How can I choose the Best Medical Aid Plan?
How do I choose the best medical aid plan?
- First decide on how much you want to spend on premiums
- Then make sure the medical aid plan makes good provision for your spouse and dependants
- You want the most uncomplicated, no-jargon medical aid there is
- Choose a medical aid that doesn’t waste your money making you pay for useless, no value items
- You should have a medical aid that offers plenty of options to cater for your small budget
Is there a Best Medical Aid Plan that Outshines others?
Having a sound understanding of your options when it comes to choosing a medical scheme plan can save you loads of time and money. The whole purpose of getting a good medical aid plan is to help offset the high cost of medical care.
Luckily for many South Africans, they get assistance with medical aid through their employer, and this helps to ensure the 
premiums they pay each month aren’t so high.
If you don’t get assistance with a medical aid, you’ll have to look what’s on offer. Most medical schemes in South Africa launch their benefits and contributions at end of the year or the start of the new year. Whether you already have a medical aid or you’re looking to make a change from one to the other, it is time to investigate these benefits and contributions.
Make Sure Your Medical Scheme is Registered
Always make sure that you choose a scheme which is a registered medical scheme in terms of the Medical Schemes Act 131 of 1998, and that it is financially sound and can payout your claims. By law, a medical scheme must have a solvency level equal to 25% of its gross contributions.
A rough guide on how to choose the best medical aid plan should have you answer one or two important questions regarding your health situation in the past year. The idea is to look at what medical expenses were once-off and which ones are ongoing. Anwser these questions:
- What did you spend on day-to-day general healthcare?
- How were your dental and optometry expenses in the year?
- Have you a chronic condition?
- How many times did you visit your doctor during the year?
- What did you pay for deductibles or co-payments in the last year?
Once you’ve answered some questions about your own state of health, you have to start looking at the medical aids.
Do they contract with specialists you want to use? How do network doctors work? What if you’re planning on having a baby soon? Will they offer maternity benefits and later on sufficient child illness benefits?
What Happened to Good Old Fashioned Health Care?
There are still one or two medical schemes in South Africa that offer plain, unadulterated health care. Selfmed is a medical scheme that stands out from the rest in some very important ways. They don’t waste their member’s money by offering them a lot of costly add-ons that don’t contribute to their health.
You won’t find any shopping vouchers and movie tickets from Selfmed – just pure, affordable health care. Selfmed also runs their very own administration- and call centre which is known as the “Excellence Centre’. They will answer questions on the 6 medical aid plans that they offer.
Selfmed isn’t the new kid on the block in terms of medical aid’s – they’re a scheme that have been around since 1965. They know what South Africans want by now, and in the 21st century, its dependable, simplistic, affordable medical aid.
All info was correct at time of publishing