Having never really worried about grown up stuff before it was time to take a look at personal things like planning for the future, kids' schooling, housing and retirement. So the hubby and I got ourselves a new financial planner to help us meet some of those everyday targets we need for that Disneyland happy ever-after tale.
Nothing bad stuck out and most of it was all good, that was until we talked about 'income protection' for me. Yes the hubby's rates where what is to be expected but, nope, not mine. When our planner questioned the rate with the insurance company she was told that TV people have died falling out of helicopters, road crashes and are a high risk. Well its a no-brainer a freelance workforce is high risk of unstable employment or loss of income but deaths from helicopters must rare (right?).
Having worked many years ago with helicopters it never crossed my mind that I could or would fall out, a camera man yes, maybe a soundie but me, no, never. I was always in the front seat with a seat belt on.
So the fact that my current role lops me into a category of high death risk it is all new to me. There are two types of TV/film producers for insurance companies Type A - anyone who works on location or studio and Type B - office based work. While they both are freelance so have unstable employment areas, Type B are less likely to die from typing or sitting in an edit suite (all though at times it may seem like you could).
It does strike me as strange that I work in a high death risk industry. I've been lucky enough not to have heard about anyone dying from falling out of a helicopter or on location.
But I do know about the lucky shave an old lady had in Sydney when a news camera mans battery fell out of a helicopter flying over her house near the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It went threw her roof, she called NASA or so she thought - as that was the phone number that was on the item that fell from the sky... but that's another story.
