Expat Family Health Insurance: What You Need to Know

When you move abroad with a family, there are tons of things to consider, from choosing the right school for your kids to finding a nanny and picking the neighborhood where you want your children to grow up. But there’s another crucial factor you shouldn’t overlook: health insurance.

Once you’re living overseas, chances are you’ll no longer be covered by your home country’s public healthcare system. That means you’ll need to rely on private health insurance to protect your family.

In this article, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know about expat family health insurance: how to save money, what kind of coverage young children typically need, how family plans are structured, and which international providers offer the best value. 

Whether you’re planning a long-term stay or just getting started, this guide will help you make an informed decision.

Disclaimer: This article may include links to products or services offered by ExpatDen's partners, which give us commissions when you click on them. Although this may influence how they appear in the text, we only recommend solutions that we would use in your situation. Read more in our Advertising Disclosure.

Save Money with Family Health Insurance

Here’s something many expat families don’t realize: you can get significant discounts when buying health insurance together as a family. While discounts and requirements vary between insurance companies, here’s what it generally looks like:

• 20% discount for a family of 4
• 2nd child gets 50% off their individual rate
• 3rd+ child is FREE

It’s also good to know that most insurance providers don’t publicly mention these discounts. It can also be a hassle to find out since, in most cases, you need to contact them individually to get the details.

How To Get a Family Discount

The key requirement for getting a discount from a family plan is that every family member on the plan needs to have the same benefits.

To give you an idea, if you want your kids to have comprehensive coverage, things like outpatient coverage, GP visits, prescription medications, and routine check-ups, then mom and dad need that same level of coverage too. You can’t mix and match different benefit levels within the same family plan.

Depending on how you look at it, this can be a pro and a con. In many families, they just want everyone to have similar coverage anyway since it’s easier to manage and remember. They can also see a doctor together at the same time when the entire family is sick (which can happen more often than you’d expect, since germs spread easily within a household).

Sometimes, visiting the hospital for things like routine check-ups even turns into a family activity. And in many cases, the family discounts can offset the cost of the extra coverage you’re getting.

Tip: There are some ways to optimize your family’s premium structure. But each insurer is different. So, you may want to work with an experienced broker who specializes in this topic, such as Tenzing Pacific, to help find the right coverage within your budget.

Popular Coverage for Young Children

Each family has different requirements for family health insurance. For some families, they want the health insurance to pay for everything, from vaccinations and routine health check-ups to outpatient coverage and hospitalization. For others, they mainly want coverage for expensive costs.

Based on what I’ve seen, families with young children almost always opt for comprehensive benefits that cover the full range of treatments their kids might need, including routine care and outpatient coverage. This way, they can immediately take their kids to see a doctor whenever they’re sick.

The most popular coverage for families includes:

• GP and pediatrician visits plus consultation fees
  
• Routine care costs like regular check-ups, diagnostic tests, x-rays, and prescription medications
  
• Emergency room coverage for accidents and sudden illnesses
  
• Child wellness programs and vaccinations to keep your kids healthy

This comprehensive approach gives you peace of mind as a parent. You’re not hesitating to take your child to the doctor because you’re worried about costs, and you’re not dealing with the stress of large medical bills on top of caring for a sick child.

That said, if budget is a major concern, you can opt for an “emergency only” plan (also called inpatient coverage). This covers serious medical situations that require hospitalization but leaves routine care as out-of-pocket expenses. It’s another way to keep premiums low.

Cashless Direct Billing

One of the best things about having family health insurance is that they can do direct billing with the hospital. Imagine trying to pay upfront for medical care for your spouse and two kids at a hospital abroad, then filing separate reimbursement claims for each family member. It’s a nightmare of paperwork and cash flow.

With cashless direct billing, you simply present your insurance card and the hospital bills your insurer directly. This works for inpatient care, outpatient visits, dental treatments, and maternity care at thousands of international hospitals and clinics in your expat country and throughout the region.

The more family members you have, the more important this becomes. You don’t want to be fronting thousands of dollars and managing multiple claims when someone gets sick.

Tip: If you’re looking to save money on premiums, you can choose a provider that only offers direct billing for inpatient services while requiring you to pay and claim for outpatient care. This reduces your premium costs, and you can leverage your broker’s customer service team to help with the claims process.

Planning for Maternity Coverage

If you are planning to have a baby, planning for maternity coverage in advance is important since most countries don’t provide free maternity care to expats and the costs of maternity care can be high.

Maternity coverage provides financial protection for:

• Pregnancy complications that might arise
• Routine delivery costs, whether natural birth or C-section
• Hospital stay for the birth and recovery
• Pre-natal visits throughout your pregnancy
• Newborn care in those critical first days and weeks

Here’s the catch: maternity plans come with either a 10-month or 12-month waiting period before any benefits kick in. This means you need to have the coverage in place well before you start trying to conceive.

Additional Coverage from International Life Insurance

Health insurance protects you while you’re alive, but what happens to your family if something happens to you abroad? Expat life insurance fills this gap with coverage that follows you globally.

The key features that make expat life insurance different:

• Global coverage and portability. Your coverage stays active no matter where you move
• Fixed level premiums that don’t increase with age or inflation
• Affordable rates compared to local life insurance in many expat destinations
• Flexible terms from 5-year terms up to whole life policies
• Substantial coverage with sum insured starting from $100,000 USD, Euro, or GBP

This type of coverage helps mitigate your family’s financial risks and provides protection when something unexpectedly happens to you and you can’t provide financial support anymore. This can be especially important if you are the main income provider for your family.

Best Insurance Options for Family Insurance

There are many insurance companies that offer expat health insurance plans, such as:

• ALC Health
• Allianz Care
• AXA Global Healthcare
• April International
• Bupa Global
• Cigna Global
• Foyer Global Health
• Globality Health
• Insured Nomads
• Lloyd’s of London
• Luma Health
• Morgan Price
• MSH International
• William Russell
• VUMI

The right provider for your family depends on multiple factors:

• Where you’re living (some insurance companies are stronger in certain countries)
• How many family members you’re covering (since each insurance company has a different family discount policy)
• What benefits matter most to you
• What you can live without
• Your budget constraints

Since there are so many options and factors involved, buying family insurance on your own can be a challenge. So in my opinion, when it comes to family insurance, it’s better to use a broker. They can help narrow down your options and find the right plan at no extra cost, saving you time and headaches.