Hi guys,
i visit this site often which is of great help to all the GCs like me. i have a situation which i hope u would have some insights into.
My wife and i are insured with AOK for about 2 yrs and we received a letter from them couple of days back, saying that my salary is over the threshold level for the compulsory versicherung. hence we are no longer insured by them, however, if we want we can be with them as "freiwillige versicherung".
I guess, it means that we have a choice if we want to change the insurance company ...
so, my question is: Are private insurance company better than AOK??
wat happens if, god forbid, i were to become arbeitslos,,, wat will happen to the insurance contribution????
I am in a dilemma now... we wont be insured after 30 sept. please give me some input guyss.....

Could you tell us how big this threshold is?

Private is better and more expensive than usual.
If you get arbeitslos you get AOK again this time for free (if you worked more than year).

Forget insurance contribution. It is not like life insurance where you actally save your money.
Everything you pay is lost forever. Only thing you can get from this money are services and those are better privat. It doesn't make difference if you pay 100€ or 10000€. Services are the same (for same insurance type).
You pay more if your salary is bigger but you do not get more.
That goes up to some limit. After that limit you pay allways the same even if you get 10 times bigger salary.
This all works for Pflichtvers.
For Privatvers. I don't know much.

You obviously have big salary meaning you pay a lot for Krankenvers. It is even possible that for you Privatversicherung costs less than Pflichtvers.

Because of that you should do more research on internet z.B.
http://www.versicherungvergleich.info/
or
http://www.preisvergleich-krankenversicherung.com/

Hi,

I can answer your second question based on own experience. I had a similar situation a couple of years back. And I switched to private insurance (if you do not have kids, the contribution for public and private insurance is almost equal for both husband and wife). As time passed, my company went bankrupt and I was jobless. That time, I could shift back to public insurance (AOK), since I was not insured privately for more than 5 years before unemployment.

So, the answer to your question is, "god forbid" if you become Arbeitslos in coming five years, you will be automatically switched to AOK by Arbeitsamt evenif you chose private insurance now. Only catch will be the Kundigungsfrist for the private insurance, otherwise you will be paying for both the insurances...

Hope this helps,
- Dushkal

Here are the answers :

A. 'Are private insurance company better than AOK??'

Any day private insurance is better than public one. Just try comparing what all is offered/covered under both the schemes and You will know the difference. Major ones are the following :

1. With private, doctors will always give You preference and You will get appointments quickly, without the loong que, and mind U ths que will be looonger in time to come.

2. In public insurance, I believe, You have to pay certain amount of medicine costs, and doctors fee as well, but in private, atleast in mine with Allianz, everything is paid by Allianz. This is very important when You need a lot of medicines or have to make visits to doctors.

3. In private, there are options like private rooms in hospitals, getting the chief doctor to attend U. etc etc.

Moreover the price gap is not so nig. I am paying 140 euros ( 70 me + 70 firm ) for myself and paying 260 euros ( 130 me + 130 firm ) for my wife, which is 200 euros from my own pocket. And from my lil knowledge on public insurance, I would be paying more than 200 euros per month from my own pocket if I was on public.

Public is only beneficial if You have more than 2 kids or so.

Looking around, it seems that the public health system is in bad state, with worse news coming in time to come.

B. 'wat happens if, god forbid, i were to become arbeitslos,,, wat will happen to the insurance contribution????'

I think You will be switched to public automatically and the government will pay for the insurance fees. It doesnt matter if You are on private or public before You go unemployed.

I suggest Allianz, bcos I have been with them since past 3 years and I am reaaaaaally happy with their service. If You want, I can forward the Allianz agents contact details to You as well, He is very nice and very very helpful.

Hope this helps
Nitin Malhotra.

For budget people, I think insurances like AOK are suitable, as everything from head to toe (including your teeth) is covered under this insurance. If you marry, your wife is automatically covered until she gets a job, and if you get children, they will be covered automatically untill they find a job too(or some age limit which surely is above 18).

In the case of Private insurance, you have to cover everything seperately, and I think dental is not covered "automatically" as in AOK. And you pay seperate insurance premiums for your wife and each child. Options like Chefarzt, Privatzimmer mit Kabelfernseher etc etc all come at a premium, and not for free!!

But as others said before, its better to make an online comparison. Another deciding factor is your age and stage(bachelor/married) in life.

-Fred