Health Insurance policy issued to you is valid in India only. When you travel out of India then you need Overseas Travel Health insurance policy because of following reasons :
i. If Hospitalization is required while you are in a foreign country then treatment may not start in a hospital; unless you make the payment in cash or by credit card or produce health insurance policy reference / card.
ii. Some embassies of foreign countries need it as part of documents for issue of visa itself. An example is the Germany Embassy or Spain Embassy.
Even though this policy in the beginning was for taking care of hospitalization/medical treatment only but at present this product is available with certain additional features.
You will notice that while in the case of Health Insurance policy valid with in India is having the limit of Rs 5,00,000 but in case of Overseas Health Insurance policy sum can be as high as US$ 5,00,000, which is nearly equal to Rs. 235 lakhs. (Rs 2.35 crores)
Health Insurance policy valid within India is issued with difficulty for those above 60 years in age. In the case of Overseas Travel Health Insurance for India, the policy can be issued even for the age of 84 years but subject to following documents being attached with proposal form for all those whose age is above 70:
• ECG test
• Blood test
• Urine test
Medical assessment in specified format duly filled/signed/rubber stamped along with license no. of the postgraduate (M.D. or a above) doctor who has filled the report. It is to be understood that report by MBBS qualified doctor is not valid.
The medical specialists of the Insurance Companies generally based in Zonal office or Head office review the documents and decide:
1. Whether to accept the proposal and underwrite the risk
2. If to underwrite the risk should there be loading on premium rates and what should be the maximum amount of Hospitalization covered.
This approval cycle can take 2 to 5 days. Normally for a person of 70+ age the limits imposed with respect to hospitalization / medication in the policy are between US $ 10000 and US $ 50000. You will notice that this is much less in comparison to limit of US $ 5,00,000, which is available to those who are in age group of 70 years or less. The good thing about this policy is that it is even issued to those who have preexisting disease. Hospitalization in foreign country even with the disease (preexisting) is covered.
On the concept of loading factor starting on a specified data it has been seen that for a person aged 84 traveling to USA, a specific PSU loaded the premium by 150%. Private Insurance Companies are generally not issuing policy to those, who are 80+in age.
In these recent months we notice that PSU's have started discouraging the issue of such policies
These policies can be divided in to :
1. Single trip policy
2. Annual multitrip policy
As the name indicates single trip covers a single trip, which is starting on a specific date and ending on a specific date. It is possible to extend the date on payment of additional premium subject to condition that no claim has been made. Extension of policy is at the discretion of the Insurance Company.
Annual Multi trip policy is having validity of 1 year. As many trips as you wish are possible but it is subject to the condition: "Single trip not being more than 30 days." Some Insurance Companies now offer option of single trip not being more than 45 days.