Health Insurance Renewal Analysis and Advice

Hi all,
Our health insurance is due for renewal in a month and I have been trying to check out some more cost efficient options. We are a 65 year old couple and have been insured with VHI all our lives on what is now HealthPlus Extra policy. the amount of plans and difficulty of comparing across companies is mind boggling and confusing to say the least. We don't want to shoot ourselves in the foot by significantly lowering our cover just when we reach an age when we could possibly start to need it more! I have been looking at the 2 Laya policies Simplicity and Complete Simplicity and comparing them with our existing VHI Healthplus Extra policy. On the face of it, to me, the 2 Laya policies seem better value and the coverage seems at least as good as the VHI one. There seems no real downgrading. I am very much thinking now therefore of switching on renewal. The excesses on the Laya policies seem reasonable especially bearing in mind their cheaper cost and we have no objection to paying reasonable excesses. Any advice from the experts on the forum would be appreciated. Is my analysis correct?

Two other questions/observations:
1. The VHI policies refer to covering '100% of technical charges' in private rooms but no one else mentions that . What does this mean and is it something that the others don't cover or does it matter?
2.If we switch to these Laya policies at this stage would there be any adverse impact on our benefits if say one had to be hospitalised shortly thereafter ( day case or overnights) other than the excess amounts payments? I'm thinking that no there would not, by virtue of the fact that we have both been continuously insured with VHI for 40 years and would not have to serve time in the system again with Laya.

Hope above post not too long. Any help much appreciated and hopefully the queries raised might be helpful to some others too.

hipj60

Hi hipj60,

Welcome to AAM. Your analysis is correct. Simplicity plan fully covers a private room in a private hospital which is not fully covered on
HealthPlus Extra plan. Healthplus Extra plan fully covers the technical charges 100% and fully covers a semi-private room in a private hospital.
There would be a shortfall to pay for a private room but the technical charges are fully covered.

The only extra cover on Simplicity plan is the private room in a private hospital. So, if you have any pre-existing illness, there would be a 2 year
wait to avail of a private room in a private hospital. A semi-private room would be fully covered as before.
Any new illnesses would be fully covered in a private room straight away.

There is no waiting time applied to the extra day to day cover on Simplicity, regardless of age. Cover applies straight away.

[broken link removed]

Regards, Snowyb

Hi Snowyb, many thanks for your excellent feedback. That is so helpful and reassuring. I think we will definitely jump ship at renewal now. The side by side policy comparison you attached is very revealing too. Simplicity seems the way to go for us and also has better day to day expenses reimbursement.

The technical charges the VHI refers to as covered I'm still a small bit bemused by - I Googled the term and it seems to include theatre charges in a private hospital - however I can't imagine any health insurance providing for admission to hospitals for treatment but not covering any of the related theatre fees so I'm thinking that it is needless but unintentionally confusing wording being thrown in by the VHI in their description. Or am I misunderstanding something there?

Once again many thanks Snowyb,

Best Regards
hipj60

My understanding of 'technical charges' means simply that the 'surgery or medical procedure/treatment' is fully covered but the cost of staying
in a private single room is not fully covered. You are covered upto the cost of a semi-private shared room so you would have to pay the difference
in price for a private room under HealthPlus Extra plan if you prefer a private single room.

The amount of this shortfall for a private room depends on the private hospital in question and can be several hundred euro per night.

Simplicity plan fully covers a private single room in a private hospital as standard.

Snowyb

Thanks Snowyb that's a very helpful explanation. I think I have the understanding now of the various ins and outs of the policies and am even more convinced of our decision to change at this point.
Thanks again for your help in all this
Best regards
hipj60