Hi,

I just had an encounter with a door-to-door salesperson offering to change for another health insurance company (Helsana) and I don't know what to make of it... He seemed competent, answered all my questions, I looked up the information he gave me and it seems to check out, plus my current insurance is not great, so I signed the application form he gave me and now I am having second thoughts. I never trusted door-to-door salesmen in my country but here in Switzerland everything seems so trustworthy... So I wanted to ask did anybody have a positive experience with such salesmen? What's the worst that could happen? And can I still cancel the application that I signed? I know, stupid me for letting him in

Thanks in advance anyway!

What did you sign for in the first place? Ideally you would upload an anonymised foto of each page of the contract.

What's the deductible for your current mandatory health insurance, and with which company is that? Do you live in Ollons VD or Ollons VS? The point of these question is, they're necessary for a comparison between your current one and the new one. You could always do that yourself by using priminfo.admin.ch, it's the official site and considers all insurance models available.

There's no right to backtrack on an insurance contract, their lobbying was too good. However, if you didn't know what you signed up for, or were materially mistaken/misled, such a right may exist; the problem would be in proving your case. But perhaps make sure your situation is worth getting the guns ready beforehand.

A simple check for Ollons VD, minimum and maximum dedutible respectively, shows some Helsana models among the top contenders. So there's a fair chance that they're indeed less expensive than your current one, probably not the very cheapest but probably close.

Personally, I'd also consider how they process payments/bills.
With some insurances you pay the bills yourself, then send them in, and they'll pay back what they think they owe you.
With others, the process is reversed:

My doc has a contract with KPT, my insurance. A bill goes directly to the insurance and gets paid by them, and I get billed for what I owe. That's not really relevant for everyday bills (which are few and low to begin with), but if you face a major thing, perhaps in the upper 5-digit range, that may become all the more relevant all of a sudden and at a time where you have more important things to do, like, heal. Same procedure if the bill comes from a hospital.

Never sign ANYTHING in Switzerland unless you know exactly what you are signing. I usually ask for a pdf file, that I can run through DeepL translater. It is surprising how many, over the years, didn’t want me to do that.

Thanks for the reply, I signed applications for the basic health insurance, the complementary and also the letter to terminate my current insurance. According to this person, they will send the forms to Helsana and I will receive a complete contract from Helsana within 3 workdays. I actually called them this morning and asked if they think it's suspicious and they said not necessarily, there are many independent brokers and it can be legit, I should call back when my applications are sent...



I mean, so long as the data I provided is really used for an application with this insurance company and for nothing else, that's good enough for me (I guess any company is better than my current, Assura). But is there anything worse that they can do with this information? Like, they took a picture of my ID, a copy of my current insurance contract, and my IBAN.


Regarding the payment process, according to the salesperson (and some people I know who are with Helsana) the bills are indeed first sent to the insurance company, they pay what they should and then ask you to pay what you owe

@bowlie Well I did read everything I signed and there was nothing obviously fishy, but then again I am no specialist in insurances...

Why do you want to cancel then now when you have read it all before signing?

Aside from the insurance contract question - which others can answer better than I - a general word to the wise:

Get rid of that mindset right now!

You should exercise the same level of 'street smarts' here as you did back home. Perhaps more if you do not understand the Swiss legal system. There are indeed many bad actors who prey on naive folks who think that 'because Switzerland' they can let their guard down.

Heck, you don't even need to be up against a bad actor to find yourself in a pickle - after all, 'selber schuld' is a guiding principle here. With all dealings, read the fine print, read it again, take time to make sure you truly understand, and never, ever sign anything under pressure.

And never, ever, ever enter into a contract with a salesperson who approached you out of the blue. Only go with companies you have researched and then where you make the first contact.

So take off those rose colored glasses, and 'Augen auf!'

----

Now back to the question of door-to-door insurance sales...

I just never had such an experience before (i.e. with door-to-door sales) and I am not very good with legal documents, there were no obvious red flags but I might have missed something...

Funny, Corona, stay away from all strangers and they ring the door bell of random people - selling them health insurance? Apt.

Thanks for the advice, well I guess it's too late for that now... But I was kind of reassured when at Helsana they said that it's not necessarily a scam


I was a bit surprised as well, he said that they get tested regularly...

I guess the people that go door-to-door are the worst salespeople, basically predators.

I guess there's no way you can get out of the basic insurance, but if you tell them you forgot to disclose to the sales guy about chronic kidney problems, a stroke or two (tell the worst story you can imagine), they might refuse to sell your complimentary insurance…..and you might be able to scape that contract.

But a more important issue, what did the contract you signed says? Translate it as soon as possible. Maybe it has better terms, maybe is a trap. Asking online if door-to-door salespeople is trustable is irrelevant, what matters is the contract.

The basic healthinsurance change period is in oct/nov.
What did he tell you about that?

It may well not be, things work Ok here overall for a reason. That doesn't mean there are no fraudsters at all, or that you won't be had over a barrel if you let them, but that's not specific to Switzerland. That said, I never sign anything without sleeping over it at least once. If that's not good or quick enough I walk away, TYVM.

Door-to-door sales may be a consequence of covid, people are much more likely to be home during the day than a year ago. I can't tell, I'm among those who would be away during the day and never know if someone rang my doorbell during those hours.