're going to talk to a financial advisor that can help you understand what's going on, because it does become a bit of a balancing act when you have a medical condition that might give

you an exclusion on a policy. And that might mean you go down a hybrid model of having your income protection with an exclusion on it from one place, but then also retaining maybe an income protection policy inside super that's not as good and not that great. And it might be cheap and it might only have a payout time of like two years or something. So, from my perspective as a financial advisor, I'd be like, if you were a clean skin, i.e. somebody who had absolutely nothing wrong with them, yes, I would replace it with a quote, better policy. But because it has no exclusions, it's very likely that I might say, but Jess, keep that one as well. Because if anything happens with your knee that is the policy we will claim on because you aren't going to get into any trouble

with it so this is why we need to be so careful with the insurances inside our super and not just jump on the super website and roll them all together and be like whatever it doesn't matter because it does especially as things come up as we get a bit older yeah so in that case something is better than nothing have your emergency fund in place if you can't get that insurance talk to an expert get them to help sort you out wherever possible if you can't get that insurance policy, which does happen and it's really unfortunate. Look after your emergency funds, make sure you've done everything to set yourself up so that you've got a nice cushion should you need it. Yeah. And I think it's quite unknown, right? So we talk on this podcast about the

importance of income protection and the importance of insurance. But I think something that's relatively unknown is that there are people that insurance companies aren't going to want to insure at all. So there are people who might have, and I'm not saying this is a bad thing, but people who have multiple serious medical conditions going on are a very big risk to insurers of claiming. And therefore a lot of insurers will say, sorry, I'm not going to insure you. So there are some people that I have met and I've had to deliver the news to that. Unfortunately, I can't find a policy where someone's actually going to insure you. It's just a no-go. And that is true for some careers. So, for example, and this is a very recent example because I have a client who is

an air traffic controller. If you're an air traffic controller, you won't get income protection in Australia. Nobody will cover you. Why? It's too high risk job. In what way? I don't know because from my understanding, an air traffic controller sits in the control tower and doesn't actually go in the sky. But that is too riskier of a job to be covered. And there are lots of jobs like that where insurance companies are going to be like, no, sorry, George, too risky working it. She's on the money. That woman's crazy. No, but it is quite serious. There are careers that aren't going to get income protection, which is why it's really important to check your superannuation again, because sometimes they would have given it to you via default, which is very helpful.

But there are also times when you might have had too many medical conditions or, you know, if you've gone through a whole heap of mental health issues and then physical health issues, and you just haven't gotten out the other side of it yet, they might go, absolutely not. We're not insuring you. But the important thing is to get advice so you know what the action plan is. So, my client who's an air traffic controller, yes, we can't have income protection, but we've done a whole heap of planning on the flip side to make sure that they do have as much protection as we can afford them at this point in time, which means they have increased other policies and we've worked out different amounts of emergency funds that they'd be comfortable with because they just

don't have access to that where most of my clients do. So I think it's really important. And I know that you guys are going to be like, but we can just do it ourselves. A policy through a financial advisor is going to be so much more thought out. Like at the end of the day, turns out that's what we do 24 seven. Like we leave it, we breathe it. We have been through it. I know who to call if I'm not sure about whether you're going to get a cover or not. I know what to talk to you about and what your priorities are like go talk to phil from sky wealth i can't do it at this point in time sorry guys one last question before we scoot off you used a term before that i'm just not familiar with you said clean skin oh yeah so in the financial advice world a clean skin which i

shouldn't even be using on the podcast is essentially somebody who if you applied to an insurance company with would have absolutely no exclusions and slide straight into getting full income protection, full insurances with no questions. It would be somebody who has an incredibly clean medical history. Nothing's ever gone wrong. There's no genetic issues in the background because when you do go for income protection, guys, they're going to say, have your parents had any kind of issues? Has anything gone on? So, a clean skin is somebody who is essentially a dream client for a financial advisor when it comes to insurance because they have nothing that an insurance company would go, little red flag, can we talk about it?

Interesting. In saying that, guys, I think we're done here. We've talked about clean skins. We've talked about the Tinder swindler, red flags. We've given some dating advice. We've talked about income protection. I just feel like this episode, we're done. What do you guys reckon?

Yeah, ready to roll. It's got it all, I think. Yeah, I feel like this is a pretty good episode, if you don't ask me. Anyway, it is time to go. So just before we head off, we'd like to acknowledge and pay respect to Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. they're the traditional custodians of the lands the waterways and the skies all across australia we thank you for sharing and for caring for the land on which we are able to learn we pay respects to elders past and present and we share our friendship and our kindness and the advice

shared on cheese on the money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances cheese on the money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or a financial decision and we promise victoria divine is an authorized representative of in focus securities australia proprietary limited abn 47097797049 afsl 236523 we'll get to the point where that rolls off your tongue again i thought that was pretty good that was it was okay sorry sorry i'm about it see you next week guys bye guys Thank you.