Insurance policies covering financial requirements arising from medical needs often offer several forms of assistance. While some cover hospital charges, some cater to daily expenses. There are policies which even specialise in specific health hazards and medical issues.
Understandably, several customers opt to buy multiple policies so that all their medical and health expenses are covered, especially if any sudden emergency demands monetary assistance.
Customers with more than one health insurance in place can avail numerous types of benefits, though it is important to note that two claims cannot be made simultaneously on the same medical expense. While customers cannot avail financial assistance from multiple policies at the same time, there are numerous tips which can help them to reduce expenses from their own pocket by availing different aspects and benefits of their health insurance policies.
Understanding contribution of policies:
Before going into tips, it is imperative customers understand contribution clause, which previously dictated equal payment from different policies in case the same medical issue is covered by them. Under new regulations, this contribution clause does not come into effect if claim amount is less than sum insured under such a health insurance policy. There are numerous scenarios where this clause is not in effect.
Important to note, cover plans like employee group health insurance policies often do not provide high cover amounts and therefore personal plans are often put into effect. Under such circumstances, contribution clause becomes a very deciding factor.
Different situations of claim and application of such clauses are discussed in detail under the vital tips for claims.
Steps and tips for claim of multiple policies:
Firstly, basic steps of filing claims from multiple health insurance online policies must be understood. Usually these claims are settled within a few weeks.
- All relevant financial institutions should be immediately intimated during hospitalisation.
- First claim should be filed with the aggregator with the highest insurance amount.
- All original bills and receipts must be attached with the claim.
- A receipt of all original bills presented must be taken from the first insurance company. Additionally, the claim settlement documents must be availed too.
- Additional attested copies of original bills and receipts must be acquired from hospitals to present before other financial aggregators.
- With settlements claimed from the first NBFC, customers can file their next claim.
- Along with all bills and receipts, claim settlement documents from the first company must be presented to the next institution.
- In case customers want to file claims from other companies too, they can simply go through the above procedure.
Consequently, keeping the underneath tips in mind especially helps when a health situation arises and claims from multiple policies must be filed.
- Individuals opting for multiple medical insurance policies should mention their existing cover plans while applying for new ones. This is vital since if not mentioned, their claims can become null and void.
- There are numerous policies on offer from NBFCs and customers should choose policies which complement each other.
- For policies with fixed insured amounts dealing with critical illness, contribution clause is not in effect. Customers should keep in mind to make full claim since these mostly have flat insurance amounts. Typically in such circumstances, customers can make claims from all the institutions.
- While customers can easily buy the best health insurance plans in India, it is generally the older policies which have higher insurance amounts since they have had a longer period of maturity.
Along with multiple policies for individuals, customers should also consider family floater health insurance plans. In case such family health insurance plans are active, customers can file claims from these policies too.
