TPD CORE: Designed for today

Lower premiums, a five-year rate guarantee and clearer claim assessment criteria for total and permanent disability.

TPD CORE provides meaningful protection for total and permanent disability, with clearer claim assessment criteria, improved premium certainty and lower premiums than traditional TPD cover.*

Why TPD CORE?

Traditional TPD was developed in a different era.

Today, advances in treatment, rehabilitation and wellbeing support mean many people have greater opportunities to recover and return to work following illness or injury. At the same time, increasing claims costs and shifting claims trends have driven premium increases across the industry, creating affordability pressures for clients seeking to maintain appropriate levels of cover.

TPD CORE has been designed to respond to these changes, providing meaningful protection for severe and permanent disability while helping improve affordability, support premium stability and enhance clients' understanding of their cover, in line with evolving expectations.

Key benefits

Save up to 30% on premiums compared to traditional TPD cover*

Five year rate guarantee for TPD CORE

Lump sum payment

Clear claim assessment criteria

Greater certainty for clients and advisers

Designed to support long-term sustainability

*Savings of up to 30% are based on a comparison between a new client applying for TPD CORE Own Occupation cover with a sum insured above $1.5 million and traditional TPD Own Occupation cover.

Designed around client expectations

Many clients view TPD insurance as protection against severe and permanent disability that is expected to prevent them from working again.

TPD CORE is designed with this expectation in mind, making it easier for clients to understand:

What is covered
How claims will be assessed
What evidence is required
How the severity and impact of a disability is determined
How permanence of that impact is determined.

This helps clients better understand the purpose of their cover and what to expect at claim time.

Ideal for clients who:

Want meaningful disability protection at a lower premium

Value affordability and premium certainty

Want greater clarity around claim assessment criteria

Are reviewing cover due to decreased need, lifestyle or budget changes

Have IP in place and want clear separation between TPD and IP

Want protection focused on severe and permanent disability

How TPD CORE works

Understanding claim assessment

TPD CORE vs traditional TPD

What is TPD CORE?

TPD CORE provides meaningful protection for severe and permanent disability at a lower premium than traditional TPD cover.

For most conditions, claims are assessed in the same way as traditional TPD. Where it differs to traditional TPD is the additional assessment criteria required for mental health conditions and specified subjective conditions such as those associated with a client’s experience of pain and fatigue symptoms. These requirements are designed to provide greater transparency, consistency and confidence at claim time.

Key features

Five-year rate guarantee
Available as Own Occupation or Any Occupation cover
Available inside or outside superannuation
Lump sum benefit payment
Same three-month no-work waiting period as traditional TPD
TPD Maximiser available
No indexation available

Why choose TPD CORE?

TPD CORE 5-year rate guarantee – similar to our Income Protection CORE 5-year rate guarantee^, which has remained free from rate increases due to repricing since its inception, providing clients with greater pricing certainty.

Premiums may still change during the guarantee period as a result of factors such as changes to age, policy fee increases, government charges, discounts, benefit changes, or a change in premium frequency.
30-day cooling-off period – provides existing clients with additional flexibility and peace of mind when reviewing changes to their cover, with the reassurance they can change their mind if needed.
Lump sum payment - provides clients with greater certainty and financial flexibility through a single lump sum payment, rather than receiving claim payments in instalments that require ongoing annual reassessment.

This can help:
- Pay down debt
- Support ongoing financial commitments
- Access treatment and rehabilitation
- Provide financial flexibility during a significant life event
Greater clarity at claim - for mental health and other complex conditions known as specified conditions, we’re introducing clearer assessment criteria, including recognised assessment frameworks, to provide greater transparency around how severity, permanence and functional impact are assessed.

This helps clients understand:
- The level of severity required and how it's determined
- How permanence of the impact is determined
- what evidence is required
- how claims are assessed

^IP CORE 5-year rate guarantee applies to 2 and 5 year benefit periods and policies with a Variable premium type.

How does TPD CORE work at claim time?

TPD CORE focuses on protection for conditions that are severe, permanent and work-ending.

For mental health and specified subjective conditions such as those associated with a client’s experience of pain and fatigue symptoms, claims are assessed based on:

Medical evidence and opinion - An assessment of all supporting clinical evidence and opinion based on specialist medical assessment.
Use of psychiatric and functional assessment frameworks - For mental health conditions, we use the Psychiatric Impairment Rating Scale (PIRS), an independently recognised assessment tool that evaluates the impact of a psychiatric condition on how a condition affects a person's ability to function in daily life and work.
Permanence - Whether the condition and functional impact remain stable and permanent despite undergoing all reasonable treatment and rehabilitation.

Mental health conditions can present differently for different people.

TPD CORE uses the Psychiatric Impairment Rating Scale (PIRS) to support more consistent and transparent assessment of functional impairment. This helps provide greater clarity about the level of impairment and how severity is evaluated.

PIRS is an established assessment tool used to measure how a psychiatric condition affects daily functioning.

It assesses (6) key areas:

Self-care and personal hygiene
Social and recreational activities
Travel and mobility
Relationships and social functioning
Concentration, persistence and pace
Adaptability and work capacity

The purpose of TPD insurance is to provide benefits when a person experiences a total loss of capacity to work that is expected to be permanent.

When assessing a TPD claim, AIA considers all reasonable medical evidence and expert opinion to determine whether the impact of a condition is stable, enduring and unlikely to improve. This helps ensure benefits are paid when a disability has resulted in a genuine and lasting loss of work capacity.

For Specified Conditions, including Mental Health conditions, a minimum 24-month treatment period applies before a permanent disability assessment can be made.

This period has been designed to:

Provide sufficient time for appropriate treatment and rehabilitation to occur.
Allow recovery and long-term outcomes to become clearer.
Support a more informed assessment of permanent work incapacity.
Help distinguish between conditions that may improve with treatment and those that result in lasting impairment.
Promote fair, consistent and sustainable claim outcomes.

By allowing reasonable treatment and recovery opportunities to be explored first, the 24-month treatment period helps provide greater confidence that a condition is truly severe, enduring and permanent before a TPD benefit is assessed.

Case Study: Meet Michael

Michael, a 45-year-old accounting professional, was diagnosed with a serious mental health condition that significantly affected his ability to work and perform everyday activities.

Despite two years of ongoing treatment and support, Michael continued to experience substantial challenges with concentration, social interaction and daily functioning. Following assessment against the PIRS criteria outlined in his TPD CORE policy, he was found to meet the required impairment threshold of 31% or greater and received a benefit payment.

The financial support helped ease immediate financial pressures and allowed Michael to focus on ongoing treatment to minimise symptoms and support.

At the time of assessment, Michael met the policy definition of severe and permanent disability and satisfied the requirements for a TPD CORE benefit payment.

This example is fictional and provided for illustrative purposes only. Individual circumstances, policy terms and claim outcomes will vary.

TPD CORE vs traditional TPD

TPD CORE and traditional TPD both provide meaningful protection if a client becomes permanently disabled.

Traditional TPD uses long-established assessment criteria across all conditions. TPD CORE retains the same approach for most conditions but includes more clearly defined assessment criteria for mental health and certain specified conditions. This provides greater certainty, supports faster and more consistent assessment outcomes, and helps deliver more affordable cover backed by a 5-year premium rate guarantee.

What's the same?

Most of TPD CORE operates in the same way as traditional TPD, including:

Lump sum benefit payment
Own Occupation and Any Occupation options
Available inside or outside super
TPD Maximiser availability
Three-months inability to work waiting period.

What's different?

For certain mental health and specified conditions such as those associated with a client’s experience of pain and fatigue symptoms, TPD CORE includes additional assessment requirements, including:

Psychiatric Impairment Rating Scale (PIRS) for mental health conditions
Permanence assessments
Additional treatment evidence requirements
Minimum 24-month treatment period
For specified conditions, a TPD claim will be assessed on ability to work in Any Occupation suited to education, training or experience, even where ‘Own Occupation’ cover is held.

At a glance

Key TPD Features and Benefits	TPD CORE	Traditional TPD
Additional PIRS Mental Health criteria	Yes	No
Indexation	No	Yes
Single lump sum payment for all claims	Yes	Yes
Physical and other objective conditions assessed against Own/Any definitions	Yes	Yes
Available as a Stand Alone	No	Yes
TPD Maximiser available	Yes	Yes
For specified conditions including chronic pain, fatigue, and mental health conditions - different claims rules apply, including: Minimum 24-month continuous treatment period Assessed under “Any Occupation” Minimum Psychiatric Impairment Rating Scale (PIRS) framework, score of 31% (for mental health claims)	Yes	No
Own/Any available to anniversary date before 70th birthday (white collar)	Yes	Yes

For a more detailed list comparing TPD CORE and traditional TPD, click the link below.

TPD CORE delivers meaningful disability protection through a modern, sustainable and affordable approach to cover - helping more Australians access financial security when they need it most.

When might TPD CORE be right for your clients?

TPD CORE may be worth considering if your clients:

Are concerned about rising insurance premiums
Want greater certainty around how claims are assessed
Are looking for meaningful protection at a lower premium
Want cover aligned to severe and permanent disability
Are looking for a disability insurance strategy that complements the recovery-focused approach of IP CORE
Are reviewing existing cover due to affordability concerns