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National Friendly One Fund

National Friendly was established in 1868 and today offers individuals and companies a range of innovative and unique healthcare and protection products from its Bristol office. As a friendly society it has no shareholders.

July 2010 Product Reviews

PRODUCT

One Fund takes a different approach to conventional health cash plans, by offering an overall annual benefit limit and then, within that, allowing the customer to decide how much to spend in each benefit area (with two exceptions – optical and health screening, which have lower annual limits).

Five premium levels are available, £10, £12, £14, £16, £18 and £20 a month per person and that provides an overall annual limit across all benefits of from £720 to £1,440.

Within that, there are six benefit categories, each of which is subject to an annual excess of £40. The six categories are (figures quoted are for a £10 a month and £20 a month plan respectively):

• Dental

• Optical (which has an annual limit of £120/£300)

• POCAH (physiotherapy; osteopathy; chiropractic; acupuncture and homeopathy)

• Consultations

• Health screening (annual limit of £120/£300)

• Counselling

So, for example, a client with a bad back and who also needs an expensive dental crown might elect to spend all their benefit on these two categories (and so pay a total excess of £80), even if say they also needed new glasses.

RATING

LITERATURE

We had not seen all literature but what we did see explains how the product works and the cover levels available.

WHAT THEY SAY

Chief executive Richard Sear said: “In essence, many cash plans don’t really provide much value for policyholders. Feedback indicates that consumers would welcome bigger sums of money that can be used to cover more expensive treatments rather than a small contribution to lots of little ones. Premium levels for One Fund are in line with other cash plan products but offer policyholders the opportunity to claim so much more.”

WHAT WE SAY

Health cash plans are often used as a form of healthcare budgeting, with most customers making more than one claim every year. The downside for many is that they will not access every benefit every year, so may feel that they are not getting best value from their plan.

This product allows them to make bigger claims in many areas, subject (in most cases) just to an overall annual plan limit. The downside is that each benefit category has its own annual excess and that some other cash plans offer a wider range of benefits. The plan can also be expensive if a whole family (parents and children) are covered.