Private Medical Insurance

This is insurance that pays the hospital or Doctor for your treatment. It can include treatment in a private ward, or being seen earlier in an NHS ward. Some plans also allow you to claim if you are not able to be seen by the NHS within a set period. Other plans may charge a little more and don’t have any link to NHS waiting times.

You are either medically checked and underwritten at outset (so you know what you’re covered for and what you won’t be), or have no medical checking at outset (but conditions that occurred two years before taking out the cover are not covered, and often there is no cover for a reoccurrence within five years after taking out the plan). Premiums are usually reviewable annually.