Medical Health Insurance

[Nutrid]

Hi All

I am in the process of applying for a 457 Visa and have been looking at companies to provide the cover I need for the visa. Does anyone have experience with HBA health insurance ? or can offer other health insurance companies with which good experiencees have been had ?

[strawberry cheeks]

Hi All

I am in the process of applying for a 457 Visa and have been looking at companies to provide the cover I need for the visa. Does anyone have experience with HBA health insurance ? or can offer other health insurance companies with which good experiencees have been had ?

Hi there

Thought Id let you know that my husband and I are with HBA (in South Australia it is mutual community) platinum visitors cover, which is one of the top comprehensive covers for 457 visa holders offered by HBA - it has hospital and extras cover. This means they cover you for hospital cover both in a private or govt hospital, for medical expenses such as private GP and specialist visits and pharmaceuticals, as well as what in Australia they call extras which is everything else such as podiatry, dental, optometry etc (although there are sub-limits that apply).

If you choose to go to a GP or hospital or specialist etc on HBAs list, then you do not pay a gap and often the bill can go straight through to HBA and you will not have to settle it at the doctors offices upfront and claim back afterward from HBA (sometimes, dependent on the doctor you are visiting, you can swipe your card at the doctors offices). Pharmacy costs however have to be settled upfront and then claimed back from HBA afterward - but they pay up to 90% of out of pocket expenses, so this is quite good. It is important to note here that obtaining continuity of cover with your new Oz medial insurance fund is in my opinion quite vital - with HBA if you are insured in South Africa with a medical aid that is a member of the international federation of health funds

http://www.ifhp.com/m-southafrica.html

then you can join HBA and have them waiver all preexisting medical conditions and waiting periods if you join within a month or two of quitting your SA fund (NB some other funds also offer this, not just HBA so you can shop around - just look for those offering continuity of cover and get them to confirm with you in writing before leaving SA that they will waiver all waiting periods). In this case you will not have to worry about whether HBA will pay when you are claiming money back from them after a doctor, specialist or pharmacy visit - if there are no waiting periods or preexisting conditions that they can reject your claim on you will be fine (and your medicines are on the PBS list). However if you have not managed to get continuity of cover from your SA fund going into your Australian fund this is something that you need to be aware of - they can reject claims if they feel the condition was preexisting or if you are still sitting out a waiting period.

On a 457 visa you are not elligable for medicare - you therefore have to take out insurance to cover what medicare would normally cover for Australian citizens here - this means hospitalization, doctors visits and pharmacy - take a look here at what medicare covers and does not cover

http://www.medicareaustralia.gov.au/public/claims/what-cover.jsp

As you can see medicare does not normally cover dental and glasses and contact lenses etc, so it is a good idea to take out an extras cover to help cover the cost of these things - especially dental care as this is very, very expensive here in Australia and is not covered for anyone here (not even permanent residents on medicare)

Hope this helps you further

[strawberry cheeks]

Oops forgot to point out that there are no extras covered on the classic visitors cover which is the one that you have been looking at (dentistry, optical etc will therefore not be covered)

[hestie tt]

We cancelled our HBA the moment we got PR. After 6 months still waiting for service from them. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr