Many people are unsure about what happens to their entitlement to the Military, currently 47% discount, once they have left the military. The rules of the forces healthcare scheme actually allow service personnel and their partner to remain on the scheme until the service person reaches 65 years of age. It does not matter what future employment is gained, if any.
As long as you join before you take out membership of the BUPA HM Forces private medical insurance scheme before you leave the military you are entitled to keep the forces discount. Children are allowed to remain on the scheme until the next annual renewal, July the first, following their 21st birthday. This can be extended to their 24th birthday if they are in full time education i.e. university.
At 65 years of age you would then have the option of transferring to the HM Forces BUPA Care retirement scheme. This is the same scheme i.e. BUPACare, but with two differences. The discount is currently 40% and thus your premiums will be slightly higher. Secondly the scheme looses the overseas cover.
Another common situation is what to do if you leave the military with your BUPA, but are then offered retired military healthcare by a new employer.
One has to be very careful about accepting this offer. In the short term it may sound inviting but it could be disadvantageous over the long term. If you come off your military healthcare BUPA scheme and join a company scheme, when you then leave that company you will be unable to access the BUPA forces discount when your employment with them ceases. This is because when you attempt to rejoin you will be a civvy and therefore will not be able to rejoin. It is better to stay on your own personal policy, pick up the forces insurance discount, and say you your employer that you would rather have higher pay as you have your own insurance or take a different benefit from them, perhaps a car. Coming in and out of insurers is dangerous as you will be re-underwritten at each turn.
Keith McGregor is a partner of Strawberrysoup, a web design agency with offices in Chichester and Bournemouth. Strawberrysoup specialise in creative web design, content managed websites, search engine optimisation, search engine marketing and graphic design.
