Singaporean’s Ultimate Integrated Shield Plan Comparison, Am I on The Best Plan?
It is a common misconception that you can either choose MediShield Life or Integrated Shield Plan, the truth is, you can’t.
Integrated Shield Plan is like an add-on to your MediShield Life coverage for hospitalisation expenses, Integrated Shield Plan enhances your MediShield Life coverage by a bit or even a whole lot (depending on which plan you go for).
TL;DR
- Integrated Shield plan adds on to your coverage on your existing MediShield Life.
- You should cover yourself with an Integrated Shield Plan if you wish to stay in Private Hospital or Public Hospital Class A/B1 Wards.
- AXA offers the lowest premium
- AIA and Prudential offers the highest coverage
- Aviva and Prudential offers planned overseas treatment.
Integrated Shield Plan consists of 2 parts:
- Part 1: MediShield Life
- Part 2: Additional Private Insurance Coverage
MediShield Life
- MediShield Life covers all Singapore Citizens and Permanent Residents
- Covers you for Life
- It even covers your pre-existing condition, even if your additional Private (Part 2) Insurance coverage does not cover it.
Read More: Singaporean’s Ultimate Guide: What You Need To Know About Medisave?
If you have an Integrated Shield Plan, it means you already have MediShield Life. As the Integrated Shield Plan is an optional add-on to your MediShield Life, you are not making double payment.
Integrated Shield Plan
There are 24 available Integrated Shield Plans (including MediShield Life) available for you to choose from, the cognitive dissonance is real man. These coverages range from:
- Private Hospitals: Standard room and below
- Public Hospitals: Class A wards and below
- Public Hospitals: Class B1 wards and below
- Public Hospitals: Class B2/C wards
How can I check if I have an Integrated Shield Plan?
These are the steps you can take to check:
- Go to cpf.gov.sg
- Log on to my cpf Online Services
(You will need your SingPass) - Go to “My Messages“
- See “Insurance” section
If you do have an Integrated Shield Plan, under the Insurance section, it should look like this:
Editor’s Note: We do not do sponsored posts, all opinions here are our own 🙂
Or if you do have any of the plans listed here below, you are covered under the Integrated Shield Plan.
Let’s Play a Game!!
As we go along, we will be awarding points to insurers for giving us the highest coverage. At the end of this article, we will see if the benefits outweigh the premiums charged.
There are 22 over plans for you to choose from, how do you know that the Integrated Shield plan you are paying premiums for is value-for-money for your needs?
Integrated Shield Plans for Private Hospitals
1 Inpatient and Day Surgery
- According to MOH, 6 out of 6 insurers covers daily ward and treatment charges (also in ICU), and surgical benefit ‘as charged’.
- 2 out of 6 insurers covers Community Hospital stay ‘as charged’.
| INSURER | • Daily room & board • Daily ICU • Surgical Procedures | COMMUNITY HOSPITAL BENEFIT | POINTS (FOR HIGHEST COVERAGE) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income Enhanced IncomeShield Preferred | *As Charged | As Charged (up to 90 days per admission) | 1 |
| AIA HealthShield Gold Max A | *As Charged | 2 | |
| Great Eastern Supreme Health P Plus | 800/day | 1 | |
| Prudential PruShield A Premier | *As Charged | 2 | |
| Aviva MyShield Plan 1 | As Charged (up to 45 days) | 1 | |
| AXA Shield Plan A | As Charged (up to 45 days) | 1 |
Source: Ministry Of Health
*Highest coverage
2 Pre and Post Hospitalisation Benefit
The number of days here indicates the maximum number of days before (after) the day of admission to (discharge from) the hospital.
Example: If it states 180 days coverage for pre-hospitalisation, it means that from the day of your admission to the hospital, count 6 months backward, any medical checkup, consultation etc. will be covered.
| INSURER | PRE-HOSPITALISATION | POST-HOSPITALISATION | TOTAL POINTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income | As Charged (Up to 90 days) | 1 | |
| AIA | As Charged (Up to 100 days) 13 months (Panel Providers) | As Charged (Up to 100 days, additional 100 days for 30 Critical Illnesses) 13 months (Panel Providers) | 2 |
| Great Eastern | As Charged (up to 120 days) | As Charged (Up to 180 days) | 1 |
| Prudential | * As Charged (Up to 180 days) | * As Charged (Up to 365 days) | 4 |
| Aviva | As Charged (Up to 90 days) | As Charged (Up to 90 days) | 1 |
| AXA | *As Charged (Up to 180 days) | *As Charged (Up to 365 days) | 3 |
Source: Ministry Of Health
*Note: We will not be considering the benefits provided by each insurer for using their Panel of Providers.
3 Outpatient Treatment and Major Organ Transplant
6 out of 6 insurers covers outpatient treatments and major organ transplant ‘as charged’, outpatient treatments such as kidney dialysis and cancer treatment like radiotherapy, chemotherapy etc.
| INSURER | OUTPATIENT TREATMENT | MAJOR ORGAN TRANSPLANT | TOTAL POINTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income | * As Charged | * As Charged | 3 |
| AIA | 4 | ||
| Great Eastern | 3 | ||
| Prudential | As Charged (for Selected organs) | 5 | |
| Aviva | 2 | ||
| AXA | 4 |
Source: Ministry Of Health
4 Critical Illness (CI) and Prosthesis Benefit
In MOH’s report, only 2 out of 6 provided additional benefit for critical illnesses and 1 out of 6 for prosthesis benefit.
| INSURER | CRITICAL ILLNESS | PROSTHESIS | TOTAL POINTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| Income | - | * As Charged (up to 10,000/year) | 4 |
| AIA | * 100,000 policy year limit (for 30 CIs) | - | 5 |
| Great Eastern | - | 3 | |
| Prudential | - | 5 | |
| Aviva | 150,000/year (for 5 CIs) | - | 3 |
| AXA | - | 4 | |
Source: Ministry Of Health
Critical Illness benefit is provided above the policy year limit and overall lifetime limit.
Do note that for AIA, this Critical Illness benefit is not applicable if the maximum claim of $2 million policy year limit has been used.
5 Emergency Overseas Medical Treatment
In any case, where you require urgent medical treatment while you were traveling, your Integrated Shield Plans will still cover your medical expenses but usually at a limit like so:
| INSURER | EMERGENCY OVERSEAS TREATMENT |
|---|---|
| Income | As Charged (limit to Singapore Private Hospital charges) |
| AIA | |
| Great Eastern | |
| Prudential | As Charged, (whichever is lower, overseas charges or Singapore Private Hospital's charges) |
| Aviva | As Charged, (limit pegged to Mount Elizabeth Orchard Hospital) |
| AXA | As Charged, limit to Singapore Private Hospital's charges |
Source: Ministry Of Health
At the moment, only Aviva covers planned overseas treatment but pegged at the cost of Mount Elizabeth Orchard Hospital. BUT it will only be reimbursed if the hospital has an established arrangement with a Medisave-accredited institution/referral centre in Singapore.
6 Policy Year Limit
This limit is the maximum amount that you are allowed to claim for hospitalisation expenses.
| INSURER | POLICY YEAR LIMIT | TOTAL POINTS |
|---|---|---|
| Income | 1 million | 4 |
| AIA | 600,000 2 million (if treated by Panel of providers) | 5 |
| Great Eastern | * 1.5 million | 4 |
| Prudential | 1.2 million | 5 |
| Aviva | 1 million | 3 |
| AXA | 1 million | 4 |
Source: Ministry Of Health
Deductibles & Co-Insurance
Integrated Shield Plans works a little like Car Insurance, where it is required of you to pay an excess first before the insurer comes in to take over the rest of the payments. It is very similar to making a “downpayment”.
Similarly, for Integrated Shield Plan, you are required to pay a sum of money first called deductibles and co-insurance before the insurer covers the rest of your hospital bill.
Deductibles
All 6 insurers have the same deductible of $3,500 if you were admitted to a Private Hospital.
You are required to pay the first $3,500 of the bill before the insurer steps in.
Co-insurance
This comes in after the deduction of $3,500 from your bill.
For all 6 insurers, you are required to pay the next 10% of the bill before the insurer steps in.
Integrated Shield Plan Riders
You are able to cover about ~80% of the deductibles and co-insurance if you add on riders for yourself at an additional cost.
Premiums
- Payable by CPF Medisave Account up to the Medisave withdrawal limit
- Premiums increase with every few years age band from 20 years old onwards.
In short, your premiums do get more expensive as you get older.
In this case, we will be looking at premiums for age 26 to 30,
Highest Coverage (Total Points Accumulated) VS Premiums Charged *cues drum roll*
| INSURER | PREMIUM (SGD PER YEAR) | TOTAL POINTS |
|---|---|---|
| Income | 450 | 4 |
| AIA | 391 | 5 |
| Great Eastern | 417 | 4 |
| Prudential | 400 | 5 |
| Aviva | 410 | 3 |
| AXA | * 368 | 4 |
- AXA offers the lowest premium
- AIA and Prudential offer the highest coverage.
The differences between the coverage of AIA and Prudential are:
- Prudential offers a longer Pre and Post-hospitalisation benefits
- There is a limit to how much Prudential can cover for Major Organ Transplants but not for AIA.
- AIA provides additional coverage for Critical Illnesses; Prudential doesn’t.
- Prudential has a higher Policy Year Limit of $1.2 million.
(Not considering the benefits if using AIA’s panel provider) - AIA offers lower premium as compared to Prudential.
Commonly Asked Questions
I have Company Insurance, do I still need this?
It depends.
- Integrated Shield Plan covers you for a lifetime.
- Your company insurance covers you for as long as you stay with the company. Unless your company offers Portable Medical Insurance.
If you are required to claim and have no Integrated Shield Plan on your own,
- Still able to get covered by the company.
- In future, when purchasing an Integrated Shield Plan for yourself, your condition that you claimed for previously might get excluded.
Should I get an Integrated Shield Plan?
Yes if you answered ‘Yes’ to these few questions:
- Do you want to stay in Private Hospital or Public Hospital Class A/B1 wards?
- Do you wish to choose your own doctor?
- Can you afford your premiums in the long term?
Premiums increase periodically as you get older. It is also possible to downgrade your plan (e.g. from ‘Private Hospital’ plan to ‘Public Hospital Class B1 Ward’ plan).
What Now?
Now that you have seen the benefits across 6 Integrated Shield Plan Providers, I hope that this will help you make a wise decision if you have not gotten one for yourself.
If you are holding onto an existing Integrated Shield Plan and you wish to make a change, do note that you will be exposed to the new co-payment feature that MOH had rolled out in March 2018. This co-payment feature will be inforce from April 2021 onwards.
Read More: ZHUN BO? Insurers Want Patients To Pay Part Of Hospital Bills
Only If You Are Healthy
- Integrated Shield Plan policies will be accepted only if you are healthy.
(There are some insurers that will insure you for your pre-existing if you have not visited the hospital for the same pre-existing condition) - If not, your plan will either be rejected or the insurer would exclude your existing condition.
- In other words, do not switch plans if your current plan covers your pre-existing condition.
Do discuss your needs with a financial advisor that you can trust. Most importantly, stay healthy! I’ll see you in the next one, till then!
