Diabetes Australia’s Advocacy Officers deal with a significant number of enquiries from people with diabetes who want to obtain some form of insurance. These types of insurance can be many and varied and may be related to life, health, travel or cover for an insulin pump.

Our Advocacy Officers can help you navigate this sometimes confusing and difficult area but it is always wise to remember that as with any product, the buyer needs to be alert, do their homework by shopping around and take advice from trusted sources.

Private health insurance

Health insurance companies are by law not allowed to discriminate against people with diabetes or any other chronic illness. While they can enforce limited waiting periods for pre-existing conditions, they cannot refuse to insure you because you have diabetes and they cannot charge you higher premiums than someone without diabetes.

Some tips

• Be clear about what you want covered and discuss this with your diabetes educator
• Use ‘compare insurance cover’ websites
• Only pay for health insurance features that you really need
• Use an excess or co-payment to lower your premium
• Check your insurer has a formal agreement with your health service providers
• Check your insurer has health promotion programs and services
• Annually review you insurance requirements and policies
• Ask your health insurer if you can suspend your premiums if you travel overseas
• If you have a complaint, contact the Private Health Insurance Ombudsman.

Life insurance

Life insurance is a contract between the policy owner and the insurer, where the insurer agrees to pay a designated beneficiary a sum of money upon the occurrence of the policy holder’s death or other event, such as terminal or critical illness. In return, the policy owner agrees to pay a stipulated amount at regular intervals or in lump sums.

Some tips

• If you have superannuation with an insurance company, ask them for a quote
• Rather than ask for lifelong life insurance, ask the company to write and quote on a policy for, say, five years. You can then shop around and ask other companies to match
  or do better on both costs and years insured. You could proceed to secure this insurance in multiples of five years
• Check whether your insurer is using Australian or overseas actuarial data when calculating your premium. The preference is for Australian.
• Be prepared to provide detailed medical histories from your medical specialists
• Read the product disclosure documents and all the fine print
• Check the cut-off date for you to start a policy — some will not commence insurance for people over 60 years of age.

Income protection insurance

Income protection (IP) insurance is a policy that pays benefits to policy holders who are incapacitated and hence unable to work due to illness or accident.
Sometimes IP insurance is requested when you are taking out a loan to purchase a house.

Travel insurance

Travellers take out this insurance to cover certain items such as medical expenses and the loss of personal belongings.

Some tips

• Buy travel insurance when buying your travel tickets. Look beyond what is offered by your travel agent and compare coverage online
• Insure yourself and your belongings
• Ensure coverage for the whole period you are away
• Fully disclose any pre-existing medical conditions
• Note any exclusions, the policy should cover emergency treatment, medical evacuations, hospitalisations and repatriation to Australia
• Cover adventure tourism if you pursue it
• An insurer can refuse coverage because of diabetes and other concurrent medical conditions. You can appeal decisions but be prepared to submit medical specialist reports and expect delays

If travelling overseas, check with Medicare which countries have reciprocal health arrangements for Australian citizens and follow the prompts to the ‘Individuals and families’ section

Seek help from your diabetes educator, medical specialist and/or Diabetes Australia about all the practicalities of travelling with diabetes, medicines and checking equipment.

Insulin pump insurance

Some people with type 1 diabetes choose to have their insulin pump insured as a specified portable valuable ($8000+) under their home and contents insurance policy so that the pump can be replaced or repaired if damaged, lost or stolen anywhere in Australia.

Ask your house and contents insurer for a quote for an insulin pump, keeping in mind that this will add to your premiums.

This article was originally published in Conquest magazine published by Health Publishing Australia