HDFC Standard HDFC SL ProGrowth Flexi Review

Plan Summary

Simple ULIP Plan with Higher Charges as compared to other ULIP Plans

Official Overview

Nothing should hold you back in life. Uncertainties of life can throw best laid plans and aspiration off gear. It’s prudent to be prepared and life insurance solutions enable you to build your savings and enjoy life cover.

With HDFC SL ProGrowth Flexi, you have a smart savings-cum-insurance plan that will enable you to simply provide the finest for your loved ones. In this plan you also enjoy life insurance coverage so that you’re loved ones financial future is secured even in your absence.

Advantages

This plan provides valuable protection to your family in case you are not around. In case of your unfortunate demise during the policy term, we will pay the greater of the Sum Assured or your total fund value to your nominee.

• You can choose any of the following 2 plan options as per your requirement.
  • Life Option = Death Benefit
  • Extra Life Option = Death Benefit + Accidental Death Benefit
• On maturity, you can take the Fund Value at the prevailing unit prices as lump sum or you can opt for settlement option.
• You have flexibility of
  • Switching: You can move your accumulated funds from one fund to another anytime
  • Premium Redirection: You can pay your future premiums into a different selection of funds, as per your need
• Tax benefits are offered under section 80C and 10(10D) of the Income Tax Act, 1961.

Editor’s Review

HDFC SL ProGrowth Flexi is a very simple ULIP PLan with no Loyalty Additions or extra features. Infact, the plan is so simple there is nothing much to write about. It can be said as a sister plan to ProGrowth Super II with only one major difference, in this plan the death benefit is higher of Sum Assured or Fund Value whereas in ProGrowth Super it is Sum Assured + Fund Value.

The Yield Net of Charges of this plan is 7.84% which is on the lower side compared to other ULIP Plans available in the market.

The only saving grace of this plan is that the Opportunities Fund of HDFC is generating a moderate return of around 13-14% over short term period of over a year. However, its bluechip Fund is having a very low returns of around 4% since inception of January, 2010.

All in all, there is nothing new or exciting in this plan as compared to ULIP offerings of other companies.

Key Features

• Option of taking Accidental Death Benefit rider
• Simple ULIP Plan

Benefits

• Good Performance of Opportunities Fund since its inception in January, 2010

Negatives

• Bad Performance of Bluechip Fund
• Higher Charges as compared to other ULIP Plans
• Lower Yield Net of Charges

Our Recommendation

The plan has nothing to recommend about in its features, charges etc. except average performance of its Opportunities Fund which may or may not continue in future. The Charges in the plan is also on the higher side. Therefore, all in all the plan is 50:50 considering the performance of its Opportunities Fund, otherwise, the plan has nothing for us to recommend.

HDFC Standard HDFC SL ProGrowth Super II Review

Plan Summary

Simple ULIP Plan with Higher Charges but a good performing Opportunities Fund

Official Overview

You will settle for nothing but the best. Be it for self or for your loved ones. With HDFC SL ProGrowth Super II, you have a smart savings-cum-insurance plan that will help you effortlessly provide the finest for your family, be it today or tomorrow.
Advantages

• You can choose any of the following 8 plan options as per your requirement.
  • Life Option = Death Benefit
  • Extra Life Option = Death Benefit + Accidental Death Benefit
  • Life & Health Option = Death Benefit + Critical Illness Benefit
  • Extra Life & Health Option = Death Benefit + Critical Illness Benefit + Accidental Death Benefit
  • Life & Disability Option = Death Benefit + Accidental Total & Permanent Disability Benefit
  • Extra Life & Disability Option = Death Benefit + Accidental Death Benefit + Accidental Total & Permanent Disability Benefit
  • Life & Health & Disability Option = Death Benefit + Critical Illness + Accidental Total & Permanent Disability Benefit
  • Extra Life & Health & Disability Option = Death Benefit + Accidental Death Benefit+ Critical Illness + Accidental Total & Permanent Disability Benefit
• This plan provides valuable protection to your family in case you are not around. In case of your unfortunate demise during the policy term, we will pay the Sum Assured and your total fund value to your family.
• This plan can be taken by filling Short Medical Questionnaire, which may not require you to go for medicals. Kindly refer to the product brochure for details.
• You can change your investment fund choices in two ways:
  • Switching: You can move your accumulated funds from one fund to another anytime
  • Premium Redirection: You can pay your future premiums into a different selection of funds, as per your need
• Tax benefits are offered under section 80C and 10(10D) of the Income Tax Act, 1961

Editor’s Review

HDFC SL ProGrowth Super II is a very simple ULIP Plan. Infact its so simple that there is nothing much to write about this plan. The only distinguishing feature of this plan is that it allows various combination of riders which is nothing great. Many ULIP plans in the industry give such options.

Plan Charges

This Plan has higher charges as compared to other plans in the industry. The overall net Yield is 7.59% @10% which is on the lower side considering similar products across industry. The plan charges Premium Allocation Charge of 4% every year for first 7 years i.e. 42% of one year premium in total.

The plan do not provide any loyalty or any other kind of additions over the plan term.

Fund Performance

HDFC ProGrowth Super II has higher charges compared to other ULIP Plans but lets see how its funds perform as a good fund performance can easily overcome higher charges.

The plan has two funds dedicated to Equities i.e. Blue Chip Fund (Large Cap) and Opportunities Fund (Mid Cap).These funds were launched only from January, 2010 so its not possible to have a long term analysis of these funds, but lets see how it has performed in last 1 Year or so.

Blue Chip Fund NAV at Lauch (01/01/2010) Rs. 10 Current NAV (15/4/2011) Rs. 10.5725 Yield 4.428% BSE-Sensex Yield 8.013%

Opportunities Fund NAV at Launch (01/01/2010) Rs. 10 Current NAV (15/4/2011) Rs. 11.8131 Yield 13.85%

So, the Blue Chip Fund has performed very badly as compared to BSE Sensex whereas Opportunities Fund has fared much better. However, the returns mentioned above should be taken with a pinch of salt as the fund is in existence for only over one year and we do not have long term history of the fund.

Also, out of 13.85% of yield of Opportunities fund Only around 10.51% is actually earned by you and the balance is adjusted against expenses going on the basis of the Net Yield of this product.

Key Features

• Simple ULIP PLan
• Large Range of Riders to choose from
• Death Benefit of Sum Assured + Fund Value

Benefits

• Good Performance of Opportunities Fund

Negatives

• Bad Performance of Blue Chip Fund
• Fund Performance based on only relatively new fund
• No historical long term fund performance available
• No Loyalty Additions
• Lower Yield Net of Charges as compared to other Industry Products

Our Recommendation

The only plus point in this plan is the good fund performance of Opportunities Fund on a relatively short term period, which may or may not be continued in the future. If we leave that out of the picture, the charges on the product are relatively high and consequently Yield Net of Charges is on the lower side. There are no loyalty additions or any other kind of incentive also.

All in all, the product can be recommended only if the opportunities fund continue its good returns, otherwise the plan feature are not anything to recommend about.

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