How To Port Your Health Insurance Policy

  Author: Jai Prakash

Unlike in the yesteryears, for some years now, the policyholder of a health insurance policy can move his or her existing policy to another health insurance provider. In the process, they do not have to lose any benefits accumulated with the existing insurer. This is also known as porting a policy.

Insurance regulator, Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) has made rules which state that when porting a policy, the new insurer will give you credit relating to the waiting period that you have already accumulated with the old insurer and ensure you at least to the sum insured under the old policy. Of course, porting is only allowed for health insurance plans.

Let us take a quick look at the various aspects related to porting a health insurance plan or as some call it, medical insurance policy.

Select the new insurance company and product When you decide to port your policy, you need to start doing your home work on the various health insurance policies offered by different insurance companies. Visit the websites of these health insurance and general insurance companies, study the various policies and select a medical insurance policy that will very well cover your anticipated healthcare costs and medical expenses.

As you are doing your research, you need to go through all the details f medical insurance plans like exclusions, co-payment and other policy terms. Remember that the product you choose should be similar to the one you have. This means you can port from a hospitalisation policy to another hospitalisation policy, one top up plan to another, and so on.

Notify and apply Notify your decision to your current insurance company in writing and also inform them about the company you wish to port your policy to. Simultaneously, you should also make an application to the new insurer. These must be made at least 45 days before your policy is due to expire or it is likely to be rejected. The new insurer needs to acknowledge the application for portability within 3 days. You are then provided with a proposal form and a portability form.

Submit relevant documents At this stage you would require certain documents from the old insurer which includes policy certificates of all the previous years, latest renewal notice received, self declaration in no claim cases and additional documents like discharge summary and investigation reports, if claims have been made. Next, you need to select a suitable product, fill up the proposal form and portability form and submit it to the new insurer. Ensure that all the details are filled up correctly.

Due diligence by insurer After the new insurance company receives the forms with the details, they will either approach the old insurer or request the same information from the IRDA portal to do a check on your claim history, medical records and so on. The old insurer has to furnish all this information through IRDA’s data sharing portal within seven working days. On receiving the data, the new insurer will process the proposal and inform the decision to you within 15 working days. In certain cases, the new insurer may require you to undergo medical tests again about which you will be informed.

It is important for you to remember that the new insurance company has several grounds to reject your application. These would include inadequate information, delay in submission or non-availability of documents; break in policy renewal and so on.