Your Cheaper Health Insurance Quote Restarts a Clock You Already Ran Down

If you hold private health cover on the Costa del Sol and a cheaper quote has arrived, look past the premium. Your policy carries two things the quote cannot show: the waiting periods you have already served, and the medical history your insurer has already accepted.

A carencia — waiting period runs from the day a new policy starts. For non-emergency hospitalisation and surgery it is six months on Cigna's hospital-reimbursement contract, eight on DKV Integral and Asisa Completa, ten on Sanitas Más Salud. Confirmed September 2026, from the insurers' own general conditions.

If you took your policy out two years ago, you cleared all of that a while back. Switch, and unless the new insurer agrees otherwise in writing, the clock starts again. That is the asset, and the quote does not price it.

We looked at why an active policy can still leave a hospital bed uncovered last Thursday. This is the switching half: what carries across, what does not, and what to have in writing before you give notice.

Sin carencias por cambio de compañía — no waiting periods when you switch is a genuine offer. Both of the big names publish the terms, and the terms are narrower than the sales line.

Sanitas waives waiting periods if you have held a full policy with another Spanish insurer for at least a year, there is no gap between the two, and the cover is similar. It applies to its own-network products only, never to reimbursement plans.

Childbirth and bariatric surgery keep their waiting periods whatever you bring, and coming from Muface, Mugeju or ISFAS does not count as coming from another insurer. Proof is the old policy's particular conditions, or a health card showing the enrolment date, plus your latest premium receipt.

DKV waives them where the cover you hold is the same or better than what you are buying. Anything you add, a higher tier or a benefit the old policy lacked, waits its full term. Childbirth is never waived, and no more than 60 days may pass between the two policies.

Both sets of terms confirmed September 2026 on the insurers' own sites.

One line from Cigna's contract explains why the paperwork matters: its waiting periods apply unless the particular conditions expressly say otherwise. Whatever you are promised on the phone, the version that binds the insurer is the one printed in your condiciones particulares — the policy schedule with your name on it.

A waiver moves dates. It does not carry across the old insurer's acceptance of your medical history. That acceptance is a separate decision, and the new insurer makes it for itself.

DKV's own switching terms say so in five words: no se admitirán preexistencias — pre-existing conditions are not admitted. Waiting periods can go; the conditions you already have do not come with you.

Cigna's contract excludes them unless it has accepted the condition expressly and in writing, or no health questionnaire was asked for. Confirmed September 2026.

So a condition your current policy has covered for years can come back from the new one as a permanent exclusion, or as a loading on the premium that was supposed to be cheaper.

Acceptance on a new application is not a given either. Sanitas caps new customers at 75, DKV does the same on most products, and each product runs its own health questionnaire. Cancel the old policy before the new insurer has said yes, and there may be nothing to go back to.

Start with your own deadline. Under article 22 of the Insurance Contract Act you oppose renewal in writing at least one month before the expiry date in your schedule, and the insurer must notify any change at least two months before it. The mechanics are in our July piece on the renewal letter.

Then get the new insurer's acceptance in writing, before that date: the product, the benefits, any exclusion for your medical history, and a line stating which waiting periods are waived and which are not.

Put the waiver on a calendar. An eight-month waiting period on a policy starting 1 October ends on 1 June 2027, unless the schedule says it is waived. Whether the treatment you have in mind is covered at all is a separate question, answered by the exclusions, not the dates.

Then check the network you use. If your cardiologist works out of Hospital Quirónsalud Marbella, Avenida Severo Ochoa 22, confirm that doctor and that hospital sit inside the new policy. A name on a list is where that check starts, and where most people stop.

Waiting periods by insurer, entry ages and exclusions are set out in our private health insurance guide, re-verified this week.

¿Consta por escrito en mi póliza? — Is it recorded in writing in my policy?

¿Qué exclusiones se aplican? — Which exclusions apply?

Get the new insurer's acceptance, its exclusions and the waiting-period waiver in writing before you give notice on the old one. Until you hold those pages, you do not know what the lower premium costs you in cover.

See you on the paseo — A. and the WaypointSur team, with the old schedule still in the drawer.