International benefit managers don’t pay much attention to expatriate group dental insurance but they should. Please note, if you are an individual looking for individual expatriate dental insurance, please contact us and describe your situation and country and we will provide assistance.
U.S. citizens working overseas for an employer expect expatriate dental insurance plans and all the major carriers will offer it along side the international group medical insurance program. Unless you have a very large group, the expatriate medical insurance carriers will not offer expatriate dental on a stand alone basis.
International Dental Insurance Policy and Planning
Unfortunately, most U.S. expatriates will not go to a dentist in their host country for several years until they feel comfortable there, and in some countries they will never go to the dentist for good cause.
Expatriate group dental insurance always needs to allow dental care back in the home country and the expatriate may have family back in the home country or a child studying in another country, so expatriate group dental insurance must be global in scope. Again, if you have a large third country national population you may want to consider a third country national dental plan separate from the U.S. expat dental insurance plan. One that saves money by not allowing dental care in the US.
Expatriate Group Dental Insurance: 5 Planning issues for International Human Resources Managers:
- If your international group will be more than 20% TCNs, or if you have more than 10 TCNs a special medical and dental plan for TCNs should be considered. They will not have the same needs or expectations as U.S. expatriates.
- $2,000 USD of annual coverage is still the best practices today. However, many global employers allow only $1,000 or $1,500 of dental care per year per expat.
- The Third Country National Dental Plan should not allow for dental care in the U.S., where it may be far more expensive.
- Please be aware that many foreign nationals and TCNs will not expect or demand international group dental insurance like U.S. expat or international assignees from other countries may.
- Most employers pay the entire cost of the international dental insurance plan for the expatriate employees but 0% to 50% of the cost of the dependent dental insurance premium. In our experience, expat dental insurance is too inexpensive to try to find savings here on the dependents. There are other areas to save on costs. If 100% is not paid by the employer on both the expat piece and the dependent piece, participation may drop.