surrender vs. insurance

Can someone explian when it is correct to surrender and when to play insurance. They seem to contradict one another.

Insurance applies when the hand is dealt and the dealer shows an Ace. You insure if the TC is at the appropriate point for the system you use and the number of decks in the game.

Surrender is a decision made _after_ insurance has been handled... And yes, you can sometimes take insurance (say TC is +4) and then surrender 16 vs A if your insurance doesn't pay off (if it does, the dealer has bj and you don't so you can't surrender there, but you didn't lose anything due to the insurance win either...)

So there is no conflict since they are done at different points in the round. You insure before anybody takes a hit, while the dealer gives everyone the option, you can then surrender when it is your turn to play...

I think the poster meant early surrender where you cannot insure and surrender at the same time.So,the question is valid.
Early surrender is quite rare nowadays since it gives the BS player a slight edge off the top.Where it exists you cannot expect good penetration, so insurable TCs are anyway rare.
At TC+5 the value of insurance is only 2% of the initial bet.In order to justify not surrendering because of insurance the EV of the initial hand would have to be between -50% and -52%.It's hard to find such a case for TC+5, so I would say that surrender takes always precedance over insurance.

Francis Salmon

No place I play (US only) has offered early surrender when I played, so I have no experience with that at all...

You buy insurance and if it loses you surrender. Looks incredibly stupid (or sharp depending on whether you're winning or losing).