Quality Product Research: Medical – when the selected excess doesn’t match the plan excess

Recently we have been challenged by several advisers on how we can rate a benefit where an insurer applies an excess, which is lower than the plans selected excess. 

For example, we refer to the Major Diagnostic wording in Partners Life Private Medical Cover. A client may decide to select a $2,000 excess to reduce cost or ensure coverage for high-cost treatments. However, the excess applied for claims under this benefit will either be nil (if the client has selected a nil excess) or $250. In comparison, the client may not even be eligible to make this claim in this scenario with a competing insurer or in some cases be surprised that an excess is required for a claim to be accepted. This is a significant and valuable difference that we are interested in showing in our Research.  

We would love to hear your insights and how you think we could incorporate this into our Research ratings. A while ago we added a sub-item “Diagnostics excess is not limited but matches plan excess” which you are able to see in your Detailed Head-to-Head comparison, but we do need a new and innovative way to show the value of this so welcome any feedback you are willing to offer.

Please email your ideas to [email protected]

Related Posts