What’s the best time to buy Group Health Insurance?

Group health insurance provides medical coverage for a group of people insured under a single master health insurance policy. Group health insurance is usually purchased by organizations, companies but even associations, NGOs can also avail group health insurance policy. Group defined a set of people employed or come together to avail health insurance under a single policy. The group should not be formed with a sole aim of availing health insurance under the group health insurance policy. Under the group health insurance policies, the premium is generally paid by the employers or organizations, and it would be offered as a part of employee benefits.

Group health insurance policy covers the medical costs of the members insured under the policy. Family members as well as parents can be added in the group health insurance policy depending on the option exercised by the employer. Group health insurance covers the inpatient treatment cost for every illness or disease except for those exempted under the policy conditions. Group health insurance policy is usually taken for a period of 1 year after which it can be renewed with the same insurance company or different insurance company.

The biggest advantage of group health insurance policy is that there would be no waiting period to make a claim under the policy. The initial waiting period, specific disease waiting period, pre existing disease waiting period, maternity waiting period can be waived off in the group health insurance policy. Group health insurance policies are tailor made policies which can be customized as per the needs and requirements of the customer.

Let us understand the best time to buy a group health insurance policy:-

1) Starting a new company: The best time to buy a group health insurance policy is at the time of starting a new company. A new company or organization needs manpower to set up and run the operations. A startup or a new company might not be able to offer incentives or other attractive packages as that of established companies but they can offer health insurance to their employees and families. This would build trust among the employees and give them a sense of satisfaction in the company they are working. Health insurance is offered by most of the companies nowadays as a part of the employee benefits.

There are organizations which offer the group health insurance benefits only to the employees while there are other companies which offer the health insurance benefits to the employees and their family members. The best time to take a group health insurance policy is at the time of starting the company. The premium to be paid would also be less as there would be less number of employees when an organization or a company is started. The group health insurance policy can be renewed each year so that the employee benefits are available to the employees working in the organization.

2) At the start/end of the financial year: The other best time to take a group health insurance policy for any organization is at the end of the financial year or at the start of the financial year. Every insurance company strives to achieve their targets every year and for this they would even offer extra discounts in the group health insurance premium to close the business. This can be seen as an opportunity by the organizations to take group health insurance policy at the end of the financial year. In this way both the insurance company as well as the organization would be benefited in their own ways.

Similarly at the start of the financial year every insurance company offers good discounts to close the business and this can be seen as an opportunity by the organizations. The loss ratios would be minimal at the start of the year and this might encourage the insurance companies to give discounts on the group health insurance policies. Most of the organizations purchase group health insurance policies at the start or at the end of the financial year to be inline with the financial year end closing and opening.

3) 30 days before the renewal date: The best time to purchase a group health insurance policy is at least 30 days before the expiry or the renewal date. It is important to note that the group health insurance policies require data mining and would take a lot of time to issue the policies. The data for the upcoming renewal needs to be prepared well in advance to avoid last minute mishaps such as missing out a few employees, misplacing the sum insured of employees etc.

The activity to renew the group health insurance policy should be started at least 30 days before the expiry of the policy so that the data can be compiled properly and submitted to the insurance company to renew the insurance policy.

4) After meeting minimum number: The best time to purchase a group health insurance policy is when your company meets the minimum number requirement. Most of the insurance companies offer group health insurance if the minimum number of employees is 7 or more. Some insurance companies offer the group health insurance policies if there are a minimum of 7 employees or 20 lives under the proposal.

There might be companies which start with less than 7 people but in due course of time they might be recruiting people and the number increases. It is important to think of the group health insurance coverage once the total number of people in the company crosses the minimum requirement. It should be noted that the higher the number of employees the lower would be the group health insurance premium. If the number of employees are low then the per person premium would be high and this can be reduced by increasing the number of employees under the group health insurance policy. To increase the number of lives under the group health insurance policy, organizations can add the family members and parents of the employees thereby providing the health insurance coverage to all the family members.