Want to port your health insurance policy? Here’s all you need to know
We’ve got used to porting our phone number from one telco to another. But did you know you can do the same with your health insurance policy too? You can change your insurer at the time of renewing your policy and transfer the benefits from the old firm to the new. Remember, you should port if you find a better plan. Use the Mint Securenow Mediclaim Ratings to analyse your policy and see if you need to port.
Who can port what? You can port similar health insurance policies from one insurer to another Health insurance plans come with benefits that build over time. For example, no-claim bonuses and benefits related to waiting periods. Let’s understand this.
There are three kinds of waiting periods in a health insurance policy. The first is a 30-day waiting period and it applies immediately after purchase. During the period, other than hospitalisation due to an accident, insurers typically don’t accept claims on account of an ailment. Second is the waiting period on pre-existing ailments, which can extend up to 4 years. Third is the waiting period on specified ailments. For instance, if hernia is excluded for the first 2 years, if a policyholder develops it after buying the policy, it will not be covered for 2 years.
Such time-bound exclusions can be ported. For example, if you bought a health insurance policy and decide to port it after 3 years, and the new policy has a waiting period of 2 years on pre-existing ailments, since you have already covered 3 years in the previous policy, the 3-year credit gets ported to the new policy, and the new policy will have no waiting period.
You can also port the no-claim bonus. “Suppose you have a sum insured of ₹3 lakh and a no-claim bonus in 4 years bumps up the sum insured to ₹3.2 lakh. Portability will be applicable on the entire sum insured of ₹3 2 lakh ” explained Reshma Goregaonkar, senior manager, product development, health, SBI General Insurance Co Ltd. However, the new insurer will charge you for a sum insured of ₹3.2 lakh and not ₹3 lakh.
Also, you can port only to the extent of the sum insured (including any no-claim bonus) with the previous insurer. So, if the sum insured is ₹3 lakh, then you can port the benefits only for ₹3 lakh, and if you buy a cover of ₹5 lakh, then on the remaining ₹2 lakh, no portability benefits will apply.
How to port ? The best time to port is just before renewal. Apply for it at least 45 days before expiry of the existing policy (but not before 60 days of its expiry). You will need to fill out a form and see if the new firm accepts your request. Given that insurers have full discretion to accept or reject a portability request, portability faces many challenges.
“Typically, if customers have made a claim, the new insurer will not accept porting. It may give a counter-offer excluding the ailment on which the claim was made, in which case porting doesn’t make sense,” said Abhishek Bondia, MD and principal officer, Securenow Insurance Broker.
So, if you want to port a policy, do so when you are healthy. After a claim is made, or if you are diagnosed with an illness, portability becomes difficult