THE MAJORITY of consumers could save hundreds of euro on private health insurance by simply shopping around, the Health Insurance Authority (HIA) said yesterday.
Liam Sloyan, its chief executive, made the announcement after a survey by the authority found more people are cancelling their private health insurance policies as a result of the recession. Some 16,000 cancelled their policies in the first three months of this year alone.
He said there were more than 200 health insurance products now on the market but many of the cheaper ones were not displayed on insurance company websites or were difficult to find on those websites.
He said all the products were available to everyone and individuals could get the same value as those in large corporate schemes. “The majority of health insurance consumers can save hundreds of euro without significantly reducing their cover,” he said.
The HIA, the independent regulator of the private health insurance market in Ireland, has details of all of the products available including those normally only marketed to large group schemes. Consumers can access these on its website at www.hia.ie or by telephoning the authority on 1850 929 166.
His comments came as the HIA published the findings of a survey carried out last November and December. It found the recession has already impacted on the Irish health insurance market, although the decline in the proportion of the population with health insurance “has been relatively small so far”. It confirms there has been an increase in the number of cancelled policies over the past few years, up from 9 per cent in 2005 and 13 per cent in 2007 to 15 per cent in 2009.
Key reasons given by those who cancelled their policies or let them lapse were the cost of insurance (44 per cent) and loss of a job (19 per cent).
The recession is also impacting on consumers expectations in relation to their health insurance cover, with the number who say they plan to upgrade or maintain their level of cover over the next 12 months dropping from 89 per cent in 2007/2008 to 73 per cent in 2009 and the proportion of those who do not know increasing from 9 per cent to 22 per cent.
Overall three out of four people surveyed said they had been affected in some way by the economic downturn. Some 45 per cent said they or their family had taken pay cuts, 19 per cent said they had been affected by job losses and 17 per cent said their hours of work had been reduced.
The survey of over 1,000 adults was conducted by Red C for the HIA. Some 300 employers were also surveyed and 86 per cent of them say they will maintain their health insurance scheme for employees.
The HIA’s report says the VHI is the largest provider of health insurance in the State “but is steadily losing market share to its competitors”. At the time of the survey Quinn had a 25 per cent market share and Aviva had 13 per cent of the market.
Some 16 per cent of people surveyed said they had switched their insurer at some stage, up from 10 per cent two years ago. More than half of employers said they never considered switching provider.
Furthermore 22 per cent of people said they would be more likely to take out insurance sooner rather than later if higher premiums were introduced for those who waited until they were older to take out cover. The Minister for Health Mary Harney has announced her intention to introduce such a system.
Some 67 per cent of those questioned said they viewed health insurance as a necessity not a luxury.
Meanwhile, two companies have contacted Ms Harney about possibly purchasing the VHI, which is to be put up for sale.