Student Health Insurance

Posted by MoneySavvy on Jul 20th, 2010 | no comments home title

How do you get the best price for your student health insurance? It’s not as difficult as you might imagine. Here are five tips to make it happen:

1. Take care of yourself

This will impact both your short-term and long-term insurance costs. If you do not take care of your body right now, you might be faced with serious health problems down the road.

And not eating healthy and exercising now will cause you to get sick more. This in turn will force you to have more doctor visits and prescriptions, which in turn will raise your premiums.

You definitely want to stop smoking. This makes a big difference in the price. It’s always one of the first questions insurance companies ask.

2. Stay on your parents’ plan

A lot of firms enable you to be on your parents’ plan until you graduate. Often times this is cheaper than getting your own.

3. Use the student health center

Most institutions have these facilities. Making use of them will allow you to conserve cash very easily.

What does it cover?

It gives you as many trips to the doctor’s office as you need. It also covers x-rays and prescriptions. Therefore, you won’t have to worry about these being on your main plan.

How much does it cost?

It’s usually less than a hundred dollars a semester to have access to the health center.

So why do you need a regular insurance plan?

This is because the health center does not take care of major medical emergencies. It just covers doctor visits, prescriptions, and x-rays. So if you get in a car crash and need to have major surgery, you are not covered. You will have to pay for it out of your own pocket. In other words, keep your regular plan.

4. Get a higher deductible

The higher it is, the less you will pay per month. Obviously you want to make sure you have enough in savings.

Sit down and figure out how much money you have saved up that doesn’t need to be used for standard expenses. The higher the deductible, the less you will pay on a monthly basis. This can be the difference between paying $30 or $130 a month.

5. Shop around

Never take the first quote you get. Make sure to get at least five to ten quotes before making your final decision on which company to use.

So the bottom line is, don’t just rely on the student health center. You will still need regular health coverage. However, if you use the student center, you can at least cut out doctor visits and prescriptions from your main plan. This will give you some serious savings.