Health insurance - to have or not to have???

[Taurean]

Definitely have a look at iSelect for other providers. Your PHI does sound awfully expensive.

We have family cover with HBF (a WA company) which includes hospital (private room in both private and public hospitals) and basic to intermediate extras cover. We pay $165 per month.

Our extras easily covers a checkup or two - each - at the dentist each year plus treatment if necessary. Chiro and physio are also rebated as is optical (I have reading glasses). We also have ambulance cover and a few other things I can't recall right now.

We pay a small excess for the hospital cover which I think is $50 per night for a maximum of 4 nights - so a max of $200 excess.

HBF is actually really good and I'd recommend them but I'm not sure it would be that beneficial for those in other states.

[*EJ*]

So much to think about

Astrid we have Life Insurance (for DH) and Income Protection (for DH) aswell as the PHI and that was fine when i was working but now on one wage we are doing our best to keep covering all of this but barely having anything left once we have. For me i know and feel they are necessities and i don't want to let them go but money can only go so far. That is why i want to review what we're paying and see if we have any better options. Thank you

Lionsandbears i think that was what i was thinking also when choosing between the two a couple of years ago. I figured extras to some extent are a bonus where hospital could be seen as a bit more of a necessity (if you have the right type of hospital cover (not like me)).

Next week we have a financial advisor coming out who can help review our LI & IP and at the same time i hope to have some decisions made on our PHI and hopefuly we will be a bit better sorted than we are right now.

I'm a little unsure about changing providers even with most saying Aust Unity is quite expensive. If we change now at the age we are won't it be harder to get less expensive cover anyway if they add on their extra surcharge?

I really appriciate all your help, thoughts and experiences ladies it has helped me see much clearer about why we have PHI and why we should keep it. I'm going on a girly weekend starting from 1:30pm this afternoon so when i don't reply for the next few days i'm not ignoring or thankful for your replys. Time to let my brain and body have a bit of rest with only myself and my little lady to look after for 4 days!!!!

Thank you everyone

[Miss E]

Astrid we have Life Insurance (for DH) and Income Protection (for DH) aswell as the PHI and that was fine when i was working but now on one wage we are doing our best to keep covering all of this but barely having anything left once we have.

Just a thought. It could be worth having a look at your DH getting his life insurance and Income Protection insurance through his super fund instead. There are quite few benefits:
• the premiums come out of you super, not your weekly budget
• it's usually a lot, lot cheaper than buying it as an individual directly from a bank or insurance company, because the super fund purchases the insurance on behalf of 100,000's of members so gets significant group buying discounts which they pass on to you (well at least the Industry Super funds do).
• the premiums are deducted before tax, which effectively makes them even cheaper.

I'm a little unsure about changing providers even with most saying Aust Unity is quite expensive. If we change now at the age we are won't it be harder to get less expensive cover anyway if they add on their extra surcharge?

No. Once you're in the system and a member of one fund, you can swap around as much as you like and still keep your Lifetime benefit (where you never pay more than a 30 year old) and also not have waiting periods. It when you stop being a member of any fund for a period of time that you loose these things. So if you wanted to switch from Australian Unity you wouldn't be any worse off.

HTH

[*EJ*]

Miss E that is really helpful thank you!!

I was just talking to my cousin the other day about the LI & IP coming out of super but wasn't certain how it all worked, we will discuss it next week. Our IP, LI and DH's super are all with the same company. Definatley an option.

And it's also great to know that we aren't tied to a certain company like you said. I've learnt so much in the last few days.