Vivas Health: take out today €300, claim €1000 for eye surgery tomorrow: catch?

J

Jockey

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Hi everyone,

My sister wants to get eye laser surgery done. She is considering taking out health insurance with Vivas health as they give you back €1000 when you get the procedure done in Optilase in Dublin. Vivas say that there is no minimum period to wait and you can apply to have it done immediately.

It all seems a bit too easy to me, you pay €300 for the insurance yet you get back €1000! Has anyone went about getting laser eye surgery done this way through Vivas? The other thing is if you take out the insurance without hospital cover its half the price, can you do this or is there conditions attached?

Thanks in advance,

Jockey
 
Re: Vivas Health

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looked at their website, does saying no waiting period, but i would check out about pre-existing etc... as most insurance comp's only have a 6 month waiting period before you are covered for operations, however if the condition is present prior to joining them it's considered pre-existing and would not be covered for a few years..... so double check with them first
 
Why doesn't she just pay for it and claim it back in tax? Friend of mine got the surgery a couple of years ago and she got about half the cost back when she claimed for medical costs. Took a while but there wasn't any problem.
Your sister might get tax back on the remaining cost after she pays the health insurance as well
 
OP, I can confirm this can be done.

My employer signed me up to Vivas in January 2006.
I had the surgury with Optilase in March 2006 and I quit my job 2 weeks later. Obviously, my empoyer immediately stopped my Vivas cover.

I only stayed on a extra few weeks so I could claim the €1000. It took several weeks for the claim to go through though.
Bear this in mind if you pay for the surgury on your credit card.
 
micmclo said:
OP, I can confirm this can be done.

My employer signed me up to Vivas in January 2006.
I had the surgury with Optilase in March 2006 and I quit my job 2 weeks later. Obviously, my empoyer immediately stopped my Vivas cover.

I only stayed on a extra few weeks so I could claim the €1000. It took several weeks for the claim to go through though.
Bear this in mind if you pay for the surgury on your credit card.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that Micmclo!

She can't claim the tax back as she is currently only earning the minimum wage and is outside even the 20% bracket. Im sure she wouldn't mind waiting awhile if she was certain to get the €1000 back. On a seperate note how did you find the surgery in Optilase? Any complications?

Thanks a mill,

Jockey
 
Just be very careful...remember you're dealing with your eyes.
I would be very wary of these discount places doing laser surgery. Also travelling overseas or to Norn Iron isn't the wisest course of action.
I had it done in Blackrock, expensive yes but the top place in the country.
7 years ago and it's still wonderful.
 
Being the most expensive doesn't automatically qualify it as the 'top place' in the country and neither does being cheap automatically make it any more or less risky. There are a wealth of websites (check google) where you can get personal recommendations for a variety of places both here and abroad.
 
Eurofan said:
Being the most expensive doesn't automatically qualify it as the 'top place' in the country and neither does being cheap automatically make it any more or less risky. There are a wealth of websites (check google) where you can get personal recommendations for a variety of places both here and abroad.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't agree. I had my eyes done in the Blackrock Clinic 7 years ago and the results were fantastic.
However more significantly a friend of mine went to the same surgeon and was told she was not a suitable candidate for the surgery due to extreme astigmatism (imperfect curvature of the cornea I think!) Apparently the procedure would be far more risky. In other words the surgeon turned down the four and a half grand. Honest, professional, ethical.
She then went to one of these 995 per eye merchants and was told "no problem, we'll go right ahead".
This would worry me greatly.
 
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