5 Mistakes to Avoid While Buying Health Insurance

1. Unknowingly Opting for Insufficient Coverage

The cost of your premium determines, at least in part, the amount of coverage you can get from your plan. However, for many people, the cost of the premium becomes the foundation of their decision on which policy is worth buying. While this is solely your decision, ensure that your policy provides adequate coverage. One way to know what classifies as adequate coverage is to compare plans across insurance providers to see what is covered by most and look for outliers. In short, the cost of premiums may be an important factor in determining the Health Insurance policy for you, but it shouldn't be the only factor. Otherwise, your insurance may fail you during your hour of need.

2. Not Considering Add-Ons

Experts normally recommend getting a comprehensive policy that goes beyond basic coverage. The justification for sticking to basic healthcare coverage is that it is budget-friendly. However, adding something like a critical illness rider or personal accident rider in addition to one’s basic insurance plan can make a world’s difference. The comprehensive Health Insurance cover makes a policy complete and likely to help during an unforeseen accident. Instead of adding a rider, you can always choose a comprehensive policy that covers cashless hospitalisations, ambulance charges, domiciliary hospitalisation and more.

3. Skipping the Fine Print

The terms and conditions of a Health Insurance policy offer all the transparency regarding when it is applicable, and more importantly, when it is not. By skipping the fine print, you are potentially overlooking important information that could help determine if your policy is worth buying. While knowing the healthcare coverage of a policy is crucial, understanding its exclusions is equally important. In case you missed out on reading the fine print of your policy, you can always avail of the benefit of the free-look period, which is available for 15 days after buying the policy. This is the time you can use to carefully consider all the information in the fine print that could turn out to be significant.

4. Overlooking Other Insurance Providers

Most policyholders find it difficult to get insurance with a different provider, if they have already committed to one provider for a prior or different financial instrument. The inconvenience of setting up an account, and learning the ins and outs of the new provider is probably worth the extra money you could save on the same policy offered by them at a lower cost. Money matters in this situation wherein two exact policies from different insurance providers differ in the cost of premiums. However, by giving in to the need for convenience you may be paying a lot more for the same healthcare coverage. Hence, definitely compare policies and their fine print across insurance providers.

5. Concealing Medical History

This error is often a result of assumptions regarding how much insurance providers are supposed to know about you. It's true that insurance providers will ask for your personal details including your medical history, but concealing your medical history from a Health Insurance provider will probably do more harm than good for you. It is impossible to buy a Health Insurance policy if you give misleading or unclear medical information. This information is necessary for two reasons. The first is during claim settlement to assess why an insurer should cover your costs. The second reason is during your application process so the insurer can get an idea about how likely they are to help you out if you need them to cover your costs under the healthcare coverage.

Conclusion

Heart disease and cancer are among the lethal illnesses that seem to be growing across the country. To treat both of these ailments, major expenditure is necessary, whether it be for surgery or chemotherapy. Luckily you can get Health Insurance to cover you for these exact issues. ICICI Bank’s Heart and Cancer Insurance Plan is perfect for those at risk of these illnesses as it provides comprehensive coverage of Rs 20 lakh, at less than Rs 99 per month.

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