The most common mistake when buying a health insurance policy is settling for a small cover, which may be enough to fund small hospitalisation costs, but not a serious case. So, it’s important you buy adequate insurance. But doing that can also mean paying a higher premium, which may not be affordable for some. For such individuals, a health cover top-up plan is a good way to increase the cover while keeping costs in check.
What is it?
This is a regular indemnity plan that covers hospitalisation costs but only after a threshold limit, known as deductible, is crossed. A deductible is that portion of the claim amount that is not covered by the insurer and has to be paid by the insured before benefits of the policy can kick in. This means you can use your base health insurance policy to make a claim up till the deductible amount and any payments over that can be covered through a top-up plan. For example, if you have a health plan with an insurance cover of Rs.3 lakh and you buy a top-up cover of Rs.5 lakh withRs.3 lakh as the deductible, to make a claim of Rs.4 lakh, you can use your base policy to pay Rs.3 lakh and then the top-up to pay Rs.1 lakh.
