Some supplementary health insurers raise premiums due to inflation
Bern, 06.10.2008 - The Federal Office of Private Insurance (FOPI) has reviewed the premium adjustments for supplementary health insurance. Semi-private and private supplementary hospital insurance will rise by an average of 2% in 2009. In other mass insurance business, the increase will be 2.3%. These adjustments are greater than in the preceding years. Given that some supplementary insurers have refrained from compensating claims inflation in the past, this will now be reflected in the premium increases.
According to the Insurance Contract Act, the rates and general insurance conditions for more than 900 supplementary insurances licensed for the Swiss market can be defined freely, as long as the rates applied are neither so high as to be abusive nor so low as to endanger solvency. FOPI is responsible for reviewing these criteria.
Semi-private and private supplementary hospital insurance
After many years of declining numbers of insured persons, a slight increase has been recorded since 2006. One third of suppliers will adjust rates for 57 supplementary hospital insurances, so that 60% of the premium volume of this insurance class will be affected. The premiums for the affected products will rise by an average of 4% per insured person; in terms of all of the products in this segment, the average increase will be 2% per insured person. The increases do not quite cover the steady annual growth in inflation for claims payments.
30 of 75 suppliers will adjust rates for 69 products representing one quarter of the premium share in this business segment. As a rule, these products have been sold to disproportionately large client bases in which past inflation has been compensated only to a modest extent so far. Persons insured only under these products will on average pay premiums that are 8.6% higher. Spreading the additional revenue from these premium increases across all insured persons in this segment, the average increase is 2.3%. These rate measures nearly compensate past inflation.
Address for enquiries
FOPI Communications, Tel. 031 322 79 11
Publisher
Federal Office of Private Insurance
http://www.bpv.admin.ch
