C3PO

Interesting bike. For those who bought it: Is the CL500 worth the extra 80k tbh compared to the CL300? Especially given the road conditions and traffic in Thailand.

Hello everyone, According to several warnings here the cost of potential child birth complications could run into the millions. My wife is Thai, so she is covered by universal healthcare. However, the hospital where she is registered does not have an NICU, so we checked Sriphat, which seems to be a popular option for childbirth in Chiang Mai. Paying for the birth is not the problem, but I would like to minimize the financial risks of potential complications. Two questions: 1. If there were complications in a hospital that is not her registered hospital (for example Sriphat), would that be covered by the UHC as it’s an emergency? 2. Would the baby be covered by the UHC, for example for a stay in an NICU? The baby will be a Thai national, so technically, it should be covered from day one. But if it's in not my wife's registered hospital, I am not sure how that works in this case. I will ask at the hospital as well but I am not sure how much I can rely on the answers from their front desk. We could also ask them to refer us to another public hospital, then I believe everything should be covered. It would be great to hear your thoughts. May thanks, and have a great day.

Thanks, @Celsius, I didn't know about the life insurance requirement. Another option would be to include Thai nationals under an expat policy. However, with many of these policies, their cover would end if the expat policyholder dies, meaning they would then be back to using universal healthcare. But that would still better than paying for a policy that doesn't deliver when it matters.

I would be curious to hear what your experiences were with the universal health care scheme in terms of the quality of healthcare. Would you rather pay for private health insurance for a Thai national, or use the universal healthcare scheme and then pay out of pocket for room upgrades and diagnostic tests, etc. to speed up processes? From what other people have commented on this forum, many Thai private insurance policies come with serious red flags.

My understanding of this policy wording: You will only be refunded reasonable and customary costs (which is a standard clause for almost every insurance policy) and they provide you a list of hospitals that they believe charge reasonable costs. That doesn't mean you cannot use other hospitals or will automatically be charged 20% deductible, as long as the costs these hospitals charge are classifed by April as being reasonable. - just my understanding, best to clarify with the insurance directly.

This is an old thread, but maybe still useful information. I learned that with some international insurances (April for example) you can take your Thai partner on your insurance plan, even if you both live in Thailand and she/he is a Thai national. It works only if the expat is the main policyholder. The downside is if the expat gets off the policy, the Thai partner won't be able to keep the insurance.

Has anyone used the AXA SmartCare plan? That's a rather new plan and insures only in Thailand as opposed to the AXA SwitchCare which insures in Asia. Premiums are considerably lower and coverage looks ok. What I don't understand is that they set limits "per illness". What does that mean? Is that per illness/ per year or is that over a lifetime? Big difference, but the Terms & Conditions don't clearly explain that.

The idea is to use private insurance wherever possible to have choice of hospital and avoid long waiting times, etc. However, considering that the local private insurance plans don't cover certain things and have low limits in place for some conditions, I was wondering if the 30-baht scheme does cover those things. This way we could use the private insurance where possible and where not possible we could fall back to the gov. health scheme, meaning we would then have to accept the drawbacks that may come with that system, but at least have access to healthcare.

Hi all, I have some questions regarding local health costs in Thailand: I am looking for a local health insurance policy for a Thai family member (international policies are not an option for Thai citizens living in Thailand). She is covered under the 30-baht scheme, but I want some top-up because I don’t want to deal with the administrative hurdles and long waiting times. The April policy seems to be popular in this forum, so I have some questions: 1. The April essential plan covers organ transplants up to 1,6 million TBH and kidney dialysis up to 163,000 TBH per policy year. Both limits seem low to me, but I am not familiar with health care costs here. Do you guys think those limits are ok? The higher plan covers organ transplants up to 5 million THB and kidney dialysis up to 1.6 million THB, which sounds more reasonable. 2. As a backup we could use the 30-baht scheme to cover things like dialysis or organ transplants that the plan excludes or has low limits on. Is there a list somewhere where I can see what is covered under the 30-baht scheme? Also, if you have made good experiences with other local policies, I would be happy for a pointer in the right direction. Also in regards to their claim handling. AXA has a good policy as well, although more expensive. Many thanks for any advice you can give.

Thanks for the answers so far. I did as scubascuba3 suggested and wrote to the insurer. Will share the answers here if I get any. Good point. Please share if you find any information regarding that. European regulators might also place a limit on price hikes based on age, but I am not sure about that. Another question I sent to the insurer is what they define as "mental or nervous" disorder, which their plans exclude or restrict. I am not sure if those are strictly psychological issues or if diseases such as Alzheimer, MS etc. would also fall under that definition. Will share an answer here if I get one.

Also regarding the April International Policy (issued in France), I have two questions to those having studied the contract: 1. Is it really lifetime renewable? The contract says in section 3. WHO IS COVERED UNDER THE PLAN? To be covered by the insurance, You must: On the Effective date of the plan, be: > between the age of 16 and 64 for medical expenses, repatriation assistance and personal liability (private capacity) cover, if covered in zone 0, Thailand and Mexico, Then under 4.4 f) when You no longer meet the conditions of insurance (see paragraph 3). Cancellation will take effect at the end of the current period and at the latest within 30 days of receipt of notification, subject to receipt of a supporting document; The question is, what means "effective date"? The policy states: "EFFECTIVE DATE: date on which the plan starts. It is specified on the Membership certificate". What date is specified in the membership certificate: Is it the first date that I take out the insurance, or is it the annual renewal date? Because if it is the latter, April can terminate the contract after age 64. 2. The contract says they exclude "in the event of Hospitalisation or excessive unreasonable or unusual costs considering the country in which they were incurred". What is the insurance definition of "unreasonable or unusual cost"? For example, if I were to get treatment in a private hospital such as Bangkok Hospital, the cost would be higher than in a government hospital. Would the insurance deem this as unreasonable? Many thanks for anyone who can provide clarity, it's much appreciated.