Reputable student health insurance providers?

AlexInHelsinki · Post by **AlexInHelsinki** » Thu Jun 26, 2008 3:07 am

Why hello there, helpful board members!

Question regarding student health insurance for non EU nationals (I'm from the USA): I'm looking for a reputable and basic student health insurance provider. I'm studying for 2 years, so only need the 30,000 euro coverage. However, I'm really confused about providers! I called both my school and the Finnish consulate in NYC and neither would give me any specific recommendations on reputable providers to check out (I assume it's because they didn't want to be held responsible for any mishaps). I've found several companies that charge about $2000, and then a few companies that charge around $380 for what the say will cover the requirements needed. This is a huuuuge price gap! I (obviously) don't want my application to get rejected and/or not have adequate health coverage in case something happens over there because I bought bogus insurance, and I don't want to get ripped off. Several of these companies that offer low prices are located in Florida (which sketches me out...nothing against Florida, but what are the chances that you'd have two international health insurance providers offering insurance at almost the same sketchily low price...in Florida?? Florida is just a little sketchy as a whole in my book...) Also, why in the world would anyone buy insurance that is THAT much more expensive if they could get comparable coverage so much cheaper? Maybe they just didn't look very hard to find options??

Here are the sites with the cheap insurance:

http://www.internationalstudentinsurance.com (just the name sounds sketchy to me...way too literal)

http://www.mnui.com/index.asp

And the more expensive ones are like, AIG, BUPA, and a few others.

Anyone have any insight on this issue??

THANKS!

Alex

**Sponsor:**

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Thu Jun 26, 2008 6:35 am

http://www.insuremytrip.com/

This is a site for comparing different different travel insurance companies. It might be of some use to you.

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Thu Jun 26, 2008 7:53 am

Also, the United States Department of State has recently put up a Web site for students abroad http://studentsabroad.state.gov/

On this page (scroll down a ways) are links for a number companies that provide medical insurance for students abroad: http://travel.state.gov/travel/tips/bro ... _1215.html

They, like everyone, post a disclaimer that they don't endorse any particular company but I have to think they have done a little vetting.

Good luck. My daughter is also studying in Finland and she has medical insurance through her program, but it is AIG and they are not financially very stable so I'm looking for backup myself.

sokser · Post by **sokser** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 12:56 am

I was in the exact same boat as you a couple of months ago. I was in NYC trying to get my health insurance and not Migri, my university, the NYC Finnish Consulate or anyone else was able to give me any acceptable information.

Personally I care a lot about my health and I don't ever want to find myself in a situation where I'm stuck with huge medical bills. If you read the fine print on many of the cheap plans they will not cover anything that existed before you signed up for their insurance. In legal terms this means that unless you're in an accident, don't expect them to pay for anything. Any disease you may come up with has probably been in the making for years. I called these companies and they told me that if you come up with something such as diabetes they will not cover it because diabetes takes years to develop. The expensive companies follow Americas pre-existing condition policy which tends to be much more lenient and states that there had to be noticeable symptoms that would cause you to go to a doctor in order for the pre-existing condition not to be covered.

In the end I chose Aetna's Good Health Plus plan (http://www.goodhealthamericas.com). I chose them because I had Aetna for years in America and always received a high level of care from them. The plan has a $2,000,000 policy limit with no limit on medication costs. Overall it provided the best level of care at a competitive cost. I paid $1277.00 for one year with a $250 deductible.

I submitted this plan with my residence permit application and it was approved for my permit.

blaugrau · Post by **blaugrau** » Fri Jul 18, 2008 8:46 am

If this question relates to the medical insurance one has to prove nowadays for the resident permit/registration, then the following is irrelevant. But if you're concerned about medical bills -- in Finland there are student health centres, where all students are eligible for treatment of all kind. The only precondition is having paid the student union's fees for the year. You don't need to be insured by Kela or anyone else to be able to use their services. They are excellently staffed and equipped, and if anything, your max. fees are 9 Euro, if you are an undergraduate student:

http://www.fshs.fi/netcomm/default.asp?strLAN=EN

Desundial · Post by **Desundial** » Sat Jul 19, 2008 12:33 am

IIRC I used mnui for several years - just kept renewing -BUT - this was pre-"proof of insurance" days and I did it as a form of accident and travel insuracne (included general emergency medical) and didn't have to put it the the RP test.

I picked mnui because they were one of the few companies offering full coverage for sports - eg no skiing, etc. exclusion, which I figured was the most likely way I was going to end up at the emergency room anyway. Don't think I took the student plan - some kind of expat plan instead which covered me wherever in europe I was (as long as I submitted with the original application a list of countries I would be in - like ticked every country possible

).

As the above post says, I used student health center for regular medical care anyway.

nsdh · Post by **nsdh** » Sun Jul 20, 2008 7:00 pm

Which one is cheapest and accepted by Finland Imigration?

sokser · Post by **sokser** » Sun Jul 20, 2008 9:27 pm

The cheapest two that I found that are accepted by Finnish immigration are the Student Secure Plan and the Atlas Plan from www.buyamericaninsurance.com and www.studentsecure.com. Either of these will run around $600 per year.

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Sun Jul 20, 2008 11:54 pm

sokser wrote:The cheapest two that I found that are accepted by Finnish immigration are the Student Secure Plan and the Atlas Plan from http://www.buyamericaninsurance.com and http://www.studentsecure.com. Either of these will run around $600 per year.

And I've seen a few policies which will let you pay a monthly payment rather than all upfront.

nsdh · Post by **nsdh** » Mon Jul 21, 2008 5:15 am

I am sitting in Finland and i need student insurance, Atlas plan seems to be good with 414$ and $250000 coverage. Can i apply online? Is that a reliable site and insurance? Can anyone share there experience those applied online?

https://www.buyamericaninsurance.com

Thanks

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Mon Jul 21, 2008 10:15 am

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Mon Jul 21, 2008 10:18 am

mrshourula wrote:
nsdh wrote:I am sitting in Finland and i need student insurance, Atlas plan seems to be good with 414$ and $250000 coverage. Can i apply online? Is that a reliable site and insurance? Can anyone share there experience those applied online?

https://www.buyamericaninsurance.com

Thanks

I have no experience with buyamericaninsurance.com but from reading the content of their Web site, I can see that they are travel insurance consolidaters (also sometimes called aggregators). The company that runs buyamericaninsurance.com is called Insubuy. Insubuy indicates on their Web site that they specialized in insurance for people of Indian origin living in the US who are inviting relatives to come to America.

I've been comparing travel medical insurance policies using these two sites:
http://www.insuremytrip.com.
http://www.squaremouth.com/ ETA: this is the Web site I find easiest to use and I have seen it referenced in many travel articles.

There are lots of brokers, aggregators, consolidaters, etc., who sell insurance but they are not the insurance companies; rather, they are the "middle man" selling a product. The best thing you can do is very carefully read the details of the policy to make sure it will do what you want and need it to do (Do you just want the cheapest policy to meet the RP requirement or do you want a policy that is going to take care of you in a medical emergency). Google the actual insurance company (i.e, Atlas) and see if you can find reviews of that company. Personally, I am highly supspicious of all insurance companies so I have been actually calling the aggregators and asking very specific questions about what is and isn't covered by a particular policy.

sokser · Post by **sokser** » Mon Jul 21, 2008 2:48 pm

I had Atlas as a temporary travel insurance before my Aetna insurance kicked in. I never filed a claim with them so I couldn't tell you if they actually will reimburse you or not but I've read decent reviews about them. Their underwriter is Multinational Underwriters.

mrshourula · Post by **mrshourula** » Mon Jul 21, 2008 5:18 pm

sokser wrote:I had Atlas as a temporary travel insurance before my Aetna insurance kicked in. I never filed a claim with them so I couldn't tell you if they actually will reimburse you or not but I've read decent reviews about them. Their underwriter is Multinational Underwriters.

Atlas International is one of the companies you can compare on Squaremouth.com. Squaremouth makes a claim of zero tolerance -- meaning they won't partner with a company that has any complaints of not paying claims until the complaints are resolved so I take that to mean Atlas International is decent. I did note that on buyamericaninsurance.com, the Atlas product listed is Atlas America (which is in line with them specializing in insurance for people coming to live in America).

On Squaremouth, the company is Atlas International. Both have MNU as underwriter. Just make sure you the quotes you are getting are for international insurance.

Just to be clear, I have no relationship with any of theses aggregators or insurance companies nor any special knowledge about student medical health insurance other than my own reading and research.

nsdh · Post by **nsdh** » Sun Jul 27, 2008 7:02 am

Thanks for the Reply.

I need to get the insurance, As iam in Finland i dont know whom should i contact? or how to get it through online? If anyone tells me the steps to follow it will be helpful.

-Deviprasad

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