In the UK, medical insurance providers offering private health insurance cover have adopted a system of grading hospitals. Generally this categorisation is to levels A, B or C, with ‘A’ grade hospitals being the best and most expensive. Lists of hospitals covered under a PMI Plan are usually available with any quotation and should be studied carefully before deciding. Some health insurance companies have their own or preferred hospitals for use under their health insurance plan, which may not suit you. It is important to consider the distance, reputation and range across the country, of hospitals offered by your potential PMI insurance company.

This is probably the most vital area of reading under a personal medical insurance plan after the Moratorium Clause is understood. All private health care insurance company policies carry a list of general exclusions from cover and some companies exclude more or place financial limits on certain benefits offered, particularly benefits such as routine dental cover or maternity cover. The most common exclusions are alcoholism, dental treatment, GP services, hazardous sports, infertility, pregnancy, sterilization, overseas treatment and cosmetic surgery,

In addition to any general exclusion, private health insurance companies may apply specific exclusions to health care insurance depending on the people who you wish to have covered in your health insurance private cover. If information on the application form names medical conditions which you have recently suffered from, often going back 5 years, a private health insurance UK provider may exclude such conditions from cover or qualify such cover.

All of us would like to be able to obtain cheap medical insurance, and it is perfectly reasonable for you to look at all available low cost medical insurance options. After weighing up all the options available to you, it is important that you don’t just settle for cheap medical insurance solely on the basis of premium price. Rather, you should opt for the most affordable personal medical insurance to suit your needs. You may have decided upon a cheap health insurance cover plan and know the present premiums, but how much will they be next year, or when you are 65 years old? At 40 years old, you may easily be able to afford a Comprehensive Plan, with all the “bells and whistles”. However, when you retire and are 65 years old, the sort of cost of premium you will be asked to pay may not appear to be cheap health insurance! Private health care costs are expensive as treatments become increasingly more sophisticated with new drugs and technology available. Companies providing private health cover increase premiums annually in line with medical inflation. Government legislation also affects personal health insurance premiums particularly if tax incentives to plans are either allowed or excluded. For all of these reasons, cheap medical insurance is becoming increasingly difficult to obtain.

Premiums for health insurance cover are clearly affected whether or not you take out a Standard Hospital Plan or a Comprehensive Plan. You may be able to source a relatively cheap private health insurance plan through a discounted price by agreeing to a voluntary or by paying annually rather than monthly. No claims discounts may also be offered and clearly claims do make for more expensive health insurance plan premiums in the long run. It may be noted that cheap health insurance is harder to source, as you get older. Personal health insurance premiums for those above 65 years old generally increase faster to 70 years old and beyond, rather than say from 25 years old to 30 years old.

Advisors at Medibroker Limited, an Independent PMI/PHI brokerage, aim to provide our clients with affordable medical insurance and will seek the cheapest health insurance cover to suit the client’s needs. We generally advise clients over 60 that their pursuit of cheap medical insurance is not likely to be met by taking up new Comprehensive Plans but to take out a Standard Plan only with excess. The costs simply grow so fast after that age that it becomes almost non-viable to take out a new personal medical insurance plan, which offers Outpatient care over the age of 70. Health Care Cash Plans are now available to support such Standard PMI Plans and can give a substantial support to elder citizens for routine Outpatient cover, dental and optical costs. A comprehensive health care insurance plan is far more appropriate, for example, for a married couple of 35 years old, both working, with three small children, aged 5, 7, and 10 years old.