Health Care International - or go Thai?

[WorriedNoodle]

I've been signed up with Health Care International HCI (advertiser in this site) for about 4 years for Emergency cover worldwide (except USA) as a 56yo expat.

 

Two questions:

 

1. For accident insurance is it cheaper for me to use some Thailand only based company as I almost always only need cover in Thailand as I mostly expat inside Thailand or should I stay with HCI?

2. Each year HCI sends me an updated more expensive premium to renew (based on age and inflation they say), but if I go to their web site and sign up for same plan its about 40% cheaper, anyone notice this? It would be cheaper to make a new plan each year rather than extend? For example an Emergency plan quotes me 850USD on the web site as a new member and they have invoiced me over 1200USD to renew same which I doubt I will pay.

[Sheryl]

I can't answer the second question, you need to ask HCI.

For the first question,

- why on earth would you want a plan limited to accidents? You need to consider all medical emergencies i.e. anything that would require immediate treatment while in Thailand.

 

- Thai based policies will not be cheaper in premium (quite the opposite) but   they usually do not include an excess, whereas I see that HCI has a $1,000 excess per incident.

 

If you want an idea of Thai policy costs got to the websites of MSH and BUPA and get online quotes.

 

http://sea.msh-intl.com/en/individual-asiacare-asiacare

http://www.bupa.co.th/en/individuals/health-insurance/individual/index.aspx#.WIscEIXh7Dw

 

Note that the maximum level of cover possible with BUPA is only 5 million baht so much, much less than HCI or MSH.

[WorriedNoodle]

3 hours ago, Sheryl said:

why on earth would you want a plan limited to accidents?

Thanks for feedback. Sorry my mistake I did not mean accident cover only. I have been subscribed to Emergency Plus package with HCI which covers in patient only mostly after a deductible. I have previously used Bupa Thailand but found their premiums much higher than HCI.

 

I will wait for HCI to explain the differences on their quotes.

 

[WorriedNoodle]

On 1/27/2017 at 8:25 PM, WorriedNoodle said:

I will wait for HCI to explain the differences on their quotes.

 

Well based on their answer which I suppose cannot be discussed publicly, but suffice to say I will be now looking for another provider it seems.

[KittenKong]

On 27/01/2017 at 3:08 PM, WorriedNoodle said:

2. Each year HCI sends me an updated more expensive premium to renew (based on age and inflation they say), but if I go to their web site and sign up for same plan its about 40% cheaper, anyone notice this? It would be cheaper to make a new plan each year rather than extend? For example an Emergency plan quotes me 850USD on the web site as a new member and they have invoiced me over 1200USD to renew same which I doubt I will pay.

 

Insurers all over the world do this. It is well known.

 

Never hesitate to negotiate hard with insurers and to play them off against each other. They are not your friends and are only interested in moving money from your pocket to theirs.