Health insurance what actually does it mean? This is a medical insurance policy that offers financial coverage for medical expenses when the policyholder is hospitalised.
Health insurance is given only to spouses and their dependent children. The eligibility of Health insurance is based on extended coverage on an individual or the family floater. For adults, the age is 18 – 65 years and for children from 90 days to 18 years. Buying Health insurance at an early age is cost-effective. Health insurance companies have tie-ups with leading hospitals that help in giving cashless treatment to the insured people.
Importance of health insurance-
Buying these medical policies is of utmost importance for a family as medical care is costly. Any kind of hospitalisation can become like a metered taxi which can burn a hole in a person’s pocket and spoil the home budget. A good insurance policy will cover the entire expense from consultation fees, medical tests, ambulance costs, hospitalization charges and post-hospitalization recovery costs. At a low yearly premium one will avail great benefits during exigencies.
Benefits of this policy-
- Cashless treatment- during any medical exigency the insurance company will do the needful so that one doesn’t need to shell out any cash.
- Pre and Post- hospitalization coverage- this coverage is up to a period of 60 days as per the medical plan.
- No claim bonus(NCB)- a bonus is paid to the person who is insured if the person has not filed for any treatment the previous year
- Transportation charges- the company pays the ambulance charges at the time of hospitalization.
- Medical check-up- it provides free health check-ups along with the policy from time to time.
- Room rent- the health insurance covers room to rent during hospitalization.
- Tax benefit- the premium paid on this insurance is tax-deductible, which helps taxpayers.
- Restoration benefit-if the total sum amount assured gets exhausted, it is replenished
- International cover- this can help a person who travels abroad and in case of a medical emergency there the insurance will cover all expenditure
Selection of the right health insurance policy-
Sum assured
The minimum age for a policy
Room rent criteria
No claim bonus
Other benefits
Types of health insurance–
Individual health insurance
Family health insurance
Senior citizen health insurance plan
Surgery and critical illness insurance plan
Maternity health insurance plan
Personal accident plan
Unit linked health plan
Health insurance claim process–
There are two types of health insurance claim processes-
Cashless claim- where the insured person provides his policy details to the hospital and they treat him and on his discharge forward the medical bills to the insurance company.
Reimbursement claim- where the insured person pays for his hospitalization and later forwards his bills to the insurance company to get reimbursement.
There are two kinds of health insurance policies from which a person can make his choice—
They are-
Fixed benefit policies– they pay a fixed amount following a claim
Indemnity plans- they provide reimbursement on the money spent during medical treatment.
Due to our sedentary lifestyle diseases are enhancing and health insurance is a must. But purchasing a policy with a high premium can deter a person from purchasing health insurance. But there is a good option in the form of fixed benefit policies that provides extensive coverage and low premium. So people can purchase without worrying about paying a hefty premium.
Fixed benefit policies cover a lot of things like hospital cash policy, accidental cover and critical illness cover. This type of policy helps to do extra coverage of extra possible expenses that are not covered by other health insurance policies. Expenses of post-hospitalisation and medicines too are covered under this policy. Fixed benefit policies do not require a large number of documents while filing the insurance claim. A pre-defined illness, a diagnostic report from the doctor or the policy-holder are enough to get the full amount of money released from this fixed benefit policy. In the indemnity plan, the policyholder is required to submit hospital bills to get the claim and needs more paperwork compared to the fixed benefit.
So take the plunge and choose the best health insurance policy without much ado as ‘Health is Wealth’
