As a Tier 2 family (family income within $210,001-280,000) for family health cover we are paying $260PM for Budget Hospital with $500 Excess and Bronze Extras at BUPA. One of us only use optical once a year out of the extra service.
Are We Paying Too Much for Private Health Insurance?
anonymoususer on 21/10/2017 - 17:04
Last edited 22/10/2017 - 14:31 by 1 other user
Last edited 22/10/2017 - 14:31 by 1 other user
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hehe, just made into that bracket and to keep up with OZB purchases we must revisit existing expenses.
Maybe they're a polygamist family where there are 5 wives and they all work.
$260 here and $260 there per month and suddenly that income is not as much as it could be
Now I'm not saying its the same thing as trying to live on a lower income, but its still appropriate to focus on expenses.
For the OP - you can compare plans as you probably know. The issue is that the cheaper plans often pull out some coverage that you may not care about (eg obstetrics perhaps) but tend to pull out cover for things you will care about (knee surgery or heart surgery). For the latter you are covered by public, and probably a bad heart will get you seen pretty quick. But bad knees are a long wait.
Anyway, what you are paying seems to be around the market average.
That said, it is very rare to cover the costs of extras. Even if you have a very expensive item (like braces), the yearly and lifetime limits are often pretty low and it can be cheaper not paying for extras at all and self insuring. Do your sums big time on extras cover - usually not worth it; and potentially you arent claiming all that you can claim anyway
(family income within $210,001-280,000) for family health cover we are paying $260PM
Ohh, the horror. 😱
It's supposed to cost around about the same as your tax savings.
You could cancel the insurance and save $260PM but it will cost you a minimum of $220PM in additional tax so your effective cost is less than $40PM.
It's a cheap policy that doesn't cover much but it's saving you some tax so it's worth keeping.
I would rather pay the tax and know some of my money goes to hospitals and education than pay a PHI company and bump up their profit for something that in case of real emergencies I will be sent to public system anyway.
PHI is good for elective procedures where you can't wait, but medically can. All else considered I rather more public spending capacity with my money
We pay way too much for too little benefit.
I'm single and on a medium level of income. I was paying just over $200/month on health insurance and had the cover for over 10 years. It was originally $70/month at the start and just kept increasing more and more each year.A couple years ago, I was sick and I was visiting a number of specialists. The total spend was a few thousand dollars over a 6 month period. Medicare rebated a portion of the cost each time, but the "top cover" insurance that I was paying for didn't even cover a cent of it!
I've also been admitted to hospital and it was all paid with public funds - not out of my pocket and not from my insurance.
While I knew before that the policy didn't cover specialists, I didn't think much about it until it happened. My incident above really made me wonder what the point of paying so much for this cover was. I dropped my insurance cover after that and now I'm just paying the Medicare levy surcharge.
And I don't get why the stupid government forces us to buy private insurance given that the public health system doesn't seem to benefit from it!
AFAIK, when you are at a public hospital, if you mention that you have private insurance, they can bill your provider so that at least part of the cost is borne by the insurance company and not public funds.
This is how I understand it.
When I left hospital, I (without thinking) went to the window and asked them how I pay, but the nurse giggled and said that it's all free in a public hospital. I asked if she wanted my insurance details and she said no. So I just thanked her and left. To be honest, I felt a little stupid on my way out! That, and because I didn't have any shoes on! haha
Someone else has mentioned your understanding to me afterwards too. Next time (although fingers crossed I never have to go back), I'll ask them again =)
For tax reasons you dont need extras cover and seeing that you dont get much benefit out of it, why dont you look at cancelling the extras and just have hospital?
My family pays something close to $480/m and that’s after a corporate discount of 10% and my old man’s senior discount. We hardly get any value out of it, except the dental and optical cover (we all wear glasses or contact lenses). However, it does cover obscure things like hip and knee replacements and psychiatric care. I don’t know how much health insurance should cost, but given the way excesses are structured and the shitty claim percentage I don’t think it’s good value at all.
In all the years of having it, on top of dental and optical extras which we use we’ve only had only one major operation (had to pay $2000 out of pocket), two admissions to rehab ($0 out of pocket, got $60k worth of value), some day admissions to rehab group sessions and one emergency stay of 7 days in hospital. The worst part about it all was the providers all dipped into Medicare too, so the taxpayer still had to pay a substantial amount of money for stuff that’s not worth half their actual cost.
Private health is a huge scam for healthy people.
The companies and the govt need young healthy people (financial losers) in the pool to subsidise the old and sick.
If you are healthy , cancel private insurance , you will be financially better off.
if you're in the $200k bracket then you're in the top fraction of 1% so you should have people you can talk to you to maximise your benefits
the fact you even ask here is a bit strange but yes, pay what minimum you need to and move on
Wow your income is so high no need to worry about small expenses like that. I wish i have the same…