With the persistence of COVID-19 in Australia, Medibank Private Ltd's (Medibank) ahm health insurance (ahm) has given its customers another year to use their unclaimed 2022 (FY22) extras annual limit for a range of health services.
ahm customers with extras cover as of June 30, 2022, will be eligible to receive the rollover of approximately $14 million – automatically applied to eligible customers' remaining annual limits for services such as dental, physiotherapy, and psychology, but excluding optical and non-annual limits.
Commenting on the announcement, Milosh Milisavljevic, group executive for customer portfolios at Medibank, said the company monitored claims activity for health services most impacted by the COVID-19-related restrictions.
“Extras such as dental and remedial massage help customers take proactive steps to support their health and wellbeing. Due to COVID restrictions at the beginning of this year, customers' ability to access these services, as well as physiotherapy and psychology, have continued to be impacted,” he said.
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When the COVID-19 pandemic started in 2020, Medibank and ahm launched an initial support package to assist their customers who went through significant COVID-19-related health and economic challenges.
The announcement of the next wave of COVID-19 customer support adds to the support package provided to eligible Medibank and ahm customers, now standing at around $477 million, including the current six-month deferral of premium increases in place until October 2022.
“We're always looking for our customers to get the most out of their extras cover, and this new rollover helps by giving them more time to use their unclaimed annual limits excluding optical. We want to make it as easy as possible for customers, so the changes will be applied automatically to their cover on July 1, 2022,” Milisavljevic said.
“We said right from the start that we would not profit from COVID. We remain committed to return all permanent net claims savings due to COVID to our Medibank and ahm customers, and this latest wave of support for ahm customers is designed to do exactly that.”
Medibank and ahm will confirm the next wave of support for their customers with hospital cover by June 30, 2022.
