ACC won't cover motorbike accidents in future

[chrispy121]

guys you are looking at this all wrong acc was bought in to cover accidents and the right to sue the prick that said sorry mate did not see you disappered

If they cancel acc they will have to let people sue again which will cause all sorts of problems and probably cost them more as the court system is over run at the moment.

Just think motorist pulls out on you causing a small accident you then develop neck injuries then he pays you salary for the rest of his natural life I bet the cagers might look out for bike then!

just ramblings but food for thought

[MDR2]

Hmmm Quite alot of speculation and knee jerk reactions going on in this thread.

I work for ACC, as a surgery assesor, my word generally ends up being final, i love helping people but not everyone can be helped, what fucks me off is the mass amounts of money we as new zealanders fork out for Physios and the like without any kind of CAP on it. it also pisses me off the amount of people that get referred to us even though they have private health insurance. they are almost always the rudest people to deal with and surgeons treat their surgeries as URGENT because it's garaunteed money, never a thought about the other poor saps that get bumped back or who aren't a priority because they havn't got the private health insurance to fall back on.

Rest assured if you have an accident and sprain something, ACC will pay for you to get back on your feet again...(as it were) If because of your accident though, your pain won't go away and a surgeon deceides you need cutting open, then we look a little further into the cause of the pain. alot of the time it's found the accident has aggrivated a gradual process condition (degeneration) The amount of people that are not willing to believe they are getting old and that the osteo arthritis was never there before the accident astounds me. And the surgeons must be able to see this before they refer... it never ceases to amaze me... still, keeps me in the job

Also if the gubbermint did choose to bin the system. ACC is currently funded in a way that IF it did go all tits up then all the people currently living off it would be sorted for the rest of their (un)natural lives.

One thing working for ACC has brought to the forefront of my mind though is, there is alot of shit that can happen to you that isn't accident related, so private health insurance isn't such a silly idea. Seems strange so many people will insure their vehicles and not give a second thought to their health.

[ducatilover]

ACC didn't do f**k all when I screwed myself over on a bike. I pay my rego. I crashed a bike with rego...where has my money gone? Wouldn't make any difference what they did. If they don't help me now neither will health insurance

[monkeymcbean]

I bet you wouldn't be paying less. Can you provide ONE example of a Western country with lower rates for personal injury insurance that covers motorcycling than ACC charge

I expect you are a Pom. So, how much did insurance cost you back in Pomgolia - adjusted for inflation etc ?

ACC has its faults , many and manifold. But it is remarkably good value.

I agree, we are very lucky to have ACC which covers everyone, no one misses out, this is why I get very nervouse when i get a whiff of our Government in term making rumbles about the high cost of ACC and mentioning people may need to fork out for there own personal insurance and do away with ACC. Which in my experience are random as to who and what they will insure you for, depending on your history and good take into account your lifestyle sporting choices.

[monkeymcbean]

The thing to remember about private insurance of any sort, is that the company is there to make a profit. So when it comes to health insurance, the company wants to take in more money than it pays out.
If you have above average health, your premium will put more into the company than you will take out, so in that respect, private health insurance is a bad investment for you.
If you have below average health the opposite case applies - health insurance is worth it for you.
Course the trouble is, it's not always easy to know what is going to happen to your "above average" health as you age...I was always super fit and healthy when younger. Now that the years are accumulating, all the degenerative things are starting to happen; bits fall off, don't work so well, need a bump start etc etc etc. So I could use health insurance now but it's too friggin late because now everything is an "existing condition" and will therefore not be covered. They'll get you every time. To profit from being insured, you need bloody bad luck.
Just in case you're wondering, yes, I do have the bike insured, along with the cage, house, contents, business etc etc etc. But no life or health insurance.

I reckon you need to look at it as though if you put that money aside that you would of paid into health insurance by the time you need a body part like ...hip joint you would have saved enough. If you paid into a health insurance they may pay for you but they will have a real good look into your history to make sure you are not hiding a pre existing condition and this will mean ACC claims which could of caused your now condition. In which case you might find they could decline your claim.
So giving them all that money would be a waste really.
Its a gamble. I personally don't like private health insurance because of what you mention, they will try and get out of paying out. I think ACC is fantastic for everyone.

[monkeymcbean]

I Will keep riding if ACC and private insurance won't cover me, then they have given me back the right to heavily sue if I am not the Cause of the accident.
ACC was set up so that we would not be using the court system to recover the costs of accidents, that is my take on it.

You can only sue if the person has money, or insured, that is if they don't do a runner.

[monkeymcbean]

[QUOTE=chrispy121;1129300183]

guys you are looking at this all wrong acc was bought in to cover accidents and the right to sue the prick that said sorry mate did not see you disappered

Just think motorist pulls out on you causing a small accident you then develop neck injuries then he pays you salary for the rest of his natural life I bet the cagers might look out for bike then!

just ramblings but food for thought[/

QUOTE]

Yep! nothing like a wounding in the pocket, to keep one alert and attentive.

[scracha]

I expect you are a Pom. So, how much did insurance cost you back in Pomgolia - adjusted for inflation etc ?

When i was a 25 year old lad in upper Pomgolia, for 3 motorycles my 3rd party fire and theft was 185 pomgolian pounds. I think the rego on one was about 30 quid and the other two about 60 quid (bigger bikes). Inflation in the 7 years since has been next to fark all and if you adjusted it for wages as well as inflation it worked out a lot cheaper.

The cops were less anal, the speed-limits higher and the roads better too. Shame the place is so over-populated, house prices are mental and the cost of gogo juice is ridiculous.

[monkeymcbean]

Hmmm Quite alot of speculation and knee jerk reactions going on in this thread.

I work for ACC, as a surgery assesor, my word generally ends up being final, i love helping people but not everyone can be helped, what fucks me off is the mass amounts of money we as new zealanders fork out for Physios and the like without any kind of CAP on it. it also pisses me off the amount of people that get referred to us even though they have private health insurance. they are almost always the rudest people to deal with and surgeons treat their surgeries as URGENT because it's garaunteed money, never a thought about the other poor saps that get bumped back or who aren't a priority because they havn't got the private health insurance to fall back on.

Rest assured if you have an accident and sprain something, ACC will pay for you to get back on your feet again...(as it were) If because of your accident though, your pain won't go away and a surgeon deceides you need cutting open, then we look a little further into the cause of the pain. alot of the time it's found the accident has aggrivated a gradual process condition (degeneration) The amount of people that are not willing to believe they are getting old and that the osteo arthritis was never there before the accident astounds me. And the surgeons must be able to see this before they refer... it never ceases to amaze me... still, keeps me in the job

Also if the gubbermint did choose to bin the system. ACC is currently funded in a way that IF it did go all tits up then all the people currently living off it would be sorted for the rest of their (un)natural lives.

One thing working for ACC has brought to the forefront of my mind though is, there is alot of shit that can happen to you that isn't accident related, so private health insurance isn't such a silly idea. Seems strange so many people will insure their vehicles and not give a second thought to their health.

Interesting, I have health insurance and it was a battle to have them pay for a operation which i fairly thought they should even though i had not made a claim at all after being with them for 15 years. They don't have to, but i feel pre exisiting condition is such a 'have' as most people will have a pre existing condition when signing up to health insurance whether they know it or not. If to be fair to all, a total health check, bone check, heart check, family history check should be done on all before they sign up, if they are going to get picky.
So i think ACC is very fair in comparision, and good value. Though it is interesting your view on the cue jumping for surgery.

[Xaria]

We just signed up for health insurance through work and all pre existing conditions were covered.

Four different levels of cover and if we wanted to upgrade or add kids, we could pay the difference ourselves.

[Brett]

Would the removal of ACC cover not also open the floodgates of people sueing others for injury related damages? At the moment the whole point of ACC is that one can't sue (or so is my understanding).
If ACC where to cease and motorcycling was to not be covered by my private health insurance, I would stop I think. Unless by that time I have managed to build my own private hospital in which case I would not really care.
I am a staunch National supporter but if they did this and did not have another scheme to cover citizens then they will have lost my vote big time. Then it will have to be Rodney.

[Brett]

guys you are looking at this all wrong acc was bought in to cover accidents and the right to sue the prick that said sorry mate did not see you disappered

If they cancel acc they will have to let people sue again which will cause all sorts of problems and probably cost them more as the court system is over run at the moment.

Just think motorist pulls out on you causing a small accident you then develop neck injuries then he pays you salary for the rest of his natural life I bet the cagers might look out for bike then!

just ramblings but food for thought

And suddenly everyone will need public liability insurance.

[NinjaNanna]

Yep! nothing like a wounding in the pocket, to keep one alert and attentive.

bullshit, it won't make a difference. An accident is always that an accident? do you really think people ride/drive around thinking, "fuck it - acc will cover them"

and beside no competent government could scrap ACC without introducing privatised compulsary third party insurance at the same time. And if at the same time they re-introduced the right to sue then your rego costs are only going one direction and no prizes for guessing which direction.

the prinicple of ACC is solid and sound, maybe some fine tuning could be done - but at the end of the day its just another reason that I prefer to live here rather than Australia.

Most NZ'rs really have no clue how good we've got it.

[duckonin]

Scenario: The now elected Government cans ACC as it is to expensive and forces people to take out private health insurance. (there has been mutterings in government for this to happen!)

Private Health Insurancers make a stance that Motorbike accidents will not be covered by them as to the high accident rate.

If this ever did happen, would you still ride your bike knowing you would have to foot the bills if you came off and had to pay for medical costs out of your own pocket?

If that was the case then it would give motocyclists the right to Sue if the accident was caused by another, the very thing ACC was set up against..

Yes I would still ride my bike,as life is to short not to enjoy, to get blood out of a stone is very hard indeed..

[jono035]

I think ACC is given a bad rap for all the good they do. It isn't perfect, but throwing it away and suggesting that private companies can do it better, well that is a road to madness.

At least, it hasn't worked for most of the other privatised industries, anyway...