But if these strictures do not apply and I hope they don't then let me tell you about the Alfa GTV V6 24V

But if these strictures do not apply, and I hope they don't, then let me tell you about the Alfa GTV V6 24V Rationally, this is a pointless car. So, if you pay pounds 400 a month for all your mortgage costs, including insurance, and you are with the Woolwich, you would pay four times pounds 5.75, or pounds 23 a month.The maximum amount you could receive would be pounds 400 times 12 or pounds 4,800, so cover is not cheap, and the insurance company has the right not to renew the policy or, in some cases, can give you just 90 days notice if they decide that the risk is getting too great - if we had another major recession for example.T he writer is publishing editor of `HealthCare Insurance Report'. That can be useful as otherwise you may be able to pay the mortgage but still have little or nothing to live on.To work out what cover would cost, multiply your monthly mortgage cost in hundreds of pounds, by the premium rate. A number of exclusions apply, although these are usually what you might expect - self-inflicted injury, taking part in a crime, pregnancy, or war, for example.In the past some policies did not cover the self-employed or those on contract but most now cover contract workers provided that the contract has been renewed more than once, and small businesses if the firm goes out of business.Specialists such as John Charcol will sell policies to existing as well as to new borrowers, often undercut lenders' rates and can provide protection over and above the monthly mortgage payment. A typical policy will pay out 30 or 60 days after you are made redundant or can no longer work due to illness or accident and pay your mortgage costs for up to 12 months until you are able to return to work. It is one of the cheapest forms of life assurance, not least because with a repayment mortgage, the capital you owe goes down each year.When you have a mortgage, your lender is likely to try to persuade you to take out its mortgage payment protection (MPP) policy, sometimes also called ASU, or accident, sickness and unemployment.

But less than one in three of us, 28 per cent, have such cover, whereas the Government and industry body, the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML), wants to see an increase to 55 per cent.To help, the CML has drawn up a list of policy requirements that its members must now have on their policies. This is not the same as mortgage-protection, which is life assurance that pays off your mortgage if you die. If you still qualify, but your partner works more than 24 hours a week or you have more than pounds 8,000 of savings, you can't claim the benefit.What you can do is to take out mortgage-payment protection. Since 1995, after some high-profile cases where once-wealthy individuals had their six-figure mortgages paid by taxpayers, help is restricted to mortgages up to pounds 100,000.The State will only pay interest - which means the outstanding capital will not fall - and only then from nine months after you first claim. Now, however, these people can insure against redundancy as well as against illness or disability. For most people, their mortgage is their biggest monthly commitment. If they can no longer afford to pay the mortgage then they may well lose their home. If they are forced to sell, they are unlikely to achieve the best sale price and getting a future mortgage can be difficult, or impossible if there are serious arrears.Once, the State would pay the mortgage if illness or redundancy hit.

Today, many people who would once have expected a job for life are on short-term contracts, have already experienced redundancy, or have set up their own business and are now self-employed. Employment patterns have changed dramatically in recent years and unless your insurance arrangements reflect this, you could be in for a rude awakening if anything goes wrong. Mortgage payment protection is an effective, but expensive, way of doing that. FOR MANY people, making sure that they can keep up their mortgage payments is a fundamental part of their personal welfare state provision. These companies' charges are high and the information they offer is often no more than you could uncover for yourself with an hour or two's work.Dividends which remain unclaimed after 12 years revert to the company which issued them.Unclaimed Assets Register: Bath & West Buildings, Lower Bristol Road, Bath BA2 3EG (01225 461006). They should have records which show whether you have any dividends that are not claimed and, in principle, you should be able to get that sorted out fairly quickly."Beware of companies which write to you out of the blue saying they have discovered dividends or other assets belonging to you, and offering to tell you about them for a percentage fee. Before picking up the phone, arm yourself with details of your shareholding and a note of any previous addresses where you have lived since buying the shares.Mr Hobman says: "If you think you are owed dividends, or you are not sure, go and check with the company.

Call the head office telephone number and ask for either the shareholder services department or the company secretary's office.Yellow Pages, directory enquiries or the Stock Exchange Year Book in your local library are all possible starting points. Mr Hollender hopes this search will cost shareholders no more than pounds 15 per person.Mr Hollender says: "With the co-operation of the registrars, we should be able to create a database which will make it as easy as possible for shareholders to find out whether they are entitled to something. In many cases, the time when that is most appropriate is when someone dies, an executor is winding up the estate, and he has got to get in all the assets."Until that service is up and running, your best bet of tracking down any dividends that you may be owed is via the company whose shares you own. It is yours."UAR plans to launch a service later this year allowing shareholders to find missing dividends from any number of companies with a single search. But Mr Jeremy points out that each direct- credit payment generates a tax-credit voucher, sent through the post. This confirms the date and amount of the payment, together with details of the account into which it has been paid.ProShare, a lobby group which works at promoting wider share ownership, is supporting BACS' call for more direct-credit payments.Tony Hobman, who took over as ProShare's chief executive last Monday, says: "In principle, anything that ensures people get their dividends is a good thing, People have invested in the company paying the dividend - they own that company - and one of the benefits of ownership is that the company pays you a dividend. Instead of automatically taking money out of your account, they automatically put money in.BACS, which runs the banks' automated clearing process, says 46 per cent of people claim they would like to get their dividends by direct credit, but only 30 per cent actually do so.Mike Jeremy, a BACS spokesman, says: "The excitment of receiving a cheque is not the ideal context for people to concentrate on the dividend payment they are going to get in six months' time and how they prefer it to be paid."Some of the shareholders surveyed by BACS see the cheque as proof positive that the dividend has been paid.