Private medical insurer BCWA is targeting Channel Islanders with two new bespoke products for residents of Jersey and Guernsey.
"Private Health Cover" for Jersey residents is based on BCWA Healthcare's Preferential plan.
The plan is available through the intermediary Rossborough Healthcare International.
It provides GP fees up to £200 per person a year while dental charges cover up to a maximum of £160 a year, including dental check-ups and treatment. Optical cover is up to a maximum of £140 a year, which covers sight tests.
"Sight tests are a pre-requisite for all staff operating in front of computer screens, and the plan also offers cash grants towards the cost of glasses, bifocals or contact glasses," said Philip Fowles, sales and marketing director.
Benefits available include the choice of up to four scales of cover; in-patient and day-patient hospital charges, surgeons and anaesthetists fees, specialist physical fees, private ambulance and home nursing out-patient services such as physiotherapy and radiology
BCWA, which had a turnover of £42 million last year, is also launching a similar product in Guernsey in April. This will include full refund for GP fees -- Channel Islanders have to pay for GP consultancy and treatment. Both products include the benefit of flights to the mainland for treatment up to £100 per flight.
Fowles claimed that the Preferential Plan, which was launched on the UK mainland in 1984, and on which the Jersey plan is based, was the first truly comprehensive PMI plan that provides a full refund benefit schedule for both individuals and groups. As a result, there are no upper limits to the core medical cover provided.
