Pacific Prime Sees More Good News On Global Private Medical Insurance Inflation

HONG KONG, Nov. 20, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Pacific Prime is pleased that it can continue to offer its clients affordable international healthcare as two more of its partners have released their 2013 premium rates.

AXA Winterthur in China came in at 10% and Healthcare International (HCI) at 9.5%; both rates lower than the 11% long term global average. Although other insurers have released lower premium rates recently, AXA Winterthur and HCI both performed under the 5 year trend and Pacific Prime is pleased with these results.

Pacific Prime clients with AXA Winterthur policies can also expect to benefit from various improvements made to the insurers China plan. Coverage amounts, for example, have been increased for Dental benefits and within some aspects of the Worldwide plan as well.

For those Pacific Prime clients attached to Healthcare International policies, certain benefits have had to be downgraded to achieve these low premium rates. Namely, co-pays have been introduced to those facilities in countries with typically high treatment costs such as Hong Kong, USA, Dubai, France and China. Furthermore, Coverage outside Geographical Area benefits for the Emergency Plus, Standard and Healthcare Plus plans has been reduced from 60 days to 30 days.

In the past, HCI has typically adopted a broad zoning policy and is not known to differentiate premiums based on location (except for the USA). Pacific Prime analysts therefore believe that these changes are targeted at those clients receiving care in notoriously medically expensive areas in an attempt to segment the market and provide customers living in low cost areas better policy value.

Overall, Pacific Prime is pleased with these latest results and is confident its customers can expect positive developments from these two insurers in the next year to come.

SOURCE Pacific Prime