About Cash Back Plans

 

The purpose of these policies is that they pay up to a certain sum of money for a number of medical events (dentist, opticians etc), usually they also pay a nightly sum if you become an in-patient in a hospital. Some include accident cover and most have additional benefits. In reality they all offer a mix of things, and this mix is different from company to company and plan to plan. So it is practically impossible to compare like with like.

We can offer a number of alternative plans with different insurers. Please contact us and we will help you to decide which company or plan suits your needs best and which level of cover you can afford. Obviously with each company the higher the premium you pay the higher the benefits will be.

Two things you should take note of:

Usually the companies will not pay claims (other than for accidents) during an initial period of around three months (however, because of the volume of business we place with these companies we can sometimes negotiate a reduction of this time).This is to avoid you making one monthly payment, claiming for dental treatment and a new pair of spectacles etc. and then cancelling the policy.

Read carefully the details of the total amount they will pay out. If for example they say they will pay up to £100 for dental treatment. This does not necessarily mean that if your dentist charges you £100 they will reimburse you the whole £100. It may very well say, for example 60%. This means they will reimburse you £60 of this £100 bill. Or alternatively for them to reimburse you £100 you must present them with a bill of around £166 (£100 being 60% of £166).

In our experience these policies can be very cost effective. Over 40 years of age most people need at least reading glasses and visit the dentist every year. You can almost always claim for both dental & optical and what you have left is a very cheap insurance policy for a number of other things. One visit to a consultant, one course of chiropody or a couple of visits to a chiropractor for a bad back etc. and your claims will total more than your year's premium. So the rest of the policy is free. If there are 4 people on your policy (two adults and two children) benefits can be claimed four times.

These policies generally show a large profit for the companies concerned purely based on the statistics that in excess of 50% of the customers will forget, not bother or in general fail to make a claim when legitimately they can. Don’t be one of these!