A health insurance plan for you and your family provides a financial cushion during any health emergency. Yet there are times when your health insurance plan would not suffice for the increasing health costs or sometimes a particular type of treatment will be excluded from your health insurance plan. This is why you must have health insurance top-up plans in your policy. Let’s know in detail about the features of top-up health insurance and how they can help you.
Features of Top-up Health Insurance Plan:
Health insurance top up plans provides wider coverage for your policy and also helps you to claim for those treatment that are excluded from your health insurance plans.
- A backup plan: There can be a situation when your hospital bills cross the assured sum of your health insurance plan. In such a situation, you will have to pay the remaining expenses from your pocket. This is where a top up health insurance come handy. For example: You suffer from a serious health issue and you are admitted to the hospital, and when you are discharged, your bills stand up to 7 lakhs, but your sum assured is only 5 lakhs. So you will have to pay the remaining 2 lakhs from your pocket. But if you have a top-up plan you can claim the remaining amount from your health insurance top-up plans.
- Available only above your base plan: You cannot directly claim from your top-up health insurance plan unless the amount crosses your base plan’s assured sum or deductible. So if you have a deductible of up to 5 lakhs, you can claim from your top plans only if your bills exceed 5 lakhs. If it is within 5 lakhs, the expenses will be taken care of by your base plan itself.
- Comparative cheaper than any health insurance plans: Most of you may find it odd to buy a top-up plan and wish to buy a health insurance plan that offers higher assured sum. It is more convincing to buy a top-up plan rather than increasing the limit of your health insurance plan because top-up plans are cheaper compared to choosing a higher limit for health insurance plan. A top-up plan of 10 lakhs is available with just a premium of Rs. 3000 which makes it more affordable than the health insurance plan.
- Can choose a different insurer for Top up plans: In India, you can choose a health insurance plan from one insurer, and a top-up plan from a different insurer. In case if you are not happy with your present insurer and wish to change or opt for a better plan, instead of cancelling your current health insurance plan, you can choose a top-up plan from a different insurer.
What if you do not have a primary health plan?
Suppose if you do not have any primary health insurance plan you cannot opt for top-up plans. In such a scenario, you can buy a super Top-up health insurance plan.
Super Top-up health insurance plans are available even if you do not have a primary health insurance plan. You just need to set up a deductible for your super top up plan.
What is a deductible in super top-up plan?
Deductible is the amount that you are willing to pay from your pocket, after which your super top-up plan will cover the expenses. You can pay the deductibles from your pocket, from your group health coverage or your existing health insurance plan.
Benefits of super top-up plans
The benefits of a super top-up plan are similar to that of a health insurance plan. It covers treatment costs, ambulance charges etc. The difference is that you can raise a claim only after it crosses your deductible limit.
Final word:
Before finalising any health insurance plan, you must look at your needs and then finalise the plan that suits your current needs. If you feel your primary health plan would not be sufficient, you have to choose top up plans. Also if you feel you are ready to pay a part of your expenses and have a dedicated emergency fund, you can choose a super top up plan.
