The history of health insurance in India is not very old. It was the year 1986 when the Indian Government launched the first mediclaim policy here. Even after this launch, health insurance remained an unknown commodity for long andthose who know about it, majorly, take it to avail the tax benefits. Moreover, only a handful of insurance companies provide health insurance plans and they did nothing significant to motivate people for buying a health insurance cover.

However, with time, the health insurance sector opened up and all credit goes to our unhealthy food habits and busy lifestyles. These days, people fall ill at comparatively younger age than before. This increased the demand for health insurance plans and more insurance providers came into the picture. One of the insurers that offers the most affordable mediclaim insurance plans is Religare Health Insurance Company.

Religare Health Insurance Company is one of the reputed health insurance providers of India. The company is a subsidiary of Religare Enterprise Limited, which is one of the leading financial services providers of India. The other shareholders of Religare group are – Corporation Bank and the Union Bank of India.

With a wide spectrum of financial services, the Religare group is well known for providing top class health insurance products and one of which is CARE.

CARE is the first product out of various Religare Health Insurance plans that provide a spectrum of benefits to its policyholders with a unique ‘Recharge’ feature.

Features of CARE Plan:

The benefits that CARE plan from the Religare offers to its customers are:

• All the policyholders are eligible to take health checkup once in a year, irrespective of the claims.
• The availability of ‘Recharge’ benefit up to 100% sum insured is available for all the policyholders of the CARE plan.
• Provides the coverage to get specialized treatment anywhere across the world for sum insured of Rs.5 Lakh and above.
• Add-on cover and no claim bonus up to 60% of the sum insured are also provided in this policy.
• Offers 30 days of pre-hospitalization 60 days of post-hospitalization benefits.
• For selected critical diseases, the plan covers the expenses of the second opinion.
• The medical expenses of an organ donor in case of organ donation to the insured are also covered in this plan.
• 20% co-pay is offered to the policyholders who are more than 61 years of age.
• For the CARE policies with sum insured of Rs.3 Lakh to Rs.4 Lakh,a cash allowance of Rs.500 per day for 5 days is given.
• Limited room rent cover is also offered in the CARE plan.
• Facility of domiciliary hospitalization of up to 10% of the sum insured is provided under this plan.
• The ambulance cover ranging from Rs.750 to Rs.3000 as per sum insured of the policy is provided.

Understand the ‘Recharge’ Feature of ‘Religare CARE’:

Out of various other inclusions of the ‘CARE’ plan of Religare Health Insurance Company, ‘Recharge’ is the most useful and unique feature.

The literal meaning of recharge is reloading and the ‘Recharge’ feature was introduced in the ‘CARE’ plan with the same intention. It is to reinstate up to the sum insured in one policy year if your claim amount is exhausted in that year.The Religare Health Insurance Company agrees to make the reinstatement up to the sum insured of your current policy, provided the below-mentioned conditions are met:

• The facility of ‘Recharge’ can be utilized only if the no claim bonus and sum assured have completely been exhausted in your current policy year.
• The recharge amount cannot exceed beyond the sum insured of that policy year.
• The recharge will be available for future claims only and will not cater to the injury or illness for which the claim has previously been paid.
• The balance of the amount that is recharged will be available during the wholepolicy year until it is completely exhausted.
• You cannot utilize the feature of recharge amount if there is only one claim made in a specific policy year.
• You cannot carry forward your unused recharge amount to the next policy year.
• The feature of recharge is not available for Optional Covers.

There are some health insurance providers that offer the facility of ‘Restore’ and it may lead you to confusion by considering it as ‘Recharge’. There is a huge difference in both these terms in the insurance sector. In order to make this clear to you, we are going to provide you with the basic definition of both these terms.

Difference between Restore and Recharge

Restore:

Restore benefit is providedwhen the basic sum insured of the policy becomes zero. Same as the case of recharge, you cannot avail the facility of restore for the same alignment.

Recharge:

Since recharge facility is not available on a single claim policy, thus it is not provided in the first claim. However, if the sum insured is not sufficientfor a subsequent health insurance claim, the recharge gets activated.In this way, recharge facility is available for future claims of the current policy and cannot be availed for any injury or illness for which the claim is already made.

Final Words:

In this way, ‘Recharge’ is one of the best inclusions that anyone can ask for while taking a health insurance plan. So, if you want ‘Recharge’ benefit with sum insured of Rs.5 Lakh and above, then Religare CARE Plan is recommended to you. The facility of no claim bonus of up to 150% in 5 years and recharge benefits are also the best possible inclusions of this plan.