BAD news this week for the insurer underwriting; business on the lunatic fringe of what is a normally staid profession, offering cover against alien attack, abduction and impregnation by beings from another galaxy and recompense for proven virgins burdened by immaculate conception. For the company, Goodfellow Rebecca Ingrams Pearson (GRIP), it was a case of X-Files chickens coming home to roost when it discovered that the 39 members of the Heavens Gate cult in the US, who died recently in an apparent mass suicide, were among its policyholders.

The alien-obsessed group took out a £500 annual premium last October and under the terms of the policy each insured client stood to receive $1 million in the event of unusual death. The insurer may be stung for nearly £24 million if a coroner's court delivers an open verdict. The company said is was "distressed and saddened" by the tragedy and had decided to discontinue cover for bizarre and unusual events. "We do not want to make money from possibly similar incidents." Or presumably lose money. So, should cover be required against your bellicose teenager growing up to be the ascertainable spawn of Satan, engulfing the globe in internecine strife, try the Guardian Group instead.