Did your super fund quietly switch off your insurance?

Here’s a sentence nobody wants to hear at claim time: “That account no longer has insurance attached.” Not because a claim was declined, not because a premium was missed on purpose, but because the cover was switched off years earlier under rules most people have never heard of - and the account owner assumed it was still there.

If you’ve ever changed jobs and left an old super fund behind, this article is for you. The insurance you think you have and the insurance you actually have may have parted ways a while ago.

What actually changed?

Between 2019 and 2021, the government rolled out a pair of reforms - Protecting Your Super and Putting Members’ Interests First - aimed at a genuine problem: millions of Australians were paying insurance premiums out of multiple forgotten super accounts, eroding balances for cover they’d never use or even knew about.

The fix worked roughly like this. Funds are now required to switch off insurance on accounts that have gone inactive, rather than letting premiums quietly drain them forever. And funds generally no longer add default insurance automatically to low-balance accounts or for younger new members - those members have to actively opt in.

ASFA’s research on insurance through super puts the scale plainly: many members lost default cover on inactive and low-balance accounts as a result. Millions of quiet accounts had insurance switched off.

Source: ASFA, Insurance through superannuation research, February 2026.

As policy, there’s a solid argument for all of it - duplicate premiums eating small balances was a real cost to real people. But the flip side is the person this article is about: someone relying on cover that an old account no longer holds.

Who’s most likely to be affected?

Worth a check if any of these sound like you:

1. You’ve changed jobs and didn’t consolidate. The old fund stopped receiving contributions, the account went quiet, and after the inactivity period the cover attached to it was switched off.
2. You took a career break. Parental leave, study, time overseas, a stretch of self-employment where you paused contributions - any of these can make an account “inactive” in the eyes of the rules.
3. You joined a fund young or with a small balance in the last few years and assumed cover came with it. Under the newer rules, it often doesn’t unless you opted in.
4. You deliberately kept an old fund “for the insurance”. This one stings the most. People sometimes keep an old account open specifically because it had good cover, not realising that inactivity is exactly the trigger that ends it.

How do I check, and what do I ask?

The check itself is quick:

1. List every super account you have. Your myGov account linked to the ATO shows all funds holding money in your name, including ones you’ve forgotten.
2. Log in to each fund (or call them) and go to the insurance section.
3. Ask three questions: Do I currently hold insurance with this account? What type and how much? And has any cover on this account been switched off or reduced - and if so, when?
4. Get it in writing. A portal screenshot or an email from the fund. If a claim ever matters, “the call centre told me” is not a document.

If cover was switched off, some funds allow it to be reinstated within certain windows or restarted if contributions resume, but the conditions vary by fund and are set out in the insurance guide. Whether reinstating, replacing or doing nothing makes sense depends on your situation - that’s a personal advice question, not one a checklist can answer.

What’s the catch inside the catch?

The part that catches people out: even where cover survived on your active account, the reforms reshaped what “default cover” means across the system. Fewer people have cover than assume they do, and the ones who do often hold amounts set by a formula that knows their age and nothing else - not the mortgage, not the kids, not the single income. “I’ve got insurance through super” is the beginning of a sentence, not the end of one. The useful version ends with what type, how much, under what definitions, and whether it’s actually still switched on.

Where to from here

Five minutes on myGov and your fund’s portal will tell you where you stand. If what you find is confusing, or the answer is “switched off in 2021” and you’re now wondering what that means for your family, book a no-obligation chat with Justin. He’ll help you take stock of what you’ve actually got - and if it turns out you’re fine, he’ll tell you that too.

Related reading

• Insurance in super, explained
• Reviewing your existing cover
• The types of personal insurance

General advice only. It does not take into account your objectives, financial situation, or needs. Consider whether it is appropriate for you and read the relevant Product Disclosure Statement (PDS) before deciding. Whether a benefit is payable depends on the specific policy terms.