SPEAKER_00 0:10

Hello and welcome back to that Home Loan Hub. Today we're going to talk about some serious stuff. Maybe not so much. I'm joined by Rebecca, our resident insurance

Sick Week, Serious Money Talk

SPEAKER_00 0:20

advisor. Hello, Rebecca. Hi. Good to see you. You too. You've been sick. So have you. So have I. So if we start coughing. So if we start coughing, we'll apologize in advance. But this um episode highlights the importance of if you are getting sick, you should be prepared for things in life, right? So um something exciting really happened this week. Um, some big news have been announced by one of our um top providers of insurances, AIA.

AIA’s Big Announcement

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Am I allowed to name them? I hope I am allowed to name them. Yeah, I wasn't sure either.

SPEAKER_01 0:54

Yeah, I've just named them. Oh well. It's AIA. I mean, if people looked it up later, they'd be able to find it.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Exactly. Exactly. But um, we deal a lot with these guys in the space. I love their product, I love um what they stand for, I love the things they do, so I'm not biased, but I think they're cool. And also because they're red, you know, I love red. And I see you're wearing blue. Yeah, all right. There are a few blue, there are a few blue. But let's talk about what they've actually come out with. So go ahead and um fill me in.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

Okay, so they've listened to the market and they brought out an alternative to full health insurance. Um, what they're calling a specialist and testing support.

What The New Cover Includes

SPEAKER_00 1:35

So um, so they currently do have a cover that's health insurance. It's full, comprehensive. You can also add on specialists, diagnostics, tests, etc. But they decided that, oh, hold on a second, that's actually getting expensive for people. Absolutely. Cost of living, crisis, people are canceling insurances, and then they need it the most. So let's do something different here. So let's dive in into a little bit more detail. What does that cover cover?

SPEAKER_01 2:02

Absolutely. So, as the title says, specialist and testing support. So it's pretty much the add-on that you can normally do on health insurance. So it's going to cover things specialists, diagnostics, tests, imagings, all of that sort of thing. And I think we've had a cap as well. Yes, so 10,000 cap for the specialists per policy year, and 100,000 on diagnostics, testings, and imaging.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

That's still massive, right? Because um,

Caps, Costs, And Excess Options

SPEAKER_00 2:29

I think someone was saying to me one time that just the MRIs in New Zealand, uh, you're looking at $10,000 if you want an MRI out of schedule. Like for instance, if you're dealing with something and the doctor says no, you can only have one once a year that's funded or half funded or whatever. And if you want to pay for more out of your pocket, something like this would come really handy. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 2:51

It'll pay for itself and one on one claim like that.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:55

Um, and there is also the options of excesses still on this. So normal health insurance has multiple excesses to bring the premium down. And this one they're offering a zero excess or a two hundred and fifty dollar excess. Nice. So if you add the two hundred and fifty dollar excess, it brings the premium down by about fifteen percent on average. Okay. So, you know, people can, you know, mostly, sometimes, hopefully, afford $250 as opposed to $10,000 to get a um a major test done. Mm-hmm. Um, if it's saving that little bit of premium if the cost is still too high.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Which is really cool. It'd be really interesting to see if other insurances will follow suit.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

Yeah, absolutely. The one thing about this type of cover with them sp specifically though, is it is an add-on to you still have to have a personal risk product. And add it on to it.

Add‑On Rules And Bundling

SPEAKER_00 3:45

It's an optional add-on. So it's an optional add-on. What do you mean by having a personal risk?

SPEAKER_01 3:50

So the life, the trauma, the income protection, the mortgage protection, or the total permanent disability. So you have to have one of those. And then this is an optional add-on.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

Okay. So for instance, if we have a client that could take $100,000 life insurance, which costs absolute peanuts, normally it's $5 a week or $10 a week. Um, so they could get that life cover and this. And that way we are protecting them from both sides.

SPEAKER_01 4:16

Exactly. And not having the especially with the health cover in particular, the younger you are, obviously, the cheaper it is, but the older you get, it becomes unaffordable for a lot of people. It becomes astronomical. Um, so even if earlier on they've got the full cover.

SPEAKER_00 4:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

Um, then again, it's gonna be an interesting one when it comes to underwriting. Because I wonder if they're going to be able to convert if you've got the full cover with specialists and tests, I wonder if down the track they'll let us convert the specialists in tests onto an existing life cover and get rid of the base cover or not. Yeah. So that's something to ask. Because I mean it was only released yesterday's. It was only released yesterday. So we don't know all the information yet. Um, but there's definitely, I mean, it's definitely a great option for people that can't afford a lot.

SPEAKER_00 5:00

Exactly. Because remember a few years ago, again, uh, this particular company they came out with an innovative

Affordability, Cancer Care, And Access

SPEAKER_00 5:06

product to cover just cancer. Yes. Their health insurance was so expensive and lots of people couldn't afford. But we live in New Zealand and cancer is one of the top diseases that kills people, and people wanted to have protection for it, but they just couldn't afford. So AIA came out and they were like, cool, we'll make it cheaper for you. I think it was 25% cheaper or something like that. Um, and they would just do cancer care cover. So if you were diagnosed with cancer, you'll get XYZ, you'll get your scanning done, testing done.

SPEAKER_01 5:39

Yeah, it's all of the all of the stuff to do with cancer. So any anything you need is covered under that up to I think it was 500,000 per police a year.

SPEAKER_00 5:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:49

So so it's quite a substantial amount when you think about how much like chemo and radiation costs. Um and it is that much cheaper. Especially it also helps with that one if someone's got other health conditions and they couldn't get normal health insurance. Yes. They can actually still get cancer care. Like I had a client a couple of weeks ago, we're still looking at options for her daughter who had about six different things wrong with her, and she couldn't get any other covers, but they're willing to offer cancer care. Yeah. And cancer was one of the ones the mother was most worried about.

SPEAKER_00 6:17

Yeah, exactly. And and that's the thing, right? Like we are living in a stage of life where money just spreads thin. You know, you you just by the time you pay your mortgage, your bills, your daily living, there's not much left. You feel like you've not been paid at all. And they're kids. I know. That's how I feel, guys. Um, you know, and and the thing is with that, is you know, where do you spend money that will give you return for your buck? And unfortunately, insurances is not where people think about. No, they don't see it, they just see it as an expense.

SPEAKER_01 6:53

Yeah. I think it's a hard one because obviously, I mean, it's great if you never claim on it, right? You want to be healthy. You want to be healthy. Um, but then if people don't claim on it, they think they're not getting their money's worth. So it's a r it is a hard one. I mean, I get how they feel. I mean, we all do when you know money is tight, but you've when you think about how expensive things are, like the MRI that you just mentioned, that type of thing, a smaller,

Why Advice Beats Facebook Opinions

SPEAKER_01 7:17

this is where this comes like the perfect thing, a smaller premium to at least have those types of cover. So even if you've got to have an operation down the track and that's in the public system, you've already had all this testing and everything that's covered. And if it's something serious, you want to be on top of it. Yeah, exactly. Like this is where they'll find those issues.

SPEAKER_00 7:36

Yeah. Exactly. And I think the most important thing for our listeners to think about is to really reach out to one of us, which they have done in the past, which has been awesome. So thank you guys for listening to our um podcast and asking us those questions because this is what we're here for. This is where we want to challenge you and your thinking and your way of being, because it's all well and good to hide under the blanket and be like, oh, nothing's gonna happen to me, I'll be fine. But look, you got sick this week, I got quite sick, and I hardly ever get sick, and I feel quite chasty and you know, headaches. And I and I started to think, oh my god, what if, you know, what if something really happens to me? Who's gonna work for me? Yeah, um, who's gonna do the job for me? And I've got four kids to feed. Absolutely, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

It's thinking, yeah, it's weighing up. Yeah, it might be another cost, but in the long run, can you afford not to have it?

SPEAKER_00 8:33

Yeah, that's the question I always ask myself as well. Like, can I afford not to have it? Yeah, because at the moment, like I'm paying $400 per month on health insurance alone, and then I'll pay another $300 a month on life insurance, mortgage protection, etc. etc. So $700 a month going towards those expenses. But the way I look at it, it's one big night out a week that I can skip, right? It's like if I take by night out, I mean taking my kids out to eat because there are four of them. Yeah. And plus me, so there's five kids. That very quickly, yeah. Literally, our bill is always like 150 bucks easily. Yeah. By the time we put all the meals together. So for me, it's like call, what where can I cut that will allow me to pay for this freedom down the track if I ever have to climb? And to be honest, with my kids, I had to claim on things like um allergy specialists, you know, seeing the allergy specialists doing the tests because public system waiting through the public system, my goodness, it took me years to wait. Yeah versus direct, you can go much faster. Absolutely. So I think having products like this is genius. You know, they are really reacting to what the public is saying. And the public is saying we don't have the money

Reviews, Life Changes, Next Steps

SPEAKER_00 9:50

to pay for the full cover. Let's do something halfway.

SPEAKER_01 9:54

Absolutely. I think, like you said, it'll be interesting to see if other insurance companies pack up on it because I don't think they really have with the cancer care so much.

SPEAKER_00 10:03

Yeah, I think there was one more provider that did something similar to what we have.

SPEAKER_01 10:09

Yeah. Um I know there's others that have like a cancer product, but it's more of a trauma. I'm not sure how in depth they've gone with the medical side. So with AIA bringing this out on top of their cancer care, I mean, they obviously are really listening to what is needed or what people can afford.

SPEAKER_00 10:26

And we can run options for them, right? We can show them, look, if you took full health care, I'm sorry. Coughing fit, one zero.

SPEAKER_01 10:41

I mean, try not. Don't make me laugh because that's what it looks like.

SPEAKER_00 10:44

I know that's where it starts, right? Yeah, so um the thing is we can sit down, we can show people, okay, if you took full health insurance, this is what it's gonna cost you. If you took full health insurance with zero excess, $250 excess, $1,000 excess, this is what it looks like. If you took only cancer care, this is what it looks like. If you took only the specialist in diagnostic care, this is what it looks like. So this is something people can't really fully do themselves online. No, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

They can look at pricing, but they can't really do a proper comparison of everything it will cover and everything it wouldn't cover. Yeah. And what is actually worth it for them. Because some people might only want to cover cancer, like they might have a lot of cancer in their family, and that is their biggest concern, and that is what they can afford. Some people might their their biggest concern might be the specialist in tests.

SPEAKER_00 11:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

But if they're young enough, they might think, oh well, maybe the full cover is, you know, an option. But knowing between the two what isn't isn't covered, I think that's where we come in to show them properly how it compares.

SPEAKER_00 11:49

You know, it still blows my mind that people go online or go on Facebook to ask for advice. And it's like, this is the most important thing in your life that can happen to you. Yeah. Why are you asking Facebook for advice?

SPEAKER_01 12:04

It's like people that are like a you know, backyard barbecue type of thing, though, someone will mention their insurance and so someone else will start asking for their opinions on it.

SPEAKER_00 12:11

Yeah. And they go, Oh no, that's too expensive. Oh, you're paying too much. It's like, well, you don't know what cover they have. No, exactly. And uh they go, I only pay this much. It's like well now she's coughing. This episode is gonna be full of coughs. Yeah, but uh but that's the thing, right? Like um, there is just so much out there and so much to compare. And yes, you might be paying only $5 a week, but it might be absolute crap cover that will not even pay out when you need it. So um, and then some people go, Oh, I'd rather self-insure. Awesome. But how long is it gonna save you, you know, take you to save $500k? And we've covered that in our previous episode. So if you guys haven't listened to that episode, please go back a few episodes ago um to listen to that one. And that just blows my mind that people will turn to social media for opinion on something so serious, like same with wills, and you know, they go, Oh, I'll just do my will online. No, like these things matter, you know, this is where you shouldn't be um saving money. Yeah, sure, buy your furniture secondhand, marketplace. Awesome, good idea. Um, you know, so buy your veggies uh at Pack and Safe versus New World, cool, but don't try to scheme on insurances, not the stuff that you're protecting like when it comes to protecting your family, right?

SPEAKER_01 13:32

Insurances, wells, all of that stuff. Exactly. Like that is there because you need to protect your family if something happens to you.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

Yeah, serious stuff, serious stuff. Awesome. Well, Rebecca, thank you so much for coming today and sharing this big news. If people want to know more, I think they will reach out to us. I really hope so. And if you are listening and if you already got your insurance sorted, that's awesome. Big hugs to you. Um, lucky we can do it by distance so you don't get our bugs. But um, but if you haven't reviewed that in a while, feel free to reach out as well because we do recommend reviewing your insurances every year to two years because a lot of stuff happens to people. You usually have a new relationship or have a baby, or your baby would have uh graduated college, you know, or you would have paid off your mortgage. A lot of things happen to people.

SPEAKER_01 14:18

So there's so many life things, right? That people don't think, oh, that might actually affect my insurance. Yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 14:25

Exactly. Awesome. Thank you so much, Rebecca. You have a lovely weekend ahead and um talk soon. Thank you.