Discovery Savings Account

Hamster

Hamster

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So I've been on this Classic Priority plan for quite a while and I'm never really sick. The only thing I use medical aid for is to buy spectacles/frame every year.

My current intention is to downgrade to something like the Classic\Essential Core. Question though: what happens to the money saved up in that savings account? There is about R15k in there...do they pay it out (partially?) or do I lose it?
 
I don't know about you, but I feel medical aids (particularly Discovery Health) are a bunch of sharks. If you put the money the money you pay to them away each month you would actually have more funds available than what they allow you to have.

For instance:

The Classic Saver as of 2014 will be R1 982 or similar per month. Their savings are calculated at 25% of annual premiums. So that is just under R6 000 per year. If you put all that money away you would have almost R24 000. The only thing I have a lack of knowledge with regards to Discovery Health's hospital plans is that if you are admitted to hospital do tests and procedures being conducted whilst there fall under the hospital plan or are they part of the savings plan?
 
Medical Aids are a bunch of sharks, but unfortunately they are necessary evils.
Most of the time when you are young and healthy you will not see the benefit, but will be funding the benefits of others.

When Medical aids do help is when you have major surgery or your diagnosed with a serious illness (as an example).
If you were in a serious car crash or diagnosed with cancer some of these treatments can cost more than R500k
Chemo therapy can run into the millions for 2-3 years of therapy

Its a similar concept to insurance...you dont really need it until you need it
 
Xennox the savings plan is only there for stuff NOT covered in hospital or the plan itself.

So if you go for an operation in any given year your R24 000 is more than likely gone with the wind. If you fall seriously ill you are looking at hundreds of thousands with a stay in hospital overnight costing more than the average hotel.

Also Chronic medication comes off the medical aid, not the savings plan. So if you have asthma or other chronic diseases you will very quickly find that your monthly payment is almost covered by your medication alone.


You don't plan/prepare for the good times, you plan for the bad times. That's why it's called Medical Insurance, when things go wrong you want them to be covered.


My wife has chronic medication and has been for two operations in the last 3 years. In light of that we made a R20 000 odd "profit" over our medical aid contributions.

*****

Also under most plans if your MSA is exhausted all GP visits are free for the rest of the year under certain limitations depending on plans. Many people don't know this and then go pay their GP cash because they are out of MSA thinking that they can't claim against it.


******

As for the OP, why would you want to cash it out? Just leave it there because ultimately somewhere in the future you will get sick and then you'll want access to that money. You won't be healthy forever.
 
SauRoNZA said:
As for the OP, why would you want to cash it out? Just leave it there because ultimately somewhere in the future you will get sick and then you'll want access to that money. You won't be healthy forever.
Click to expand...

Those new plans don't have a medical savings account so you can't leave it there.
 
XennoX said:
I don't know about you, but I feel medical aids (particularly Discovery Health) are a bunch of sharks. If you put the money the money you pay to them away each month you would actually have more funds available than what they allow you to have.

For instance:

The Classic Saver as of 2014 will be R1 982 or similar per month. Their savings are calculated at 25% of annual premiums. So that is just under R6 000 per year. If you put all that money away you would have almost R24 000. The only thing I have a lack of knowledge with regards to Discovery Health's hospital plans is that if you are admitted to hospital do tests and procedures being conducted whilst there fall under the hospital plan or are they part of the savings plan?
Click to expand...

For me, medical aid is there if i have a serious accident or need serious surgery. The amounts can get ridiculous, and the small savings you have put away by avoiding it will be depleted very very quickly.

If you get a decent hospital plan with ad med gap i think that is good enough
 
Some sort of hospital cover is mandatory regardless of age. An accident or illness can easily wipe you out financially.

SauRoNZA said:
As for the OP, why would you want to cash it out? Just leave it there because ultimately somewhere in the future you will get sick and then you'll want access to that money. You won't be healthy forever.
Click to expand...
Regardless you'd be better off storing the money somewhere other than with the medical aid. The only benefit a medical savings account offers is that you can get the entire year's saving upfront. The downsides are that they control what you can spend it on, how much you can spend and the money doesn't grow at all. So really the only people who should bother to use one are those that can't access the equivalent amount easily.
 
SauRoNZA said:
As for the OP, why would you want to cash it out? Just leave it there because ultimately somewhere in the future you will get sick and then you'll want access to that money. You won't be healthy forever.
Click to expand...

I'd rather move that money into an investment account/shares. I always keep some money available as an emergency fund anyway. Just seems like a waste having that money just sit there when I CANNOT ACCESS IT whenever the hell I want. I'd rather handle that money myself.
 
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