# Health Insurance...Again!!



## bhuggett (Aug 31, 2008)

Sorry me again, Thanks for all the info before. I thik I forgot to add that myself and my family are emigrating in September, my wife is US Citzen as ar emy two children and I am a Permanent resident, my question is....do you know if there is anyway to get health insurance in place before we go? 
Thanks.


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## Bevdeforges (Nov 16, 2007)

bhuggett said:


> Sorry me again, Thanks for all the info before. I thik I forgot to add that myself and my family are emigrating in September, my wife is US Citzen as ar emy two children and I am a Permanent resident, my question is....do you know if there is anyway to get health insurance in place before we go?
> Thanks.


All politics aside, it really does depend on how you're planning on supporting yourselves over there. If you have jobs lined up, you should check into employer sponsored health insurance.

If you'll be looking for work, you may only need an interim coverage until you (or your wife) find a job - or if you will be setting up your own business, until you can set yourself up with employer-type insurance or something through a business association.

An interim coverage would be for catastrophic injury or illness only - with the idea that you put off less urgent care until you've found work. 

And despite dissenting opinions from some posters here, I think you're better off waiting until you arrive so you can discuss your insurance needs with someone face to face. If you do have to buy individual insurance, there may be some advantage to placing your insurance with the same agent who handles your car, home and life insurance. This is the part of US insurance that gets tricky.
Cheers,
Bev


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## andrewr (Mar 15, 2009)

am a new poster to the expat forum and read with interest all the posts for your request. I moved to Florida 18 years ago and have always maintained what is known as expat health insurance. Which varies greatly from any plans offered in the USA. My own experience with claiming on that insurance was limited until 2004 when I succumbed to Colon cancer. After that experience I feel that i am well qualified to highly recommend expat health insurance.

I am sure you will by now understand that excess and deductible are the same animal. Now take a typical US policy and the deductible will usually be a minimum of $ 250 per year and after that you will be responsible probably for 20% of the next $ 5000. I say typically as a lot of it is down to choice of limits on your part. Then when you make a claim you will be left facing additional charges to pay for each part of your treatment as the US policies have limits on nearly every step of treatment, so if you opt for the best treatment it usually costs much more than what a US policy allows. So if your bill from a particular provider is say $ 10,000 and the policy only covers $ 5,000 for that particular part of the treatment guess who is liable for the missing $ 5,000 !! Believe me it is a minefield out there with US companies and the stress you are caused when you are already going through a traumatic time compounds and affects you dramatically.

Now all I can do is recount my personal experience. I have for the last 9 years been insured by Morgan Price who are out of Diss, Norfolk. I have always used expatriate-insurance as my broker again a UK company. The Morgan Price policy is administered through Allianz Worldwide Care you may have heard of Allianz, a huge coporation. Their insurance is handled from Dublin.

So my story starts in January 2004 when I attended the doctor after being hounded by my family to go and get checked out as I didn't look too well and my appetite was affected. Up until then a doctors office was for sick people an not me after all after 54 years of never needing to see a doctor except for injections, colds, flu etc I was invincible. So I breezed in to his office fully expecting him to prove my theory that it was due to my time of life etc. Within 4 days I had had blood tests, a colonoscopy and now was lying on a surgeons table having a huge cancerous growth removed from my colon. I came out 3 stone lighter, an ostomy bag and appointments over the next year for radiation and chemotherapy. 

Prior to being admitted I called Allianz to get treatment guarantee and they took over completely, I never saw a bill, never had a threatening telephone call or collection letter from any of my health care providers. As the Irish girl I initially spoke to told me “we will deal with everything, after all you need to concentrate on getting better and don't need to be dealing with complicated medical bills”. She was true to her word and after bills that ran past $ 300,000 my exposure was for just the standard deductible of at that time $ 35 (it's now $ 50) after that they covered 100%. Since 2004 I have returned to hospital and had the ostomy reversed, had a hernia operation that transpired due to my original surgery, been for 3 monthly blood tests and consultations with my oncologist, who on my next visit in April will after 5 years shake my hand and call me a CANCER SURVIVOR. All for a deductible of $ 37.50 and not one bill collector hounding me for a penny. 

I can not tell you how highly I rate the Morgan Price policy and the Allianz administrators and also Dawn Sheldrake at Expatriate Insurance Services. 

The relevant websites can be found by searching for Morgan Price and expatriate-insurance services (it wouldn't let me display the website addresses as I am a new poster) I hope I haven't gone on too long but I feel that as an expat you need to know what is available. By the way it is not just catastrophic coverage that is included the policy also covers GP office visits and everything from there upwards. 

Good Luck.


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