Health Insurance in Dubai is a bit of a swampy soil where it is easy to get lost. Especially now, that the new health insurance scheme will be if at least partly effective in the UAE, this will make things even more confusing. Let us now see how health insurance companies in Dubai work and how their roles will change in the future.
Health insurance in Dubai runs on multiple levels. First, we can talk about the expatriates arriving in Dubai and need a good health insurance, sometimes even if they are already insured. According to the new regulations, expats wanting to get a residence visa need to show medical check records both from their home country or country of residence and must do the health checks in Dubai to obtain the health card. With health card, most of the healthcare in Dubai governmental hospitals will be free. Meanwhile most expats, even though they do have their health card will choose themselves the local health institute of their nationality when it is possible.
For private healthcare, it is sometimes better to opt for a health insurance plan from international health insurance companies, out of which there are so many in Dubai. There are local and international health insurance companies which help you with different sorts of health insurance packages. The most important here is to find health insurance companies whose programs are the best for you. Avoid health insurance companies who restrict the number of days spent in hospital and get such health insurance policy that does not terminate by the time of retirement. Purchase an international policy if you are a frequent traveller and if you are sure that, you will be willing to work at other countries too. Look for such health insurance companies in Dubai, which have subsidiaries in several other countries.
Dubai local insurance companies usually do not have offices outside the Middle Eastern area. Companies like Axa are good. NextCare has offices only in the Middle East and Egypt yet the Emirati Daman have its European subsidiary too and offer international healthcare and health insurance programs. Dubai and the whole Emirates is practically full of private health insurance companies. Count around AED 200 for your monthly fees for regional coverage, if you acquire international plan may be even the double. The most important is that you always need to check out your package.
What brings confusion is the new plan of the Emirates, which is to start and get implemented from next year which may discourage many Dubai based companies to carry on with their business in Dubai. Dubai will make every company who are to hire expatriate workers obligatory to pay for their workers’ health insurance packages. This new program’s implementation can take some time. It would give surely a great motivation for even more people to want to work in Dubai yet they may change the whole business structures and further prices in the UAE region.
The new health insurance scheme will also bring huge changes for the insurance companies who from then on must work double as hard to reach a much smaller market than before so we can predict that many of them will fall out of the battle and pull out of the Emirates. Try to check the insurance plans and also ask local insurance companies in how will the change affect your insurance