Please tell me about YOUR Private Health Cover

[Jaffaz]

Wow $150pm makes ours really expensive. We are with Defence Health on Top Extras (highest cover with them, no excess) for $290pm. It is expensive but due to my boys medical issues and having DS2 at a private hospital we have got value for money over the last few years.

From talking to friends recently who are a similar age and same number of children, they pay around $250ish pm so this seems pretty average.

[allycat06]

iSelect doesn't compare all the bigger (sometimes cheaper) companies such as HBA, NIB, Medibank etc so something to take into account......

We're with NIB, just got rid of our hospital cover, for us it was a waste of money. We're both young and very healthy and I gave birth in a public hospital and planning a homebirth next time round so it's pretty irrelevant to us. Our extras is about $50 a month (for 2 adults under 30 and a baby) and includes pretty much anything you can think of. We use it a fair bit and go to the dentist twice a year.

Our combined hosp + extras was $130 a month with medium level cover and a $500 excess. Ambulance cover comes under extras and there are no out of pockets and you are covered from day one of the policies, whereas other things with have a waiting period of some sort. You need combined cover if you earn over 70k to avoid the Medicare surcharge.

[Miss.September]

iSelect doesn't compare all the bigger (sometimes cheaper) companies such as HBA, NIB, Medibank etc so something to take into account......

The guy that I spoke to from iselect gave me NIB as an option

[Nettie]

We've recently changed from Mutual Community to Medibank Private because I could claim a wider range of things (like my new orthotics). A few things are dearer now (like my chiropractor), but overall, I'm happy with Medibank. We pay about $90 a fortnight for extras (intermediate cover) and hospital.

I've chosen to have hospital cover in case I need elective surgery. The public wait list can be months or years long - but privately you can usually get it done within months. Just something to consider.

We've also got ambulance cover with SA Ambulance as the insurance only covers 'life threatening' ambulance call-outs. So if you fall off a ladder and break your leg - you could still get a bill It's $32 a year for the whole family to be covered for ANYTHING. Gives me peace of mind so I wouldn't think twice about calling an ambulance if I thought I needed one.

[nic]

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[rubibaby]

my family and i are with hcf health insurance and it costs us approx $200pm for hospital cover and extras such as dental and pregnancy cover.
we got the cover before we had our second child and we'll keep it for a while longer. i like knowing that if anyone of us needed medical attention, we would get it without delay.

[rubibaby]

my family and i are with hcf health insurance and it costs us approx $200pm for hospital cover and extras such as dental and pregnancy cover.
we got the cover before we had our second child and we'll keep it for a while longer. i like knowing that if anyone of us needed medical attention, we would get it without delay.

[Visitor6]

Medibank Private are soon to be my ex insurer.

They cover nothing useful in BLue Ribon extras to any successful limit. 21 dollars for a 100 dollar script.
Exercise physiology, which is a mainstream profession and part of the Medicare Enhanced GP Program is considered a nutural therapy as is rmedial massage so you have a couple of visits and you lose out still paying buckets all year. You want insurance that covers prevanetative health as much as restorative interventions. you'd think they'd jump at the chance to save money as an insurer-nope.

If you want a choice of specialist for elective treatments, use private health cover.

Don't make the assumption that Private Health Insurance somehow gives you special privelege rights when you are crook--the old I want a private room is a good one--if they are available and not more appropriately required for others you may get one. you wont get seen quicker because of PHI-- people are seen in order of need for example in Emergencies.

Emergency care in a private hospital including facility fees are not covered by health insurance. In a private emergency, you will see the on call specialist.

Want to pick your OB then private it is.

If you or your bub is sick--public is the way. Major pead and neonate ICUs are in the public system. If you are sick from an OB process--> really sick--then again public you should go.

Ambulance cover. I would suggest that you avoid private health insurance ambulance cover like the plague. It is a scam. They must be emergencies and even then they may reject all or part of the claim. Australian Unity has cover for ambulance in Victoria, that if you used it for one trip to hospital (you would use it all up). They couldn't reply to me on this one... a little scared.

Take out Ambulance Membership as applicable via your own state service--it's gives you reciprocal coverage Australia Wide.