Medical Insurance Cost Cutting Plan Article Discussion Area

sheramber

russellsnr wrote: »

Hi, We now live in Europe and before moving worked 40 years paying NI contributions. We have been told (rumour) that now when we visit the UK we are not entitled to free NHS care should we need it yet due to one of us claiming the DLA we are entitled to free health care where we live paid for by the British Government as we have both paid the full NI while working in the UK.
Is it correct that we cannot receive the free NHS care if needed?
Many Thanks
Russ

Regulations changed recently. There is information here

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/418634/Implementing_overseas_charging_regulations_2015.pdf

but the relevants bits seem to be

Regulation 13 – UK state pensioners resident in the EEA
: UK state pensioners
who are resident in another EEA member state are exempt from charge for all NHS
hospital treatment, including elective treatment, provided that they have registered an S1
document in that member state. See Chapter 9 for more about this exemption.
............................................
S1
– issued to pensioners, posted or frontier workers. The term ‘pensioner’ includes those
in receipt of a qualifying long-term benefit. If an original form is presented to an OVM, this
should be sent to the Overseas Healthcare Team in Newcastle for registration (the holder
may also have a copy for personal use)
.................................
Chapter 9

UK state pensioners living in another EEA country
9.51
From April 2015, all pensioners in receipt of a UK state pension who are living abroad in
the EEA or Switzerland and have registered an S1 form from the UK with the local authorities
in their EEA country of residence, and their family members, will be able to access all
healthcare in the UK as though they were ordinarily resident and should not be charged for
treatment. If they present an EHIC, their EHIC information should not be entered into the portal
for reimbursement. Regulation 13 of the Charging Regulations concerns this category of
patient.

vlc

Is it possible to use ones pension fund to pay for medical bills ( before retirement ) ?

endomorph

I wanted to contribute to this thread because it seems to have gone off-course slightly.

"If you've had a positive experience with a broker please let us know"

I was a company health care secretary for many years. The boss was a frugal woman and every year I spent days/weeks going around all the PMI companies getting quotes, comparing plans, reporting back to the MD, going back again .... etc. Very laborious and frustrating task.

And then I found a broker! Wow! What a difference is all I can say - talk about making my life easier and saving money.

On the renewal in 2015, we were currently with Aviva. Their renewal cost cost came back at around £22,000 for the plan. There had been a good number of claims on the plan obviously.

Time for the broker to take over. Within about 4 days she came back with an offer from Bupa (who we used to use) for just under £10,000 for like for like plan !

The broker took care of everything for us, the switchover was painless and best of all we didnt have to pay them anything.

If I am permitted to name drop, the broker was SMP Healthcare in Chelmsford Essex ( smphealthcare.com )

The director Lianne is very knowledgeable of products and the industry as a whole. She has been a central contact point for both renewals and for issues during the year with things like claims, advice, and complaints.

Highly recommended

Trev_Smif

The article mentions that several providers give a discount for annual payment of premiums. I belong to Aviva medios scheme and they have informed me that they will not be providing the 5% discount from 1 Jan 2017 because of "changes in the Consumer Credit Act". I cannot find any reference to changes in legislation. Is this their choice or does this apply to all companies?
I note you say that cover does not apply to emergency admissions but I had to go to A&E for renal failure and the insurance covered the stay ;although there is no private equivalent to intensive care (when I mentioned private treatment they said "you're too ill for that!")

another_intruder

Thanks for mentioning April UK in the tabs, it never appeared in the searches I made on the comparison websites, but it was the best deal so far.
Looking for a comprehensive cover as a EU citizen... Not easy to find ! If anybody has a some tips, you're welcome to share... Still looking around.

RJS2209

Recently took out a new policy with a health insurance broker based in Cardiff called ActiveQuote.

Wouldn't normally post articles of this nature but the service was first class, my wife and I had some concerns regarding pre-existing conditions and whether what we actually wanted to be protected would be covered. The adviser (Claire) was helpful, but also very knowledgable. We had looked into private health cover, several times before but were put off by what felt like 'pushy sales tactics' from the brokers contacted. As we started our research on MSE we thought we'd post here to try and save people the leg work.....our advice go and speak to Claire......

Mark300zx

Hi,

I am looking for a website with independent reviews of Health Insurers, has anyone come across one ?

TIA

Mark

Smartmoney2017

Hi Mark,
I worked in the medical insurance industry for years and quickly learned that each insurer has their pros and cons, the most important thing to take into consideration when choosing a policy is what type of underwriting will be applied as this will affect what the insurer will and will not cover.
If you would like to get some free impartial advice the guys at protectedhealthandlife.co.uk are very good and can help you find the right policy to suit your needs
Thanks

Timothy_Burk

we've have a small company policy for years, we were told by several brokers that we could not move due to our claims history which is understandable, after looking at AMII (found On MSE) for more advise we contacted a broker close to us (Healthier Cover), and although again we could not move, they are apparently the only Broker that gives you any renewal commission they receive back, so we have changed broker to them and are now receiving a lower premium without doing anything to our policy. strongly recommend people to use them as they were the only broker that were able to save me money after trying what seams like dozens over the years.


I dealt with Jason Surgeon, may be a pun there......

Elquestionardo

HI all,

I'm new to the Forum and have been trying to find information on purchasing international health insurance. Basically, i need to ensure i'm covered for the 2 years whilst i travel and work in Canada. Does anyone have a company that they'd recommend or a site that could help? I've scoured MSE and can't seem to find anything about this type of insurance!?

Any advice would be very much appreciated.