Irish Life Health to cut premiums by up to 9.5%

Competition in the health insurance market is heating up with Irish Life Health the latest insurer to announce a price cut.

On Tuesday the health insurer, formed in 2016 when Irish Life acquired Aviva Health and GloHealth, said it will cut prices by an average of 9.5 per cent for adults, and 14.2 per cent on children’s premiums. The price cuts will be effective from March 2nd.

According to the insurer, this means that a family of four on Health Plan 13 could save €437 a year, while an adult on the BeFit2 plan will see an annual saving of € 133.20.

The move will come too late for thousands of health insurance customers however, who will have already renewed their policies earlier this month.

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Jim Dowdall, managing director of Irish Life Health, which has a 21 per cent market share, said that the insurer is "committed to providing our customers with the best choice of innovative benefits and value in the market". He once more called on the Government to address the "inequitable health insurance levy model and inappropriate charges in the public system", which, he said, continues to drive health insurance inflation.

“The public hospital bed legislation whereby people with private health insurance customers are being double taxed for public system services is unfair, and if charges such as this were removed, health insurance costs would reduce considerably across the industry,” he said.

Competition

The move from Irish Life Health comes hot on the heels of a move by Vhi last week to reduce premiums. Vhi cut its plans by an average of 5.5 per cent, although the cuts ranged from as little as 2 per cent on some plans, while premiums on others will fall by as much as 14 per cent. The insurer said that almost 90 per cent of its customers will benefit from a reduction of some kind.