Health insurance for overseas visitors works a little differently than what's available to locals, so Allianz Care Australia makes it easy to understand by breaking it down into three streams of cover, each tailored to a different type of visitor: students, workers and travellers.
If you fall into one of these groups, Allianz Care Australia has a selection of policies just for you, whether you're a student or worker whose visa requires it, or you're a backpacker who just wants some extra protection.
Top 3 features:
Good for people who want full medical cover for most treatments. All of Allianz Care Australia's policies cover nearly every necessary hospital treatment including pregnancy.
Good for people who appreciate customer support. Allianz Care Australia has been helping travellers for over 30 years and maintains a 24/7 helpline if you need assistance.
Beware if you don't need full cover. If you are young, healthy and single, you may not need a policy that covers pregnancy, cancer and heart surgery.
Allianz Care Australia Overseas Visitor Health Cover
This is a summary of information and benefits. For the full exclusions, limitations, waiting periods, terms and conditions please read the Policy Document which is available at https://www.allianzcare.com.au/en/policywording.
Who is Allianz Care Australia?
The Allianz Group is one of the largest insurance companies in the world, operating in 66 countries around the globe. The division that offers health insurance to overseas visitors is called Allianz Care Australia.
It was born in 1983 as a company called Worldcare, when its founder struggled to safely bring his son home from overseas.
It specialises in helping people travel safely with products like Overseas Visitor Health Cover (OVHC), Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC), roadside assistance, travel insurance, emergency home assistance and more.
What health insurance options are available?
Allianz Care Australia offers three streams of cover to different types of visitors: students, workers and travellers. Each of these groups has slightly different needs and Allianz Care Australia's policies cater to them accordingly.
Here are the options available to all types of visitors:
Students: Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC)
For most students, the number one feature they need in a health insurance policy is for it to meet visa condition 8501, which is the government's requirement for the student to have adequate health insurance.
Allianz Care Australia offers two OSHC policies that meet this condition. These are Standard Cover and Essentials Cover. The standard policy has no waiting period for psychiatric services and 12 month waiting period for pregnancy related services. Both Essentials and Standard policy have a 12 month waiting period for pre-existing conditions. Students are covered for a range of treatments and services including:
Here's what it provides for students such as those on visa 500:
Full cover for most hospital treatments. It pays 100% of the Medicare Benefits Schedule (MBS) fee for all treatments
Doctor's visits. This covers the MBS fee for doctors visits and specialist visits.
Prescriptions. It gives you $500 per year (for singles) to cover prescriptions prescribed by a doctor.
Ambulance cover. It pays 100% of medically necessary ambulance transport.
Workers: Overseas Visitors Health Cover (OVHC)
Most workers visiting Australia also need insurance that meets visa condition 8501. Allianz Care Australia offers four policies for workers who need it, such as those on visas 482, 485 and 405. These are:
Budget Working Cover. This pays 100% of MBS fee for most treatments except assisted reproductive services (like IVF) and elective cosmetic surgery. It also covers secondary fees in a public or private hospital including your accommodation, medications, ambulance, surgically implanted prostheses and rehab.
Standard Working Cover. This covers everything Budget Working cover does plus doctors visits, non-hospital prescriptions, blood work, radiology and specialist visits.
Mid Working Cover. This covers everything the first two workers policies do plus a range non-hospital treatments like general dental, optical, physiotherapy, chiropractic, acupuncture and remedial massage (these are called extras in Australia).
Top Working Cover. This covers everything Mid Working Cover does plus additional extras like speech therapy, hearing aids, podiatry, psychology and health management programs.
Visitors: Overseas Visitors Health Cover (OVHC)
Allianz Care Australia also also uses the term OVHC to refer to its visitors cover, although it does not promise that these policies meet condition 8501. That's because these travellers aren't required to meet this condition for their visas.
Here are the policies available for travellers, such as those on visas 600, 601 and 651:
Budget Visitors. This covers 100% of the MBS fee for most medically necessary treatments except assisted reproductive services and elective cosmetic surgery. It also covers fees you're charged in a public or private hospital, including accommodation, doctor's fees, in-hospital medications, emergency ambulance and surgically implanted prostheses.
Standard Visitors. This covers all the same hospital expenses as Budget Visitors policy, but adds cover for doctors visits, specialist visits, blood work, radiology and non-hospital prescriptions.
What are the benefits of taking out cover with Allianz Care Australia?
There are a number of benefits of going with Allianz Care Australia, including:
24-hour support. Allianz Care Australia has been helping travellers for more than 30 years and offers a 24/7 helpline if you ever need assistance.
Family cover. You can take out cover for yourself, you and your partner or the whole family. All dependants are covered free under a family policy.
Access to agreement hospitals and doctors. If you visit a hospital or doctor that's in Allianz Care Australia's wide network of agreement hospitals, you can save on a major out-of-pocket expenses called the gap. This is what non-network doctors will charge you above the benefit amount Allianz Care Australia pays.
What is the Allianz Care Australia health insurance ID?
Your Allianz Care Australia health insurance id is your policy number listed on your certificate of insurance.
You'll need that to register for Allianz Care Australia's online member portal and app, where you can make a claim, find a doctor, update your membership details and access the 24/ helpline.
Once you sign up, you can simply login using your email address and password.
How do you make a claim?
Claiming is slightly different for Allianz Care Australia's OSHC and OVHC policies.
OSHC
If you visit one of Allianz Care Australia's Direct billing providers, your claim is automatically sent to them and payment is made directly to the medical provider. Alternatively, you can also use the My OSHC Assistant app to make a claim. All you need to do is download the app, create an account, select submit claim and upload photos of your invoices and receipts. You can also sometimes claim in person with a cash claim on-campus. Cash claims are available at most major education providers. There is a limit of $105 per invoice, and your medical bill needs to be paid.
OVHC
With OVHC, when you make a claim, you can either claim money back for the treatment you've already paid for or claim money to pay for the treatment. To claim, download the OVHC claim form, print and fill out the form, scan your completed form and any relevant receipts and invoices and email them to ovhcclaims@allianz-assistance.com.au with your policy number as the email subject line. If you'd rather post your claim, send it to:
Allianz Care Australia Locked Bag 3001 Toowong QLD 4066
Tim Bennett is a Finder insurance & utilities expert. For over 10 years he's reported on news, politics, finance and other topics as a journalist and radio presenter. Tim's roles have included radio news reader and breakfast at the ABC, news producer for SBS and producer for Fairfax Media. Tim regularly appears as a health insurance expert on programs like Sunrise and SBS news, as well as in the Australian, The Daily Telegraph, The Courier Mail and more. See full bio
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