I received an email advising me that my European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) is about to expire, so I thought I better renew it.
I followed the link and was taken to a website to enter my application. Don’t worry, this isn’t going to end horribly wrong; it was a legitimate email and a legitimate website.
I entered the expected details – name and address, National Insurance number, number of existing card, etc. and moved to the next page.
“How would you like to pay the £19.99 charge?” Whoa! Wait a minute! Roll back the truck! A little bell was ringing at the back of my head.
Wasn’t there something on a financial programme about companies that charge over-the-odds for this sort of application?
Time to do a little research.
![A EPIC card -By Zeugma fr (talk) (Antoine FLEURY-GOBERT) (Own work) [<a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>], <a href="http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACarte_Europ%C3%A9enne_d'Assurance_Maladie_France.jpg">via Wikimedia Commons</a>](https://chandlersfordtoday.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/EPIC-France.jpg)
It didn’t take long. The first result from a search engine gave me the NHS site Apply for a free EHIC card. “The EHIC is free of charge…Beware of unofficial websites, which may charge if you apply through them.” What’s more, the site was able to tell me that my EHIC doesn’t even expire until August 2016.
Please note that the original site I went to (whose address I am deliberately not giving) and others like it are NOT fraudulent. They are not going to run off with your money or clear your bank account. They are just asking you to pay for something you can get for free.
In practice (and probably in legality) it’s no different to one shop selling milk for 50 pence because customers don’t realise that just down the road is another shop selling it for 40 pence. caveat emptor.
Be warned
So – be warned. If you are being asked to pay for a service, and you are not applying through an official government website (which will probably have a gov.uk or nhs.uk suffix), look again. You might be paying more than you need to.
I have written to the company asking them to justify their £19.99 charge. I’ll let you know if I get any response.
Using your EHIC in Spain
By Foreign & Commonwealth Office
I would be very suspicious of this company – if the service is completely free of charge under the NHS, no company should be charging you. Why do you think the business is not fraudulent?
It’s not fraudulent because they are providing the service they offer at the advertised price. At least, I assume they would have done had I proceeded with my application. The fact that I can get the same service for a cheaper price (or free) elsewhere is irrelevant. The contract between me and the site is that they give me a EHIC and I give them £19.99. So long as both sides honour this contract, no fraud is involved. Underhand and sneaky, yes – but not fraudulent.
Though there is also the question of why they are telling me my EHIC is about to expire when it has more than 18 months to run …
Also, the site does say in the small print that the EHIC can be obtained free of charge from the NHS site. So it is legal. Still underhand and sneaky, though.
Thanks for the warning. Only once have I needed a doctor’s care abroad. I split my scalp and had to pay about £10 to get it stitched up. Actually the doctor used Michel’s clips, like staples, rather than sutures. When it came to removing them I was on a camp site up a mountain with a doctor friend. We had Cognac for sterilising (and anaesthesia if necessary) and a pair of electrician’s pliers. Perfect result. You cannot see the scar. Well, maybe you could if I was bald.
When you think about it, different prices at different shops is not unusual. You can buy the same products in Waitrose an Lidl, yet the prices in Lidl are considerably lower. But at least you know you could have gone to Lidl and paid less. Where these sites are underhand is that they give the impression that this is the only way to get a EHIC. And a difference between £19.99 and nothing somehow seems worse than a difference between £180 and £160.