Anand Rathi's Amjad Khan on new age health insurance, zero waiting period policies & more
Amjad Khan, Executive Director — Employee Benefit Practice & Workplace Wellness, Anand Rathi, says “there are options today of health insurance policies with zero waiting periods. But under a conventional policy, you cannot do away with the waiting period. Probably you can look at a reduction. If you are 25 years of age, your waiting period can go down to two years. But you cannot have a zero waiting period unless you look at these new age policies which have a zero waiting period under them.”
What would be those criterias where an insurance company would be willing to skip the waiting period? Can we pay more premium and just skip this entire process for a few years?
What we see in the last 12-18 months is that there are a few insurance companies in the Indian market who are giving policies which do not have these waiting periods.
These policies are pretty new and they do not have precedence in terms of claim settlements and other aspects. But obviously, these policies are much costlier than the normal traditional policies.
But there are options today when we look at policies, health insurance policies with zero waiting periods. But under a conventional policy, you cannot do away with the waiting period.
Probably you can look at a reduction. If you are 25 years of age, your waiting period can go down to two years. But you cannot have a zero waiting period unless you look at these new age policies which have a zero waiting period under them.
When you talk about new age policies, what kind of policies do you mean in terms of features and coverage?
These policies are like any other normal health policies offered by the insuretechs or new companies which have come up in the health insurance space.
