19 NOVEMBER 1994, Page 42

High cost of dying

THAT POINT is brought home to me by a Lloyd's member who is trying to save his heirs from the unresolved liabilities that would attach themselves, leech-like, to his estate. Estate protection insurance is the way to do this, and Lloyd's has sent him two quotations. He can pay a premium of £20,000 a year. Or he can pay £900 a year but the estate must bear the first £800,000 of his losses. For a Lloyd's member whose commitments were about one-tenth of Lady Delves-Broughton's, these figures are ominous, not to say shattering. He concludes that either Lloyd's is bust or he is, or both. He is not, though, in any hurry to find out.