A group health insurance plan, often known as a corporate mediclaim policy, is a health insurance policy purchased by employers. The plan aims to provide medical security to the employees and their family members. The plan covers the employee till they are part of the company. Group health insurance is beneficial for both employees and employers. Let’s start with how this policy benefits employees and then move to the advantages for employers.
Group health insurance benefits for employees
Why would you want to work for a company that provides group health insurance?
Read on to understand the importance of corporate mediclaim policy.
Family cover
Most companies, through a group health insurance plan, cover their employees’ families. It includes family members of the employees such as their spouse, dependent parents, and children.
Pre-existing disease
One of the most significant advantages of such a policy is that it covers pre-existing conditions from the minute you start working for the company. It means, unlike an individual plan or a family health insurance policy, you don’t have to wait until the end of the waiting period to use your policy.
Cashless treatment
A group health plan, like your individual plan, gives you the option of cashless or reimbursement medical treatment. You can go to any of the network hospitals listed in your corporate health insurance policy and receive medical treatment there.
Corona Kavach policy
Given the coronavirus concerns, the IRDAI has allowed insurers to include Corona Kavach policy in group health insurance. It means if your organisation provides you with a corporate mediclaim policy, it is very likely that your COVID-19 related treatment costs for yourself and your family will be covered.
Maternity cover
In most of the group health insurance, employees are provided with maternity cover benefits. Such type of corporate mediclaim policy covers both c-section and normal deliveries. In addition, it also covers the medical complexity or immunization costs of babies for the first 90 days after their birth.
No health check-ups
To receive the benefit of corporate mediclaim policy, you don’t need to undergo any health check-up. The plan covers you regardless of your lifestyle.
Group health insurance benefits for employers
Providing medical cover to the employees can prove beneficial to the employers in more ways than one. Some advantages of the same include:
Employee retention
With so many start-ups hunting for inventive people, retaining your employees is one of the most difficult tasks. You can’t retain your staff by just paying them well; extra benefits such as medical insurance are among things that everyone wants. In addition, if you provide family health insurance to your employees under a mediclaim policy, your employees are more likely to stay with you for a long time.
Tax benefits
Group health insurance is beneficial for both employers and employees. Providing such a type of medical insurance benefits to staff allows you to save a significant amount that you would have had to pay towards tax.
Motivated employees
Given the high cost of medical services, providing financial protection against medical expenses of your employees will make them feel more secure, allowing them to focus more effectively on their work. As such, we can infer that having a group health policy or inclusion of family health insurance benefits in such a policy will enhance productivity and motivate your staff to do better.
Low cost
Instead of providing individual health insurance to each employee, a group health plan provides various benefits at a low cost. The low cost is because premium and the risk are shared among a large number of employees.
Bottom line
A group health insurance plan has a lot of advantages. However, it is important to note that even if your company offers these insurance benefits, the scope of coverage and the sum insured under a group health plan are limited. Plus, group health insurance coverage will end as soon as you leave the job. You’ll have no health cover in place to face any medical emergency that may arise in your family then. So it’s better to get individual health insurance or family health insurance to avoid exhausting your savings at such dire times.
