Why leave?
On July, 13, 2021 it was possible to put discrimination of foreigners children to an end by letting employed foreigners pay for their children’s public health insurance. This would have been a win-win for everyone – with children receiving the coverage they need and public health insurance ending up with additional 120 mln czk of annual profits.
But ANO party members from VZP Board of Directors had different plans. They didn’t want additional 120 mln for the Czech public health insurance fund annually, they wanted 800 mln czk all to themselves. So ANO party, the Communists and the Extreme Right SPD conspired to turn down public health insurance for children and instead lobbied for enforcing a 5 year monopoly of a private branch of VZP company – Pojišťovna VZP a.s. (PVZP).
19 days later the brand new monopolist has raised their prices for a very limited version of health insurance that works for healthy people only by 69% for children, 64%-86% for adults, 80-82% for seniors, 28-32% for students. Now for the first time in history the price of a limited private health insurance substantially exceeds the real health care expenses for each and every age category.
Every year the Czech public health insurance fund gets at least 3.3 milliard czk in taxes from employed foreigners that don’t have permanent residency yet, while their own health expenses are capped at 1.2 milliard czk and they can’t spend a penny from their contributions on their families. The absolute majority of them has public health insurance with VZP and not many know, that they can actually choose any of the 7 public health insurance providers. The least we can do to fight for our children’s rights is leave VZP.
How do I do that?
Every person who has public health insurance can change an insurance company once a year. If you apply before Sep, 30 – the change will happen on 01, Jan; apply before March, 31 and the change will happen on 01, Jul. Public health insurance will offer the same services no matter what company you choose!
So all you need is:
- Choose between VoZP (201), ČPZP (205), OZP (207), ZPŠ (209), ZPMVCR (211), RBP (213). Coverage will always be the same as regulated by Law 48/1997, from client perspective the only differences are in provider network and benefit programs (compensation for non-mandatory vaccination, sports, preventive breast cancer checkups etc).
Make sure that your general practitioner and dentist works with the one you choose and you are fine.
Benefit programs to compare: VoZP (201), ČPZP (205), OZP (207), ZPŠ (209), ZPMVCR (211), RBP (213). - Fill in and sign the application form: VoZP (201), ČPZP* (205), OZP (207), ZPŠ* (209), ZPMVCR (211), RBP (213). (* visit to the offline branch will be needed for foreigners without permanent residence).
Upload photo of your VZP card, your residence permit and your employment contract to the attachments section. - Not later than 8 days after the change of provider is in place (01 January or 01 July) inform your general practitioner, your dentist and your employer about the change.
That’s it!