Cheaper Business Health Insurance

The private medical insurance industry is suffering in the recession as people are changing their level of health cover. Personal healthcare director, at national specialist intermediary ADVO Group, Michael Payne says:

'We are certainly getting a lot more enquiries from existing policyholders asking how to reduce premiums and this has tended to involve excesses increasing to all sorts of levels and at looking at restricting outpatient benefits. But the encouraging thing that we have noticed this year is that there hasn’t been an increase in cancellations. People are just trading down or switching to new policies.'

So what can you do to reduce the premiums that you pay for your employees?

How much can you save?

This blog looks at specific changes you can make to a policy to reduce costs for your corporate health cover.

Change provider
Its a very competitive market out there and medical insurance companies are very happy to encourage you to do business with them. Business private health cover represents a large proportion of their business.

Ask your current provider to reduce your premiums
If you let your provider know that you are considering changing providers they are likely to offer you reduced premiums. This would probably be a more 'hassle-free' way forward for you. Business medical insurance is a lucrative market for the industry.

Reduce the level of cover
Your private health insurance provider will offer several different levels of cover. You will be able to lower the amounts paid out per treatment or tweak the level of out-patient cover that is provided.

Remove Psychiatric Cover
Normally this is only offered on the top level policies.

Limit Your Choice of Hospitals
Some providers have different hospital lists which you can choose from in order to reduce the cost of your employees cover. Standard Life Healthcare have a choice of three different lists: Countrywide, Countrywide London upgrade and the Extended London upgrade list.

Choose the Guided Option
The guided option leaves the choice of hospital you go to up to the insurance company. Standard Life Healthcare offer the guided option at a 15% reduction to your normal premium. They have 100 hospitals to choose from in their network.

Increase the excess of your policy
This puts more of the onus on your workforce so it is important to look at what your average employee would be able to afford should they need to pay an excess. There are some companies which offer extra high excess options (from £1,000 - £5,000) but this is not really suitable for most companies. Most insurance companies offer excess options of between £100 - £500.

The Six Week Option
This is where you opt to use the NHS if they can treat you within six weeks. If your appointment time is longer than this then you use your health care policy. Axa PPP Healthcare offer this type of cover and it applies to any out-patient surgical procedure, in-patient or day-patient treatment. It offers you a reduction of 10% on your premium.