Just as Nishit was busy planning for his annual holiday to Europe with family, his father suffered a major cardiac arrest. Following the attack, Nishit’s father had to undergo a major bypass surgery. Since, he was admitted at a leading private hospital in the town, the expenses incurred towards this exigency were a veritably huge sum. As days passed, Nishit’s father was discharged from the hospital and started recovering gradually. However because of this unanticipated situation, Nishit not only had to cancel his vacation given all his savings had been whisked away, but also had to reconsider his financial planning, since his accounts now would take time to recover from the monetary jolt.
As healthcare costs are on a constant rise, planning financial resources towards unanticipated medical costs is absolutely imperative. While, sustaining a few medical expenses from one’s own pocket may not hit the bank balance hard, it is notable that a single critical medical condition as mentioned above is well capable of perturbing your finances. With increasing awareness and well contemplated employee benefits, though many are covered under basic retail and group mediclaim health insurances, a double protection to face such exigencies is highly advisable. Typically, the opted sum insured range for basic mediclaim policies varies between Rs 3 and Rs 5 lakh. Bearing medical expenses beyond this sum can take a toll on an individual’s hard earned savings.
Super Top UP health insurance plans are an added protection in such scenarios, when the maximum payout from a basic health policy gets exhausted. Under Super Top Up policies, a customer can choose a specific limit/deductible amount that a policy holder will have to bear, before the insurance policy starts paying out at the time of claim. This limit is termed aggregate deductible in insurance parlance and a customer can opt for the figure depending on the maximum coverage of his or her basic medical policy or the expense one may extract from one’s own income.
In a Super Top Up plan, your insurer considers the sum total of all the eligible medical expenses in a given policy period and if this amount crosses the chosen deductible in the policy, you become eligible for a claim payout. Thus, Super Top UP plans are a comprehensive and economical shield against the un-foreseen medical costs that may be incurred beyond the cap of a basic health policy.
For example, in Nishit’s case, if he had a floater health insurance policy covering his father, with a coverage of Rs 3 lakh, he should have opted for a super top up plan, preferably with a Rs10 lakh coverage and a deductible of Rs 3 lakh. Hence, any expenses that were incurred over Rs 3 lakh, during the policy term, which otherwise he would have to bear out of his pocket, would now be covered by the super top up health insurance. This would have been a sigh of relief for him as earlier during the year, he had suffered a dengue attack and Rs 50,000 off the Rs 3 lakh mediclaim policy had already been consumed. His father’s ailment cost him an expense of Rs 5 lakh, half of which he had to bear himself since the policy limits got exhausted. Had he taken a super top up, this extra cost would have been easily tackled, in fact, at a much lesser premium amount!
In order to offer maximum coverage, Super Top Up policies can be availed either as an individual or as a floater policy. With this type of policy one can cover self, spouse, dependent children and dependent parents under the same policy and total number of family members covered in 1 policy can go up to 6 members. The entry age criteria for dependent children and dependent parents may vary from insurer to insurer. There are a number of benefits that a super top up plan offers besides the regular inpatient, pre and post hospitalisation expense covers such as aggregate deductibles, road and optional air ambulance covers, cover for organ donor expenses and free medical check-ups. There are plans available in the market with sum insured ranging from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 50 lakh with the aggregate deductibles options from Rs 2 lakh to Rs 10 lakh. Waiting period for pre- existing diseases remains to be there in the super top up plans, however few insurers have now started introducing a much shorter waiting period such as 12 months for pre-existing diseases.
Opting for affordable super top up plans can be a good way of keeping your finances in good health, as they come at a less premium and shield you during the critical medical needs and emergencies. Waiting for a bad experience to teach you may not be wise, when a stitch in time can save you nine.
