PMI comparisons flawed

Specialist private medical insurance (PMI) brokers have warned of the dangers of buying direct or through comparison sites as cuts to the NHS prompt speculation that PMI could take off, The FT reports.

Brian Walters, principal of health insurance brokerage Regency Health, has warned that varying no claims discounts on private medical insurance make comparisons sites useless.

“Some insurers start new members on a high level of discount, while others enrol new members at a lower level. Equally, some discount structures are more punitive than others, with members typically losing between 10% and 25% of their discount for a single claim, depending on the insurer.”

Individual or group NCDs

Gemma Harris, operations director with PMI adviser Chase Templeton, said: “Bupa and Axa have NCDs for individuals, while Aviva does not allow child-only policies and would roll the NCD into one policy for the family. This means that if a child needed treatment on the Aviva policy, the overall cost of the policy would increase. We would recommend a plan which was a per-person policy.”

Age differences

Andrew Tripp, chief executive of Perfect Health, said: “I would never advise a client aged 55 to 70 to buy a policy with an NCD. If you were in this age group, I would suggest saving costs by buying a budget policy that covers in-patient treatment only. The savings you make can cover the incidental costs of outpatient treatment, such as seeing a consultant.”

PMI and NHS partnership

The Times carried an interview with Adrian Fawcett, chief executive of General Healthcare Group on why the NHS can no longer do everything alone

“We need to move the debate away from the NHS towards the UK’s healthcare requirements,” he said.

“We need an intelligent partnership with the private sector…. There needs to be much more of a blurring between the private sector and the NHS, and we should be requesting and looking for the person or the facility or the business that is best equipped to deal with it.”