News from November 12th, 2020
Civil servants, high-paid employees, students and the self-employed all have the choice of whether to switch to private health insurance. But switching to private health insurance is not always worthwhile.
Advantages and disadvantages of private health insurance
The biggest advantage of private health insurance is the wider range of benefits in contrast to statutory health insurance. While the statutory health insurance only ensures basic care, as a private patient you often benefit from a better treatment offer, for example treatment by the head physician, one or at most double rooms in the hospital, as well as the assumption of the costs for complex dental treatments such as the insertion of implants.
In the statutory insurance, benefits can also be canceled without replacement. This is not possible with PKV. The services that were agreed upon when the contract was concluded are also paid for.
Officer
A large number of civil servants are privately insured because, unlike all other professional groups, they benefit from the subsidy from their employer. The allowance reimburses 50 percent of the treatment costs under the aid regulation. If you have two or more children, the reimbursement through the allowance is even 70%. This drastically reduces the contribution to private health insurance.
Another advantage for civil servants in private health insurance is that they do not have to take into account the daily sickness allowance in their tariff, which also reduces the contribution. In the event of incapacity for work, the employer continues to pay the salary.
However, private health insurance is not the better alternative in all cases. One advantage of the GKV, for example, is that children up to the age of 25 are insured with one parent free of charge, provided the children do not yet have to take out insurance themselves. In the private health insurance, each child must be insured individually, which leads to higher contributions. Comparing the so-called family tariffs and their services is therefore very important if you want to filter out the cheapest and best offer.
For civil servants with low salaries, contributions to private health insurance can represent a major cost factor despite subsidy discounts. Since the GKV calculates the contributions according to the income, these are correspondingly cheap with low salaries.
Even those who suffer from previous illnesses may be better off in the GKV, as private health insurances often set significantly higher contributions if they have previous illnesses.
If you start your civil service career late, you should carefully consider switching to private health insurance and calculate whether it is worthwhile. Because with increasing age, the contribution rates also increase.
Employees
Employees who earn more than EUR 55,000 gross per year have the option of switching to private health insurance.
The rule of thumb is then: if you are young, have no previous illnesses and no children, switching to private health insurance is often the more cost-effective alternative than remaining in statutory health insurance.
According to a study, the Move the premium development of private health insurance and statutory health insurance at the same level, there are no cost disadvantages in the long run.
However, if you intend to start a family in the foreseeable future or already have children, you should also take a close look at the family tariffs of the individual insurers and weigh up whether it is worth switching to private health insurance.
Self-employed
The same rule of thumb as for employees also applies to self-employed or freelancers, with one exception: a minimum income does not have to be proven. This means that the self-employed basically have the choice between private health insurance and statutory health insurance.
Since the employer does not pay half of the contributions to the GKV for the self-employed, these must be paid entirely by yourself. Since the contributions to the GKV depend on income, there are very high contribution costs for high-earning self-employed. On average, a person with statutory health insurance pays a maximum contribution of 368 euros per month. A self-employed person would have to pay twice as much, i.e. more than 700 euros, with the same income. (Those: financen.de)
Students
Students also have the choice between GKV and PKV at the beginning of their studies. If one of the parents has statutory insurance and is the main breadwinner, there is the possibility of remaining insured there free of charge up to the age of 25.
If you have reached the age of 25 and opted for statutory health insurance, you pay a discounted student rate there. This applies until the end of the 14th semester or no later than the 30th birthday. After that, you are a voluntarily insured member and pay a higher contribution.
If the main breadwinner is privately insured, you can either take out statutory insurance under the student tariff or take out private health insurance, which also offers reduced tariffs for students.
If both parents are privately insured and eligible for subsidy, you benefit from their subsidy in the PKV, which reduces your own contribution.
From the age of 25, however, there is no child benefit or any entitlement to allowance through the parents. One should keep this fact in mind, especially when it is foreseeable that one will still study after the age of 25. (prm)
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