They solve different problems, and for routine costs the cash plan is usually the better buy.

What the policy documents actually say

Private Health insurance pays for treatment of acute conditions, typically running to five figures per claim and excluding almost everything routine. A cash plan pays fixed amounts towards everyday costs — dentist, optician, physiotherapy — with small annual caps and no underwriting worth the name.

The comparison shows up inside the policies themselves. AXA Health's optician benefit pays 80% of prescribed glasses and contact lenses up to £200 a year and is explicitly exempt from the pre-existing restrictions. Aviva covers accidental dental injury up to £600. Bupa runs dental as a named add-on with per-year maximums. These are cash-plan style benefits bolted onto an insurance product, and they are capped accordingly.

So if dental, optical and routine physiotherapy are the reason you are buying, a dedicated cash plan generally returns more per pound than a medical policy's add-on.

Where the cash plan fails is the thing insurance exists for: it will not pay £15,112 for a knee replacement. It is a budgeting tool for predictable small costs, not protection against large unpredictable ones.

Crucially, a cash plan also does not care about your medical history in the way an insurer does — which makes it the realistic option for someone whose conditions would be excluded from a medical policy anyway.

Questions to put to the insurer or broker

  • What am I actually trying to cover — routine costs or major treatment?
  • Would my history be excluded from a medical policy?
  • What are the annual caps on each cash benefit?

Related questions

Sources

  • Source: Aviva — Healthier Solutions Terms and conditions (2025-04), read 4 September 2026.
  • Source: AXA Health — Personal Health membership handbook, October 2024, read 4 September 2026.
  • Source: Bupa policy guide — Bupa By You health insurance (BINS 14718) (2024), read 4 September 2026.

The limit behind every answer here

None of this reaches a condition you already have. Cover is written for problems that arise after it starts, so anything you have symptoms of when you apply is excluded — permanently under full medical underwriting, or until a symptom-free period has passed under a moratorium. Chronic conditions are excluded by every insurer whose wording we hold. Figures quoted come from current policy documents and change at renewal, so check the document you are actually offered.

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