NEWS December 05, 2025
Managing the one risk too many engineers fail to account for
Life insurance and income protection are vital components in protecting a successful career and lifestyle.
As an engineer, Marcello Bertasso understands well how important it is to manage risk. As Head of Claims and Underwriting at insurer PPS Mutual, however, he has noticed that many engineers have a blind spot when it comes to one specific type of risk.
“Engineers think about risk all the time: structural risk, project risk, execution risk,” he said.
“But they don’t always think about putting in place structures to create stability in their own work life. Most engineers start their careers as young professionals, and they’ve got great earnings potential.
“Their biggest asset is their ability to earn an income, particularly because theirs will grow so steeply, but if something interferes with that growth trajectory, it’s very difficult to recover it.”
Engineers, he said, too often fail to think about the inherent physical and health risks involved in their professional lives and how disruptive it can be if accident or injury does strike.
Proactive financial protection can play a vital role in sustaining personal and professional success, as well as safeguarding an engineer’s financial future in the face of unexpected challenges.
Life insurance and income protection help ensure they can maintain the lifestyle they’ve worked hard to build, regardless of what the future might hold.
“Often people wait until they’ve got children and a mortgage before they buy insurance, because that’s when they recognise that the need is there. But if they’d done that earlier, they would have had the advantage of getting in at a cheaper rate and locking that rate in.”
Laying the foundations
In the same way that an engineering project requires effort, planning and investment, so too does an engineer’s career. And as engineers advance in the profession, often other people begin to depend on their wellbeing.
“If you’re an employee and you stop working, obviously the money stops coming in,” Bertasso explained.
“But if you start to branch out on your own, you’ll be responsible for others’ livelihoods as well. You might have saved enough money to cover being unavailable for work for a period, but what about your employees or business partners or customers?”
Having the right protection in place can assure other stakeholders that wages will still be covered and projects completed even when unexpected events arise.
“We’ve got a young member who developed Parkinson’s disease in their early 40s and they will never work again because of the nature of that condition,” Bertasso said.
“Now they’re on long-term full value claims; the potential claims they’ll receive back from PPS Mutual will be in the order of multiple millions of dollars of lost income.”
Bertasso warns against becoming too dependent on superannuation and other public safety nets, highlighting the ongoing strains on systems such as Medicare on the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
“A super fund might have default cover, but that default cover could not adequately provide the protection that you’re looking for,” he said.
“Even if it does provide a salary continuance benefit, it might only be payable for two years, and, if you’re a young engineer who finds themselves in a state where they’re unable to work for a very extended period of time, two years’ worth of income when you’re earning $110,000 is only $220,000.
“Your lifetime needs, however, are going to be multiples of millions. Being inadequately protected leaves you with a big financial gap.”
Getting the right coverage
Every person’s individual circumstance is different, and Bertasso’s overriding advice for engineers wanting to safeguard their career and lifestyle is to first consult a financial adviser. However, he has seen patterns among the professionals he talks to.
“Our younger members lead off with income protection cover because they typically don’t have debt other than university debt,” he said.
“First and foremost is insuring your greatest asset, which is your ability to earn an income. Then, when other things are in place, like a mortgage or a family with dependents, or you want to plan for business needs, there are other products that are appropriate to those needs.”
For anyone looking for coverage, Bertasso advises understanding the difference between income protection and a more comprehensive life insurance product.
“An income protection benefit is a temporary situation; you don’t have to be permanently disabled in order to access these very good quality products,” he said.
“You might even be working part time even – you don’t have to stop work completely. You just need to have a reduction in your hours and your earnings in order to start accessing benefits.”
Life insurance, on the other hand, becomes applicable upon death – which is, by definition, a permanent state. Trauma protections also have a similarly binary approach to coverage, depending on whether a person qualifies according to the defined conditions or not.
But whether income protection or life insurance, Bertasso highlights how important coverage can be to peace of mind.
“I think it’s never too soon to start a financial roadmap and use that as a blueprint for your life: this is where you want to get to,” he said.
“But how do you get there and how do you protect that if it all goes wrong all of a sudden? I think, for me, that’s the critical question.”
