What You Need To Know About Claiming Physiotherapy Expenses From Your Private Health Insurance
Can I Claim Anything Back?
When you are claiming physiotherapy expenses back from your Health Insurance the very first thing that you need to do is check that you are going to a physiotherapist who is registered with CORU and Irish Society of Chartered Physiotherapists (ISCP). If your physiotherapist is not registered with both of these organisations, you will not be able to claim money back for your treatments.
Next, you will need to check with your health insurance provider to determine what level of cover you are on. The amount of money you are entitled to claim back varies depending on the insurer, and on the level of cover you have. Some insurance covers allow you to claim back for Physiotherapy-led Pilates classes and up to 50% off all Physiotherapy Treatments . Physiotherapy Massages are also covered with most health insurers, that is either a sports massage or a deep tissue massage administered by registered Chartered Physiotherapist. It is important to check what is covered to ensure that you are not missing out on a payment.
What Insurers Cover Physiotherapy?
In Ireland the main Health Insurers are VHI, Irish Life and LAYA Healthcare. However there are many other health insurance providers which allow you to offset your physiotherapy costs, insurers such as Glo Health, Hospital Saturday Fund and the Garda Medical Cover also allow for the claiming of physiotherapy expenses.
It is important to note that Health Insurance Providers will require you to be treated by a Chartered Physiotherapist, one who is registered with CORU and the Irish Society of Chartered Physiotherapists.
How Do I Claim My Physiotherapy Expenses from Health Insurance?
Once you have attended your physiotherapy treatment, physiotherapy led Pilates class or physiotherapy massage, you will be issued with a receipt. The easiest way to receive this receipt is by email, but paper copies can be provided.
Next, follow these steps:
- Check your level of cover, this can be done by calling your Health Insurance provider or by reading you ‘Table of Benefits'(VHI), ‘Everyday Expenses’ (LAYA) or ‘Check My Cover’ (Irish Life) which would have been provided to you on the uptake of your policy.
- Simply take a screenshot or a photo of your physiotherapy receipt, then add it to your claim within the app. You will be required to add some details regarding the claim, make sure that the picture you have uploaded is clear and easily read. Review your claim and simply press send.
- Get reimbursed: VHI takes up to 10 days for reimbursement, claims can be submitted up to 3 years. LAYA advertise a speedy turnaround, 2 days for the claim to be processed, although it may take longer than that to see the money back in your account. Claims can be submitted up to 1 year after receipt date. Irish Life will pay claims into your bank account between 3-5 days after the claim has been approved. They are however quite strict with the timeframe for submitting claims. Any claim submitted later than 6 months from end of the policy year wont be reviewed.
It is important to note that the best way to submit these receipts is one at a time. The applications do allow for more than one submission, however they are less reliable when doing multiple receipts.
Claiming Using Hardcopy Receipts
If you are not comfortable using the Health Care Apps, you can always submit them the old fashioned way. To do this you will need a claims form, you can download the claims form from the website of your Private Health Insurance provider. By doing it this way, you can send as many receipts as you wish, the turnaround for payments is much longer than using the app however.
Tax Relief From Physiotherapy
You can claim relief on health expenses through Revenue Online Services (ROS) for some health treatments, including physiotherapy. You need to have receipts for all these expenses, and while you do not ordinarily need a referral for private physiotherapy, you must have a doctors referral for physiotherapy to be able to claim the relief on it.