Health insurance in Venezuela allows you to receive all the necessary medical care for free, simply by showing the policy of a clinic worker. * Almost any policy provides for the following standard risks:
Outpatient and inpatient treatment
Emergency Dental Care
Reimbursement of funds spent on medicines
Call an ambulance
Transportation to Russia when a serious illness is detected
* Provided that the sum insured is sufficient for the treatment.
How much does travel insurance cost in Venezuela?
The base price of insurance in Venezuela is determined by the insurance company, based on the degree of danger of visiting the country for a tourist and the average cost of treatment if he visits a clinic. Thus, the safer the stay in the country and the lower the average cost of treatment, the cheaper the insurance, and vice versa.
When applying for a policy, its cost is also affected by:
Trip duration
Tourist age
The presence of chronic diseases
Additional services
Existence of a deductible (fixed amount, unpaid insurance)
Sum insured (the amount established during the execution of the policy, within which the insurance company will pay for the treatment)
The average cost of insurance for a trip to Venezuela for two weeks with an insurance amount of $30,000 is 12-15 euros*, or 4-5 euros for every $10,000 insured amount. With an increase in the sum insured up to 100 thousand dollars, the total cost of insurance will increase by only 50-60% and amount to 20-25 euros, which means that 10,000 insurance dollars will cost only 2-2.5 euros, which is two times cheaper than with minimum sum insured.
*Average price when applying for a policy online. Buying from an insurance agent can cost more.
Do I need insurance in Venezuela?
The standard of living and the state of the economy in Venezuela are below average, which directly affects wages, crime rates, consumer ability, etc. The healthcare sector in general, and the quality of medical services in particular, do not reach either Russian or even European standards, which is why Venezuelan medicine is considered one of the cheapest in the world.
However, it is cheap only in public clinics, and only for Venezuelan citizens, and treatment in a private clinic can cost tourists almost the same. expensive, as in European countries, while the likelihood of an insured event is an order of magnitude higher.
How to choose travel insurance for Venezuela?
In order to make your trip truly safe, it is not enough just to buy the first available insurance, because not only the very fact of its availability is important, but also what functionality it has and how it can help in an emergency.
Assistance is an intermediary company that performs the functions of the organizer of all necessary actions in the event of an insured event. If you get sick, it is the assistant who will take your call, advise you, look for the nearest clinic, negotiate with doctors about treatment, and pay for its cost with the insurance company. Therefore, the speed of receiving medical care will largely depend on which assistance you choose. Operators of the following assistance companies are considered to be among the most qualified:
International SOS (ISOS)
Mondial Assistance (Mondial)
Class assistance (Class)
Europe Assistance
Global Voyager Assistance
An insurance company is essentially a money bag, and the bigger it is, the better. Large, well-known companies will not evade payments and look for formal reasons for refusal, because the trust of several thousand customers and a good reputation are much more expensive for them than several thousand rubles.
The largest insurance companies with the highest percentage of payments in 2015:
Alliance
Rosgosstrakh
Ingosstrakh
reso-guarantee
Renaissance Insurance
The sum insured determines how expensive treatment the insurance company can pay for. The sum insured should be chosen based on the average cost of medical services. in Venezuela, a sum insured of $30,000 may well be enough even for the treatment of a serious illness, but if you do not regret another 5-7 euros, you can increase the sum insured to 50,000-100,000 dollars.
Active recreation insurance guarantees the payment of the cost of treatment for extreme sports, recreation or tourism. Without this risk included in the contract, no insurance company will pay for the treatment of an injury sustained while surfing, playing football, running, roller skating or any other potentially hazardous activity.
Payment method. To date, in insurance applies two main types of payment for treatment:
Service payment for medical services implies the complete absence of any financial costs on your part: you simply provide your policy to clinic employees, and they themselves agree on payment with your insurance company.
You can also pay for the treatment yourself, and upon arrival contact your insurance company and receive full compensation for the entire cost of treatment.
The deductible reduces the cost of insurance, but if you seek medical care, you will need to pay for part of the treatment yourself. For example, a $200 deductible means that you will pay $200 yourself, and the insurance company will take care of the remaining costs. The presence of a deductible in the insurance contract is highly undesirable, since under such conditions the very essence of insurance is lost – to protect a person from large treatment costs. A franchise can reduce the cost of insurance in Venezuela by 30-40 percent, which, with an average policy price of 15 euros, saves 5-7 euros, but in the event of an insured event, you will have to pay 30-35 times more. If during the rest you go to the clinic a second time, then this amount can be multiplied by two more. So does saving 5-7 euros justify the risk of losing 200-400 dollars?
Additional services. Legal advice or the help of an interpreter in a country like Venezuela can be really useful, because not every Russian knows the official language of this country, and even more so its laws.