You can, but you cannot claim the same cost twice, and the second policy is usually wasted money.
What the policy documents actually say
Nothing stops you holding two, and people occasionally end up doing so — a personal policy kept running after joining an employer scheme is the common case. What you cannot do is recover the same expense from both. Insurers ask about other cover at claim stage and apportion between themselves.
The employer scheme is normally the better cover, because it is often written on medical history disregarded terms — the one underwriting basis that ignores your history entirely. AXA Health lists it alongside full medical underwriting, continuing medical exclusions and moratorium. That basis is rarely available to individuals buying alone.
So the question is usually not whether to hold both, but whether to cancel the personal one. The argument for keeping it is continuity: cancelling means fresh underwriting later, and anything that developed while you were on the employer scheme becomes pre-existing on whatever you buy next.
The mechanism that resolves this is continued personal medical exclusions, where a new insurer accepts the exclusions an old policy applied rather than re-underwriting you. Ask about it by name before cancelling anything.
If you do keep both, tell each insurer. Non-disclosure of other cover is the kind of thing that surfaces at exactly the wrong moment.
Questions to put to the insurer or broker
- Would cancelling mean fresh underwriting later?
- Is the employer scheme on medical history disregarded terms?
- Will a new insurer accept my existing exclusions?
Related questions
- Can I add my partner, child or parent to my policy?
- Is company-paid private health insurance taxed as a benefit in kind?
- Does private health insurance cover A&E or an emergency?
- Will private health insurance pay for cosmetic surgery?
Sources
- Source: AXA Health — Personal Health membership handbook, October 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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