Saving Lives & Money: Review Your Parents' Health Insurance Before It's Too Late

As the saying goes, 'Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.' Your parents' health insurance is not just a piece of paper, it's a safeguard against potential health issues and financial disaster for you and your family.

Here are some common problems that can be avoided if you get a professional review early enough:

REAL CASE 1: DECLINED MEDICAL COVERAGE

One of my client's father (let’s call him Mr X) was in the senior management of a financial institute where he and his wife used to enjoy ultra-high medical coverage benefits. Thus, he didn’t think there was a need for personal medical insurance. When Mr X was in his fifties, he was diagnosed with stage 2 bowel cancer. Since he knew he had extraordinary corporate medical coverage, he didn’t hesitate to get the best doctors in town for the surgeries and treatments. Luckily, he recovered within 2 years and during then, he was still employed and working half the time.

However, when he was approaching his retirement age, he wanted to purchase personal medical insurance so that he could get coverage afterwards - but due to his cancer and long-time diabetes records, his applications were all declined by multiple insurance companies.

REAL CASE 2: HYPER-EXPENSIVE INSURANCE PREMIUM

My friend’s mother (Mrs Y) had great medical coverage (HK$50M lifetime benefits) bought more than a decade ago and is currently paying around HK$85K annual premium. It was one of the first high-end medical insurance back in the day. Mrs Y is currently in her seventies and she never had any policy review after purchasing this plan. Nobody told her about the government-supported VHIS (voluntary health insurance scheme), which offers plans of almost the same coverage as her current one, but it would only cost her HK$40K/year.

She had cholesterol, blood sugar, and other health problems from a few years back - her application to swap to VHIS plans was declined as her health condition couldn't pass this new insurance plan’s underwriting procedure. She didn’t want to lower the coverage as it would mean transferring the financial burden to her children, so she left herself with no choice but to continue paying hyper-expensive premiums (these old medical insurance premiums have a steep yearly increase due to old age).

DON’T FALL FOR TRAPS

There are always traps for people in the cases above. I’ll list a few here for your easy reference:

• Hiding health conditions - don’t do this as you’re only buying a false hope. If the insurance companies found evidence you were lying about your health conditions (they do have a way), they would decline your claims, and your policy would be treated as a broken contract from day 1.
• Getting insurance from a small-scale insurance company - purchasing insurance means buying an option when things go bad. It’s very common to see very low underwriting standards in these small-scale companies to compete for quick sales. But if the insurance company’s finances are not solid, it would most probably change its products’ claims conditions, be acquired by other companies and limit its old product options… etc. It’s highly suggested to only purchase insurance from companies of great scale where you live, with a long history, and with great insurance agents who truly care about you. This will save you a lot of time, energy and worries in the future.
• Not having annual reviews on your policies - some people might think annual reviews are useless, but it’s actually a good opportunity for your consultant to know about any changes in your contact details, job, family members, and financial responsibilities, and also let him/her update you on the potential better or cheaper options based on what you need. Imagine you bought an iPhone 1 in 2007 and didn’t have a review - everyone else is currently using iPhone 15 which offers better features and more options than yours. Your old phone can’t take benefit from the latest tech like 5G - what’s the point of continuously paying for the old insurance plans year after year if they don’t serve our current needs?

REVIEW NOW TO SAVE MONEY AND LIVES, DON’T DELAY

Get your trusted insurance professionals to help review and update your family’s health insurance policies now before it's too late. Or you can take advantage of our free consolidation service - “Project Gracious - Family Emergency File ” - by booking via this link . Limited monthly quota, first-come-first-served.

If you are interested in learning more about our retirement & life planning process, you can visit this page .

This article originally appeared on GraceChan.co .

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