Compulsory insurance facts

What you need to know about the roll-out of the mandatory health insurance scheme.

For phase one, companies with 1,000 or more employees will have to cover their staff before the end of October 2014

For phase two, companies with 100 to 999 employees will have to cover their staff before the end of July 2015

For phase three a), companies with 100 or fewer employees will have to cover their staff before the end of June 2016

For phase three b) all spouses and dependents will have to be covered before the end of June 2016. It will be the responsibility of the sponsor of the spouse and dependent to bear the cost. But the DHA strongly encourages companies to cover the spouses and dependents of their employees as well.

For phase three c) all domestic workers will have to be covered before the end of June 2016

For most employers, the average cost of providing the basic insurance works out at about 1.5 per cent of a company’s payroll budget

All employers are responsible for providing health insurance cards for their employees. The health insurance card will be valid for one year and will have to be renewed annually.

Only registered insurance companies with Health Insurance Permits, obtainable from the DHA, will be able to provide insurance schemes and packages. Health insurance permits have to be obtained by the end on January 2014. A list of the legitimate health insurance companies will then by announced by the DHA.

Failure by employers to provide insurance carries fines of between Dh500 and Dh150,000. Repeated breaches carry a maximum fine of Dh500,000. The DHA may also issue a warning and suspend the company’s health insurance activities within the emirate for not more than two years, or cancel the health insurance permit. The breach may also result in civil or criminal cases.

Every employee is expected to be covered by mid-2016. Two million people are now not insured, the DHA estimates.

* The National