My parents are visiting us from overseas for six weeks, do they need to have insurance here?

My parents are visiting us from overseas for six weeks on visit visa, do they need to have health insurance here? which health insurance is good for visiting parents?

Well…it all depends on your appetite for risk aversion. You need to calculate the risk by looking into several factors including age of your parents, existing medical conditions and the cost of treatment in case of any emerging situation. Medical heath insurance with deceleration of pre-medical conditions is very costly. But if don’t mention pre-existing condition while purchasing insurance you’ll not get any claim of the medical situation arising from or related to the pre-existing medical conditions.
Also, there’re not many good insurance companies that offer insurance to visitors. I only found one Allianz partners which costed me $1200 NZD for upto 3 months (including travel) for a single parent with pre-existing medical conditions. The process is first you need to purchase a comprehensive medical and and travel insurance and then declare pre-medical conditions (such as Heart and Coronary disease) of your parent. They’ll make medical assessment through online questionnaire or phone call and make a separate quote for it based on the assessment.

The cost of insurance of is very high and that’s why many people don’t go for it. If you assess that that there’ll be no serious health risk to your parent and they may need to visit GPs only during their stay then medical insurance will be waste of money as you have to pay excess ($100-200) by yourself before making any claims. There’re some basic pre-existing medical conditions (e.g. Diabetes, Blood pressure) that are covered in the comprehensive insurance which may cost around (400-500) for six weeks or so. Nevertheless, its a tough choice any ways.

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Here is a list of some insurances recommended and personally used by my friends for their parents:

https://www.scti.co.nz/affiliates/visiting-new-zealand-515154/?fbclid=IwAR3iGvHRd5LKdVeI9LEI0RrcZHBDC_BhVGjXJ6vcsnqMJ7M-1AVtn8_5sF0

Sandra Grant: P 07 855 0772 / 0800 855 0772
www.healthandtravel.co.nz

Southern Cross - Visiting New Zealand Insurance. This is a reasonable option. However, you can read the details before you decide

AA Travel Insurance is cheaper

SCTI and AMI also provides travel insurance. Prices are almost similar but higher than AA.

I think these Insurance companies do not provide cover for the pre-existing medical conditions that have been treated some time ago or for which our parents are taking regular medication. My advice is if your parents have some existing medical condition that is not mentioned in the basic pre-existing conditions list, you must declare it and get policy from the insurance company that provide cover for it. Getting an insurance policy without covering the pre-existing medical conditions would be a waste of money.