A sick leave insurance for the self-employed, as we have already mentioned on many occasions, is a fundamental policy for the self-employed worker. Thanks to this type of policy, in the event that the worker suffers an illness or an accident (occupational or not), he/she will be able to collect an income during the corresponding period. This complement for a sick leave situation is even better if the insurance company does not include waiting periods in its contracting. In this post we will delve into the options for sick leave insurance without a waiting period, as well as the different time periods for sick leave insurance due to illness or pregnancy.
Waiting periods for sick leave insurance
Most insurance companies, both in sick leave and self-employed health insurance policies, usually impose a waiting period.
The waitingperiod of an insurance policy is the time during which, even though the policy has entered into force, the company would not provide coverage if a loss related to the guarantee for which there is a waiting period were to occur.
For example:
- In the health insurance for the self-employed usually have a waiting period of 8 to 10 months for surgical interventions. We have already talked about health insurance gaps some time ago.
- In the sick leave insurance for the self-employed a waiting period of between 2 and 6 months is more frequent for illnesses or surgical interventions. To give us an idea, in the Temporary Incapacity for Work (ILT) insurance, the waiting periods for an illness are usually 3 months and for hospitalization and operations about 6 months, although these periods vary depending on the companies. Thus, the time to activate the sick leave insurance for common ailments such as abdominal hysterectomy or sciatica will depend on these factors.
Why do the companies set grace periods?
We think it is a pity that waiting periods have to be established. The reason why insurance companies started to impose it is because on many occasions policies were taken out and after 15 days or shortly thereafter, they had diagnoses of illnesses that could have been known in advance.
These “tricks” suffered by the insurers meant that as a preventive measure, these initial months of insurance were established in which, in reality, there is no coverage for certain issues.
The most common, in this sense, is the period of grace period for childbirth, since it is a period of temporary disability insurance, which would be paid by the company.
Is it possible to avoid them? Sick leave insurance with no waiting period
In PIB Group Iberia we work with the best insurance company for sick leave, which in its star policy does not impose any deficiencies (except for the lack of childbirth, which is unavoidable). But it does not impose any deficiency on illnesses or surgical interventions, as most insurance companies do.
If you would like to find out more about the advantages of this insurance over others on the market, we will inform you without obligation, you won’t regret it!
REMEMBER: in order to subscribe these insurances, the companies ask you to fill in a questionnaire that includes your current state of health. In it, we must detail if we suffer from any type of pathology before subscribing the insurance, because otherwise we will have problems in the event of a claim.
