How to Change Your Swiss Supplemental Health Insurance

Most Swiss health insurance providers offer supplemental health insurance in addition to mandatory health insurance. There are also insurance companies that offer supplemental health insurance, but not mandatory health insurance. In every case, these voluntary health insurance offers complement the cover that you already get from mandatory health insurance.

1. Understand your eligibility

Unlike mandatory health insurance, you do not have a legal right to voluntary, supplemental health insurance. It is up to the insurance company to decide whether or not to accept your application. Factors that can play a role in determining your eligibility include:

• Your age: The older you are, the more likely it is that your application will not be accepted.
• Your health: You must fill out a health questionnaire when you apply for supplemental health insurance. Depending on the insurance provider and the specific offer you want, you may also have to undergo a medical examination. If you have serious health problems at the time you apply, then your application may be rejected. The insurance provider may also accept your application, but exclude coverage for your existing health problems.
• Your genetics: If your family has a history of cancer or hereditary illnesses, your application may be denied even if you are in good health.
• Your place of residence: You must be a resident of Switzerland to be eligible for most Swiss supplemental outpatient insurance, hospital insurance, and dental insurance offers. Guest insurance and international health insurance are exceptions to this rule.
• Your creditworthiness: Insurers can check your credit scores to determine your ability to pay your insurance premiums. However, this is not a common practice, as premiums are typically charged in advance, and failure to pay results in a loss of insurance cover.

If you have serious health problems or are relatively old (age 60 or older, for example), there is very little chance that you will be accepted for a new supplemental health insurance. In this case, you can save yourself time and effort by simply sticking with your existing insurance – assuming you still need and want complementary insurance.

2. Evaluate your current and future needs

Before you even begin looking at other insurance offers, it is important to understand which costs you want and need to insure against. Do you still need the coverages you have had in your existing supplemental health insurance? Do you need additional cover due to changes in your situation? 

There are huge differences in the coverage provided by different supplemental health insurance offers. As a general rule, the more cover an insurance offer provides, the higher the insurance premiums are. It is beneficial to find an insurance offer that best matches your specific needs.

• Accidents: Many insurance providers let you exclude cover for accidents in exchange for lower premiums. Excluding accidents can make sense if your Swiss employer’s accident insurance already includes supplemental insurance for the things you want to cover. But if your employer only has basic, mandatory accident insurance, or if you do not work for a Swiss employer, then you must include accident cover to be able to claim supplemental health insurance benefits for accidents.
• Hospitals: Would having your own room be important to you if you were ever hospitalized? Or would a two-person room or even a general ward be adequate? Are you content to be treated at hospitals on your canton’s hospital list? Are you satisfied with public hospitals, or do you prefer private clinics? How you answer these questions will determine whether or not you need supplemental hospital insurance, and which offer you should use.
• Dentists: Dental insurance is generally offered as a stand-alone supplemental health insurance offer. It is important to carefully compare the premiums with the benefits, as dental insurance is relatively expensive.
• Other coverages: Insurance benefits for medicines, checkups, treatment outside of Switzerland, medical transportation, hearing aids, glasses and contact lenses, orthodontics, recovery and rehabilitation, alternative medicine, home-based care, vaccinations, psychiatry, and maternity vary hugely between offers. Typically, these benefits are found in outpatient insurance offers, but some of them may be included in supplemental hospital insurance as well.
• Extra benefits: Some outpatient insurance offers include extra benefits that may cover the cost of gym memberships, swimming pool passes, yoga courses, sports club memberships, and even dance courses. If you would otherwise spend your own money on these things, getting an insurance that covers all or part of the cost can make financial sense.
• Incentive programs: Some insurers have incentive programs that reward you for healthy lifestyle choices.
• Customer care: The available avenues for getting customer service vary between insurance providers. For example, some insurers may have branch offices near you where you can get help in person, while others may not.
• Correspondence: If you want to receive statements and other correspondence through an online portal or app, check whether that option is available. The same is true if you want to receive correspondence by mail.
• Payment methods: All health insurance providers let you pay premiums using QR bills, though some charge you extra fees when you pay bills at the post office instead of by bank transfer. Direct debit orders are also widely offered. Many insurance providers now give you the option of paying via eBill. A few insurers let you use credit cards, Twint, or even bitcoin payments to settle deductibles and coinsurance payments, or even to pay your premiums.

3. Look at insurance limits

Supplemental outpatient insurance, hospital insurance, and dental insurance offers generally have limits on coverage. 

The same offer can have many different limits for different coverages. For example, most offers that cover preventative checkups have a relatively low limit for this coverage (500 francs, for example). You can find many more examples of limits for individual coverages in the guides to health insurance for dental work, psychotherapy, medicines, alternative medicine, glasses and contact lenses, hearing aids, and orthodontic treatments.

You can find the limits on the information pages of offers in the moneyland.ch comparisons.

4. Find offers that match your needs

Once you have determined which insurance cover you need, the next step is to find offers that have the coverages you need or want. The interactive outpatient insurance and hospital insurance comparisons on moneyland.ch let you filter and sort offers based on their benefits. 

5. Compare the costs

Once you have narrowed down the options to offers that include the insurance coverages you need, the next step is to compare the insurance premiums and choose the most affordable offer. You can compare premiums using the moneyland.ch comparisons for supplemental outpatient insurance and supplemental hospital insurance.

It is important to note that the premiums charged for supplementary health insurance go up as you get older. Typically, premiums are raised at five-year intervals. Because it becomes more difficult to change your supplementary health insurance as you get older or develop health conditions, it can be worth looking at the premiums you would pay in the future in addition to the premiums you would start with. You can get an idea of how premiums will develop over time by comparing outpatient insurance or hospital insurance offers several times using a different year of birth each time.

Some insurance offers have deductibles and/or coinsurance. These may apply to the insurance as a whole, or just to specific coverages. Some insurance providers let you choose between several different deductible models, and charge lower premiums when you choose a higher deductible or a higher coinsurance quota.

Typically, each supplemental health insurance policy has its own deductible and coinsurance requirements that apply to that policy only. But there are exceptions. Swica, for example, applies any coinsurance payments you make towards your mandatory health insurance to your supplemental insurance as well – if you use Swica for both your mandatory and supplemental health insurance.

6. Compare eligible offers with your existing insurance

Once you have found the most affordable offer matching your needs, take time to compare the cost with that of your current insurance. If the new offer is more suitable and/or more affordable than your current insurance, then applying for the new offer makes sense.

7. Check the required notice period for terminating your existing insurance

Before you apply for a new insurance, you should check when the contract term of your existing insurance will expire, and what the required notice period is. Typically, you have to submit your notice instructing the insurance company to terminate your policy either three months or six months before the end of the calendar year. The insurance will then be terminated when that calendar year ends. Exception: If the insurance provider raises your premiums, you can terminate the insurance contract ahead of schedule. That only applies to extraordinary premium hikes, and not the standard age-based premium increases scheduled in the terms and conditions. Typically, you must give notice within a certain timeframe after receiving notice that your premiums will be raised (30 days, for example). You can find detailed information in the guide to terminating a supplemental health insurance policy.

If you signed a contract with a minimum term of more than one year, you will only be able to give notice in the last year of the minimum contract term.

Important: Do not actually give notice before you apply and get approved for the new insurance.

8. Apply for the new offer

Once you know the date on which you can terminate your existing insurance, you can apply the new insurance offer. You can apply for many offers directly in the moneyland.ch outpatient and hospital insurance comparisons. Depending on the insurance provider, you can also apply online through the insurer’s website, by mail, at one of the insurer’s branch offices, or through an insurance broker or agency.

Unless you need additional cover immediately, it makes sense to specify the date on which your current insurance will be terminated as the date on which the new insurance should begin. That way you avoid paying twice for the same insurance coverages.

9. Wait for approval

Do not terminate your existing insurance until you have been approved for the new insurance offer. Ideally, you should sign up and receive your new policy before you give notice on your old insurance. That way you avoid the risk of being left without insurance if the new insurer rejects your application.

10. Terminate your existing supplemental health insurance

Once you have your new insurance policy, or at least a guarantee of acceptance, you can give notice on your existing insurance. You can get clear information about how to go about this in the guide to terminating a supplemental health insurance policy.

Make sure that your old insurance provider gives you a confirmation that your old insurance will be terminated on the specified date.

More on this topic:
Compare supplemental outpatient insurance offers now
Compare supplemental hospital insurance offers now
How to terminate a supplemental health insurance policy
Tips for choosing the right hospital insurance
What is already covered by mandatory health insurance?
What can be covered by supplemental outpatient insurance?