How To Make Health Insurance Affordable For You?
It’s been several months already since mankind witnessed the initial outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic. We are nearing to complete one year in a couple of months ahead. Awareness of the need for health insurance has increased among people. There is also a drastic growth being noticed in the health insurance purchases graph globally compared to the pre-pandemic period.
The percentage of people willing to take health insurance has increased with pandemic incidence. But the fact is the necessity of health insurance is there even before the Covid-19 pandemic. Keeping in mind the nature of treatment that a Covid-19 requires IRDAI has advised all health insurance providers in India to introduce Corona specific plans a few months back. They are priced at different slabs based on duration opted as the insured period.
But what if somebody is looking to take a regular health insurance plan to safeguard themselves over an unpredicted medical emergency? Are these regular family health insurance plans available in the market affordable enough? Let’s explore things to consider for choosing an affordable health insurance plan for you.
People tend to purchase health insurance plans through some agent or some references in their friend circle or community. This method is still in practice where there is less penetration of awareness. It can be said that the scenario is changing slowly as a result of mobile development, network, and internet penetration. With technological advancement, the whole encyclopedia is at our fingertips.
Compared to earlier days insurance companies are more transparent these days. Every health insurance company has an online presence. All you need to do is explore the options available and do proper research before deciding to purchase a health insurance plan.
Moreover, there are online platforms that make it easy to compare multiple plans and their features, which can be more helpful for a typical buyer to make a valuable decision. If we have to talk about key deciding factors to choose the best affordable plan, there are few aspects to look for in a health insurance plan. So what are they? Let’s have a look.
Get It When You Are Young
Generally, a health insurance plan is purchased on yearly basis and the amount we pay to keep the policy active is called the premium. The premium amount varies from person to person based on several factors like the age of insured members, the insured person’s age, and their overall health condition, geographic location, etc.
Generally, the premium would be high as the age of the insured person increases. Hence it is generally advised to take a health insurance policy when some is at their young age.
Choose Deductible Amount
Most health insurance plans would have an option to choose some deductible amount at the time of purchasing the policy. If you choose a deductible amount while purchasing health insurance, the health insurance company would be paying the medical bills only once your medical bills exceed the deductible amount. The deductible amount has to be paid out of your pocket. So if your financial condition allows you to bare some amount out of your pocket, selecting that much as a deductible amount would reduce the overall premium charged to get the same amount of coverage without a deductible amount.
Get A Minimal Base Plan And Top-Up Plan
Another option is to get a base plan that covers the minimal sum coverage and get another top-plan. The premium also depends on the amount of sum insured you choose to have. In health insurance, there are plans called top-up plans and super top-up plans. Not all insurance companies offer these top-up plans.
While purchasing top-up plans, there would be an option to choose the deductible amount. As we discussed earlier in this article, this deductible amount may be either the amount you can spend out of your pocket of the amount of cover
Choose Plans That Have Longer Waiting Periods
Health insurance plans come with some default waiting period if the insured had any illnesses already at the time purchasing the policy. Ideally, this waiting period ranges from 2 to 4 years which varies from plan to plan and company to company.
Plans with longer waiting periods are priced low compared to those with lesser waiting periods. You can choose plans with longer waiting periods provided you don’t have any critical illnesses at the time purchasing the policy or if all the insured persons are young.
Choose Plans Without Dental And Eye Coverage
The core purpose of buying health insurance should be to protect yourself or family members from any unforeseen medical emergencies. Health insurance plans that cover expenses for some health conditions and treatments like dental and eye treatments tend to be priced high. Choosing a plan without such options may cost low.
Select Plans With Sub-Limits And Co-Payment Options
Some health insurance plans come with co-payment options and sub-limits on various aspects of hospital bills. Choosing plans with such features should be your least preference to cut down on the premium amount. Because co-payment and sub-limit mean that part of the bills are to be paid by you as an insured. In general, if the overall bill amount is less, the amount you would pay is also less. But if the total bill is high so as you share of payment would be.
