PKV Allianz increases its contributions

The PKV Alliance wants to increase its contributions. A ruling of the Federal Administrative Court had previously prohibited surcharges for a change of tariffs within health insurance.

(28.06.2010) Allianz's private health insurance (PKV) will increase its contributions to individual tariffs in the coming week. The reason for this step is a new judgment of the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig. The highest judges had forbidden the "Allianz private health insurance AG" to charge flat-rate surcharges of insured, if they wanted to change from a more expensive tariff into a favorable one. The alliance made a 20% premium from the willing to change. The verdict should also be seen as a signal for other private insurers (Ref 8 C 42 09). The judgment is final.

In addition, Allianz must now reimburse all surcharges levied by a tariff change. According to the PKV insurance the affected members will automatically be refunded the money, no separate applications have to be made. Now Allianz will have to think about how to recover the lost contributions. It is clear that fares called "Aktimed" will experience tariff increases. Aktimed was previously offered to new customers on very favorable terms. If an old customer also wanted to switch to the low-cost tariff, he had to pay a surcharge. Thus, the tariff for old customers was not worthwhile, because the tariff was then no longer cheap.

The alliance confirmed that higher contributions are now being calculated on the Aktimed fares. As the alliance explained, the contributions for new customers, existing customers who switch to the "Aktimed tariff" as well as for existing insured contracts are partially raised. The exact amount of the contribution increase is not yet fixed. (Sb)