chew_ronnie,

i agree there is one-fits-all solution. i guess this also very much depends on your healthcare budget. if you cant afford the old-age premium it's no use taking a high coverage plan. sadly malaysia does not provide a uniform coverage as in europe where the insurers compete by price and additional benefits (rehab, private room etc).

i can understand your remarks and i can accept them. but i feel that seperating insurances and not bundling them allows you for better flexibility. say i buy a med+crit.ill.+ILP with death and TPD - if i need to change any one of those components i am first of bound by the offers of one company only (cant get the best deals anymore) and i am more often than not stuck with what i have. cancelling such combi products is often accompanied by a big loss. that is why i like to split the insurances and the investments and this is also why i dont combine med.insurance with death and TPD. it's just easier - i can assess the policies annually and switch where it seems necessary. also you can easily plan for old age - i wont need death and TPD coverage to the same degree i need it now in 30 years. i might only need TPD after all

with respect to your advice for guranteed renewable plan: this is essential! i absolutely agree - never ever take a policy whose renewal is up to the company. you will regret it if major claims happen. also make sure there will never be personal loading after you have been accepted. anything less is not worth the paper the wording is printed on.

and i appreciate your comments on the med.ins. for kids - i totally agree. dont confuse death and crit.ill. with a medical insurance - those are different things alltogether and they do cover different risks.

personally i dont have critical illness cover since we deem the med. costs will be covered by the insurance. of course the lump sum might be used to cover for the fact that you cant work and as such makes sense if you are employed. if you have assets to dispose (i.e. a business or the like) it might be viable to continue the business with an extra employee so you can get payments from this or you might be able to sell it and get a lump sum payment this way.

but it reminds me that i still need to get crit. ill. cover for my daughter - despite the lien rule

numbertwo,

i am not sure i know all that much. i just did some research and formed an opinion. i hope i right (or close to it) but i will most likely only find out if i really need the medical insurance. hopefully i wont have to find out though.

i didnt say CI is mandatory. actually i believe it has nothing to do with the issue of medical insurance at all. the medical insurance should be chosen such that i will also pay for the required medical costs that arise from any critical illness (not just the 36 you can buy extra insurance for). this of course does not hold for AIDS since no insurance company in malaysia covers this through a medical card. but that is alltogether a different issue.

why is CI usefull? if you do have one of those 36 CIs - say a severe stroke - you might find yourself in a position that you can no longer work. if you are employed and you were looking at another 30 years of hard labour then you are in trouble. this is where a cleverly chosen CI insurance can help you by paying a lumpsum that closes the gap between your working life and retirement. as such the coverage should be enough for an instant retirement. to allow for this, it has to very very high at young age and then gradually go down to zero coverage at age 65 or whatever age you want to retire. this way you can effectively cover (most) of the risk of getting so sick that you will not be able to work. death and tpd usually only cover accidents and not sickness so CI has a use there.

i hope i did make sense - this is at least why i think CI makes sense. for my daughter i would probably want a cover of rm 2,000,000 - how high ould the premium be for that chew_ronnie? she is currently 17 months. i will compare this internationally - there are insurance companies that cover the risk of not beeing able to work anymore (and nothing else) even if you are not residing in their country (look for german, uk and irish insurances targeted at expats) and the cover is cheap. i believe for my kid and rm 1,000,000 my quote was a mere 60 EUR annual premium.

feel free to discuss this further

chew_ronnie,

certain CI in europe are indeed very very cheap. i guess this also has to do with a different risk assesment.

the allianz offer is very costly for just a CI insurance. nothing attached to the policy?

premium alone would total up to 236k roughly until 65 - or is the premium degrading over time? if you invest this much you end up at 750k or even more dont you?

chew_ronnie,

i know i know... the policy premium is quoted you is only CI (but i think it covers a wider range of sickness my list has 75 listings) and no death, TPD and its not ILP. this most likely explains the entire difference in premium.

death alone for RM 1M would probably be another 60-100 EUR annually, TPD is the costly part i presume but this is not available with the insurance we use. they have this "unable to work policy" instead which is not a lump sum but pretty similar in premium to what you quoted just now so the secret is reveiled. splitting the insurances can get specific covers you want at very low prices

and yes, we'll go ahead and take the policy from the german insurer. they are surprisingly unworried about the fact that they insure a malaysian citizen. they say they cover worldwide no matter what. just reserve the right to check with a german doc if they doubt the diagnosis which seems reasonable.

Hi all,

I m newbie here...but i find premium for TM medicPlus is extremely cheap compare to normal conventional insurance provider... does it sound fishy????

As for guarantee renewal issue, there is a guideline by MMA that all insurance provider shud quote "it is guarantee renewal provided the insurer continue to provide this plan in the market". Which mean any insurance provider (IP) are allowed to withdraw the plan provided they have informed their customer few months in advance. Normally IP will opt to withdraw the plan rather than absorbing the losses if the claim is too high or mismanage continuously.

A typical example  : i have a real case happen to my friend's mum who bought a medical card frm SIHAT MALAYSIA was not allowed to renew after she made a claim due to minor stroke hospitalisation.

On the other hand, another case where my friend's mum was allowed to renew her medical card with Great Eastern without any discruption after she made a claim due to Parkinson.

I was told to opt for Life insurance provider instead of General life Insurnce provider due guarantee renewal issue...as normally reputable Life Insurance Provider has better/larger pool for risk assesment.

cutepigy

Lusmays, your answer is irrelevant as I was responding and asking questions with regards to what mfitri77 said "That's true also, but I would like to advise that if your insurance have the 20% co-insurance penalty for room upgrades, make sure you get the best room cover available that you can afford." Bear in mind the 20% co-insurance is DUE TO R&B upgrade and has NO limit.

Perhaps mfitri77 can answer my questions.

Chill, Chill, here to share.

For those who are wondering who I am, yes, I am Pru agent also, I am also a GI agent, currently with Kurnia, and I have quite a background in law.

Okay, lets begin to answer some questions.

1. Can I pay room myself? Or can I nego with hospital about what's in the bill?

Short answer is no - If you have a medical card, its all or nothing. Either use the medical card to pay everything, or don't use it and pay yourself. Nego with hospital concerning bill also, unless your cable is quite strong I don't think you can do, because insurers can easily kick you off the panel if they are caught, and no hospital in the right mind would care to lose panelship (imagine potential patient going to another hospital because they have to pay first at your hospital). Another reason why its damn hard to get a copy of your official receipt, needed to make a claim from another insurer, because insurers only accept original receipt, and hospitals are told not to issue copies to avoid double claiming.

2. Whats up with the R&B

I see two difference, one with GI medical cards and the other with Life medical cards.

GI medical cards usually go for deductibles, or cashless with 20% co-insurance room upgrade charge. Problem with some GI's with 20% co-insurance charge is there are usually no capped limits on the charge. The other is the fact that some don't talk about room upgrade, some only talk about room charges. This is even more dangerous because you can get hit with 20% if your four bedded exceed say for example RM100, say RM120. Dah la have to pay the difference..

Life however is a bit different, because the usually cap the charges. Take Allianz for example. Sure, got 20% co-insurance if you upgrade, but its capped at RM1000. If you follow the room rate, you don't pay co-insurance at all makes it a better option then say Pru, (I sure kena with my leader on this), which hits you with co-insurance regardless.

The only thing I don't know about Allianz is their reputation in paying out claim.

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Added on March 22, 2010, 9:16 am

Another aspect of Pru polices is the frequent upgrade. In one year, it went from PMM4 to PMM5 to PruHealth - Three upgrades in the span of one year. PMM4 low lifetime limit compared to PMM5, with high lifetime limit to PruHealth which is plus NCB for no claims.

The thing I'm not happy about PruHealth is its exlusions are now the same with everyone else (adds knee and spinal condition), and concerning epidemics, plus the NCB. What it means that before this, you get a nice policy for RM100, now you don't.

What i heard is that GE's smart medic do have max cap, which is 20% and RM 500 max. Besides, GE's smart medic also have annual limit of RM 90k and lifetime limit of RM 720k for RM 150 R&B. Correct me if i'm wrong

Oh, then its true i think. I misunderstood ur previous post. What other companies that have max cap for upgrading R&B?

But how do the annual and lifetime limit of Allianz's medical card look like? And is it standalone or rider?

ok. thanx ronnie.

I assume reasonable and customary charge is a charge that sound normal maybe something like market price. Means Allianz will not pay something that sound very ridiculous.

Ronnie are right in this point. More information about "Reasonable and customary charges" refer to this link :
http://health.howstuffworks.com/reasonable...mary-charge.htm
Hope the article will clear up all the confusion regard this term.
As I'm an AIA agent, I hav check my brochure of medical card as it also stated "Reasonable and customary charges up to co-ins free amount."
No offence as it really stated in the brochure of AIA medical care plus.

I just want to check with you guys and share information. I am not here to offend anybody and I think my involvement only to provide information and up to people out there to choose which product are best for them. I never said Pru is the best but so far what Pru had is best suit me and I foresee it will suit for me in the future. Everybody need is different and nothing in this world can be best for everybody in this world.

I am also here to educate people, you should have insurance, regardless with which company and I am happy to share my experience. Even though you hold lots of policy and broucher with you, it doesn't mean you are the best. There are too many details in each product and I dare you 'hafal' all the terms. I was asking you the term because it keeps highlighting in your brouchure and I just want a short and quick answer from you. But you do not reply straight to me. And I believe you just do your home work only after I ask you the question, 2nd time. But maybe 3rd time because mfitri did ask earlier.

I become an agent is not for me to make lots of money from commission. I found it is good to have insurance after my sons and I need to be hospitalized and at that time I used my company's medical card. Since most agent is not so transparent (mostly just want to collect commission regardless which company), I decided to become an agent so that I can access lots of information and learn more about insurance. And I love to share something good with others. Sorry if my habit disturbing you. I did compare few insurance company especially its medical card (but not AIA - I wish I can learn more from AIA) and at the end I choose Pru because of its flexibility to upgrade policy and its service in making claim and also Pru has Takaful.

We are here no to offend anybody. I believe we are here to share and the most important thing for people outside to have more information regarding the insurance. There is no competition here to be won.

There is a little story I've been meaning to share.

A client of mine bought a takaful ILP for her daughter from me. 2 months after policy in force, her husband called me at 5.00 am (lucky it was Ramadan, so was up having sahur), and asked if his daughter would be eligible to go into hospital with the medical card from Pru. She was having continous high fever which no antibiotics from clinics can seem to cure.

Unfortunately, he has to pay first. Pru medical card has 3 waiting periods, the first month for accidents only, 2 to 3rd month can go into hospital, but pay first, claim later and lastly, the 4 months (120 days) spesific illness waiting period. Needless to say, I told him that if he chooses to do so, he has to pay the bill first and then claim from Pru.

Little did I know how special this case would be. The first doctor cannot come up with a diagnosis after 9 DAYS of hospitalization, 3 of those in isolation ward due to suspected H1N1, later ruled out, it was decided that the family get a second opinion from another doctor. The second doctor diagnosed the kid with incomplete Kawasaki Diesease.

Another phone call ensued. The nurses there sort of spooked my client when they told her *** insurance does not pay for antibiotic treatment costing RM1k that the doctor told my client her daughter needed. No such exclusions in the policy was there after I checked, and I told her to tell the doctor to proceed.

Final bill? Slightly higher than 15k.

Submit claim to Pru, and Pru requested everything from her neo-natal report (check Kawasaki Diesease why), checkup report, regular doctor report and all that. It took a few months to process the claim, lucky my client understands (Rm200 paid and suddenly go and claim RM15k?) before got approval.

Discussion Points

Let's see spesific cases, claim procedure etc.

1. What's the waiting period like for other cards? For pru, 1 month accident only, 2-3 month pay first (even if you have the medical card) claim later and 120 days spesific illness.

2. Your experience in using the medical cards. Any problem encountered? Who solves your problem?

3. Cost you / your client actually paid, regardless of what's written in the policy.

Lastly,

4. If you're an agent, how confident are you that your insurer will honor what is said?

just a side note,
for AIA medical card, eventhou you dont have the medical card with you, you just tell the hospital you have certain medical plan with AIA
they will check with AIA with the i/c number. that'll do as sometime some ppl didnt brought their card always

just abit of not understand.
why two different product?
Traditional Life product , sum insured 50K + 36CR,
IL sum insured 110k+36CR with medical

how much do you pay for two actually?
i found its abit funny to buy almost same thing.
Anyway, the sum-insured is low. RM160K now days can't help alot.
Imagine you bought this plan and 1 year later touch wood  sayonara, the funeral itself already taken you 20% of the amount.

the information provided very brief, cant give you a clear idea if the plan suitable or not

sorry if i ask stupid question... does any insurance company that sell medical card offer cash bonus after end of premium date ? Means like u pay for 20 yrs then maybe u get back the sum premium insured?

imo, from what i heard from ex-GE holicy holders, they claimed they were able to admited to hospital "han han dei" need to wait 2 hours

so i think Tag time should be around 1.5 hours to 2

hi all

is it true that if we have medical card, and we claim during the first year, the insurance company have the rights to refuse our renewal for the second year? although it already stated in the brochure that the company cannot refuse policy renewal.

Hi,

I  just want to ask your opinion. My mum is looking for insurance - general insurance to be exact where she can use the card for medical claim, etc.

she is now at 45 years old and which one is suitable for her? Honestly I have no idea where to start finding. I hope you guys can direct me with a few suggestion on the best policy for my mum.

thank you.