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No More Breaking the Bank: How Health Insurance Can Help You Save Money

Health insurance helps you save money by covering costly medical treatments while simultaneously offering various benefits such as mental healthcare, dental and vision care, and more. This is great news for expats living overseas, as healthcare may be more expensive compared to their home country.

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Whether you’re an expat overseas, a local citizen, or a traveler on vacation, always remember that the risk of illnesses and injuries will always exist. This Pacific Prime article will discuss how health insurance can help save you money.

Why Health Insurance Matters

Regardless of whether you’re an expat living abroad, a local citizen, or just a traveler on a family vacation, the risk of illnesses and injuries will always exist.

Additionally, for expats or travelers on vacation abroad, depending on the particular country you’re located, healthcare may be more expensive than in their home country. However, with a suitable health insurance plan, you can safeguard your finances through comprehensive coverage.

This will allow you to get the right form of medical treatment you need without breaking the bank. Additionally, depending on the particular plan you choose, you could also gain access to various additional benefits, such as dental and vision care, mental healthcare, and much more.

Healthcare Without Breaking the Bank: How Health Insurance Helps You Save Money

Different ways health insurance helps you save money include covering various forms of medical care along with offering various forms of benefits, all of which you can tailor to match your unique healthcare priorities.

Below, we’ll be discussing how health insurance helps you save money.

Comprehensive Medical Care Coverage

The first advantage of a health insurance plan, saving you tons of money, is its ability to cover various forms of medical care. Expats or travelers abroad are equally at risk of injuries or illnesses, as living in their home country and medical care may be more expensive abroad than locally.

Without suitable health insurance, any injuries or illnesses, along with medication and treatment, will require complete out-of-pocket payment, which can be incredibly problematic, especially for individuals on low income.

However, a comprehensive health insurance plan allows you to seek various forms of medical treatment without incurring significant costs. These may include physician or specialist consultations, prescription medications, or vaccinations.

Additionally, insurance brokers can also help you secure comprehensive health insurance plans and suggest options for copayments and deductibles to manage your premiums.

The Relevance of Brokers in the Health Insurance Industry

Offering Additional Benefits

The other advantage of a health insurance plan is its ability to offer various additional benefits. Some of these additional benefits could include mental healthcare, dental and vision care, hearing care, chiropractic care, or maternity and newborn care.

Some of these additional benefits can really come in handy for expats moving abroad with their families.

For instance, the dental care benefits would be perfect for you and your other family members to get dental care, while your spouse would appreciate the maternity and newborn care if you are expecting a child abroad.

Access to a Network of Healthcare Providers

Health insurance plans also allow access to various hospitals and clinics thanks to a network of healthcare providers courtesy of the selected insurer. Insurers can negotiate reasonable rates with healthcare providers that are part of their network of providers.

This allows expats to access affordable medical attention without compromising quality. Without a health insurance plan, you could be forced to pay completely out-of-pocket in full, which can be a huge hassle, especially if it’s common for the country you’re living in to have high healthcare costs.

How to Find the Right Health Insurance Plan

Now that we’ve discussed how health insurance helps you save money, let’s now move onto the next question you may have in mind: “How do I find the right health insurance plan?”.

Finding the right health insurance plan involves defining your healthcare needs, comparing multiple plans from different insurers, understanding the terms and conditions, and referring to customer feedback.

Below we will discuss the steps to finding the right health insurance plan that aligns with your budget and healthcare needs.

Define Your Healthcare Needs

Finding a suitable health insurance plan requires defining your specific healthcare needs, specifically what your healthcare needs are for you and your family.

For instance, if you’re living abroad on your own or you’re already healthy and you don’t need beyond annual health checkups, a basic plan will be enough.

On the other hand, if you’re bringing your family along on your relocation or vacation, or if you have any pre-existing conditions in need of constant healthcare, private health insurance is worth considering.

Comparing Between Multiple Plans

When comparing plans from multiple insurers, remember to pay close attention to comprehensive coverage, access to a network of healthcare providers, and any additional benefits, and not decide solely based on price point.

This is because while there are affordable plans, they may not grant you the coverage you need, which can be problematic for families or just individuals with pre-existing conditions.

Comparing plans on your own may be equally as time-consuming as it is costly, which is where an insurance broker comes in. An insurance broker can serve as a second opinion, allowing you to discuss and filter out appropriate health insurance plans.

This is because in addition to the big names in the insurance industry, there may also be smaller insurers offering plans for excellent value out there that you may not know of, to which an insurance broker’s expansive knowledge of the industry is especially useful for you.

Assisting in plan comparisons is just one of the roles of an insurance broker. For more information on the role of an insurance broker in the industry, click the link below to check out our article on insurance brokers for further reading.

The Relevance of Brokers in the Health Insurance Industry

Know the Terms and Conditions

Make sure you carefully read and understand the terms and conditions on health insurance plans before selecting one. By doing so, you know what is and isn’t covered under the plan, as each plan will have varying terms and conditions.

This means just because one area isn’t covered by a particular plan, this doesn’t exactly mean the other plans will also exclude the same area. If you have further questions surrounding potential coverage limits, you can contact the insurer’s customer service for further information.

Refer to Customer Feedback

As part of plan comparisons, customer feedback is another crucial factor that will help you decide on a health insurance plan. Reading reviews from the insurer’s past clients, potentially including various expats and travelers, can shape your decision on whether this insurer is trustworthy.

You can also seek recommendations from friends and family members, which can be especially helpful if they’ve previously chosen health insurance plans from particular insurers.

Conclusion

In conclusion, with a suitable health insurance plan that covers your unique healthcare needs, you can effortlessly access quality medical care without breaking the bank. With additional benefits such as dental or vision care, you can also not only safeguard your own health but also your family’s.

When selecting a plan, it’s also strongly advised that you enlist the help of at least a second opinion in the form of an insurance broker. Their expertise and knowledge in the insurance industry can help guide you through plan comparisons so you know which plan is right for you.

If you’ve made it this far in the article, you now know that wherever you’re headed, you are always at risk of injuries and illnesses, and healthcare abroad may be more expensive compared to your home country.

Having the right health insurance plan, however, can alleviate the financial stress from these unexpected, overwhelming medical bills. While plan comparisons can be daunting, it doesn’t always have to be a nightmare, and that’s where we come in.

As an international health insurance broker with over 20 years of experience, Pacific Prime has helped numerous clients, such as expats and travelers, seek out suitable health insurance plans that not only tick the boxes for their budget range but also their unique healthcare needs.

Whether you’re an expat living overseas or just a traveler looking to spend quality time with your family across international borders, we will be more than pleased to help you out with completely impartial advice at no additional cost.

If you have any further questions, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us and get a free quote here for plan comparisons.

Content Writer at Pacific Prime
Wish Sutthatothon (Nickname: Guy) is currently a content writer at Pacific Prime Thailand, an insurance broker that connects individuals and businesses with insurance providers worldwide. He creates and edits blog articles, guides, reports, webpages, and other types of digital content.

He graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication Arts, Media & Communication major (concentration: Creative Content) from Mahidol University International College (MUIC). During the compulsory major elective period in the summer of 2021 and voluntarily during the summer of 2022, he also interned as a video and photo editor at Mbrella Films.

He has experience working as an English Content Writer at a real estate buying/renting/selling platform in Thonglor. There, he crafted company blog posts on a multitude of topics. Topics include market trends, legal issues and disputes in property businesses, financial guides, expat guides, home insurance, home decoration and maintenance, and weekly real estate news quick-recaps. Occasionally, as part of the blog-writing process, he would also translate existing Thai blogs to English.

In his free time, Guy enjoys doing scriptwriting and storytelling for comic strips, watching movies, and listening to music (particularly film scores).
Wish Sutthatothon
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