Health insurance for the price of a latte a day
BUPA is running a radio campaign highlighting just how cheap private medical insurance can be.
BUPA is running a new radio campaign, which compares the cost of its comprehensive private medical insurance (PMI) plan with a takeaway coffee – an everyday item that you might pick up in the morning on your way to work. Its message is:
“The average cost of a takeaway medium latte in Caffè Nero, Costa Coffee and Starbucks in November 2013 was £2.43. 56% of Comprehensive Bupa By You customers joining between May and October 2013 paid less than the equivalent price of a takeaway medium latte per day.”
So just going without your morning coffee could prove very beneficial one day in the future.
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The price of a coffee a day
If you're not a daily coffee drinker, how could you free up a couple of quid a day to pay the cost? Here are a few ideas:
Draw up a budget for your finances and stick to it! Once you’re in better control of your finances, you could free up the money for PMI from somewhere else where you're spending money unnecessarily. Our free MoneyTrack budgeting tool can help you see where you can make cutbacks.
Energy bills are always a source of concern – but you could save by making a switch to a different energy provider. Try our energy price comparison service.
Register with a cashback site or two. Have a look around for the best cashback deal that you can get, and on which purchases you can cash in. Getting a percentage of your purchases returned to you definitely adds up. Find out more in The top cashback websites.
Check out your other insurance policies while you’re at it. If you find better deals on your car, home and life insurance policies, you might even be able to save more than the monthly cost of your PMI and pocket the difference.
Quit smoking. I got a (preliminary) quote for comprehensive cover from BUPA (online) for £52.23 per month as a non-smoker. I’m 22. If I did smoke, the price would rise to £54.92. That might seem negligible, but that’s £32.28 a year – and it will only get worse as you get older. For a 65-year-old, those prices rise to £165.03 and £174.50 respectively, and the difference saved over that period would add up to a lot. So you can save a bit on the policy (and a few hundred pounds a year on tobacco products, based on this NHS calculator), plus you’re less likely to get ill in the first place. You should note however, that you need to have stopped using tobacco in all forms for two years to be eligible for the cheaper prices here.
Shopping around for medical insurance
If you can afford a PMI policy, it's vital you do some research before you commit to a plan.
What do you actually need? Insurers might offer you additional options to your policy such as dental cover or worldwide travel cover. Do you already have a good deal on these elsewhere? Could you get one? These are good questions to ask before shelling out more for your policy. It’s also definitely worth investigating the small print to see exactly what you are buying.
For detailed tips on ways you can cut the cost and still get a decent policy, have a read of How to pay less for private medical insurance.
Get a free, no obligation private medical insurance quote
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Running down the NHS is a political choice which Tory voters should know is what you get with them. Firstly do not swallow the idea that there's a shortage of funding ; they reduced tax on the super rich, they allow top tax relief of 45% on private pension contributions, they have reduced corporation tax and most big companies here like Amazon pay little tax as they have loopholes of tax avoidance, the very super rich foreigners are buying up London's property ( many countries will not let you do that) at very low tax rates, big bonuses are still booming, the South East is booming thank you very much so money is there on big 4*4s etc., couples can put 30,000 pounds into tax free ISAs, tax was removed from AIM share purchases, our Royal Mail was almost given away to rich buyers. The Tories want to reduce the state & have a low tax regime but we are all at risk then to life's misfortunes. We should follow Denmark, Finland or Sweden pay a little more tax but know we are some of the happiest and relaxed families in the world. Its about choices and most Brits want a good NHS not a life of worry about what happens if they loose their jobs, health and well being of their elderly folk or children.
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@jedi44: The problem as I see it is that this and former governments cannot afford the escalating cost of the NHS. This is because this and former governments have wasted so much of our money on foreign wars, internal waste (which is still being highlighted by the Tax Payers Federation) and allocation of money to less important causes ( aid to India comes to mind). Add to this the escalating debt mountain that these governments have got us into and you can see why the NHS finance is being pared back, like everything else. National Insurance has never been "ringfenced" for the NHS nor for pensions. How on earth can any institution collect money and not allocate it for the reason it was collected. We should all have a personal pension pot by now and we should have an insurance contract with the NHS which sets out our entitlements. Running it on a post-code lottery system seem quite wrong to me. I wouldn't trust ANY government to run anything to do with finance; leave it to the professionals. r.
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Expect to see many more articles on here promoting private health care since the coalition government is starving the NHS of funds in order to push people into the hands of insurance companies run by their donors. I agree with some that it is right to have choice, but not at the expense of the NHS and people who can't afford the rates in the private sector. I remember when we had a health service that was the envy of the world and now we seem intent on turning it into a sad impersonation of the fiasco that is health in the USA.
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07 April 2014