Tag Archives: Ireland

Bupa to leave Irish market

I can just imagine the cheers and celebration going on at VHI HQ this afternoon as it was announced that Bupa, the second largest health insurer (with 22% of the market) is going to pull out of the Irish market because of risk-equalisation.

Two things really annoy me about this decision:

  • When they set up shop in the first place they knew that risk equalisation was inevitable. It’s a side effect of how the Irish health insurance market works. Everyone pays the same premium, the incumbant VHI has older and more costly members and risk equalisation meant compensating VHI. They should have planned realistically for it although how one can plan to compensate another company a sum of money larger than one’s own entire profits is beyond me.
  • Why couldn’t they have come up with a more imaginative solution. If VHI had simply given Bupa a percentage of their elderly members to even out the age spread of their memberships then VHI wouldn’t have had a leg to stand on and risk equalisation wouldn’t be an issue.

I’m a Bupa member as is my wife. A friend of mine works for Bupa in Fermoy. We’re all sorely disappointed at the decision today. There’s still Vivas Health but I wonder what their plan is to cope with the huge payouts VHI will want off them in a couple of years.

The company is blaming the move on a scheme known as risk equalisation – which it says compels it to pay €1 million every week to compensate other insurance providers for covering older consumers.

The company claimed the move would force it to hand over €161m to its rival over three years, even though its profits for the period would be just €64m.

Michele linked to a newsletter written by Martin O’Rourke, the boss of Bupa Ireland. As I expect the Bupa website will disappear sooner rather than later and this message with it, I’ll copy/paste it here after the jump as a record of what evils a monopoly does to an industry.

bupa-ireland.jpg

Continue reading “Bupa to leave Irish market”

Worried about the NCT?

Two years have passed really quickly and it’s time for my car to be tested again as part of the National Car Test (NCT). Registration was simple through their website and hopefully the test will be as uneventful.

My car has been serviced recently but there’s still that nagging doubt in the back of my head. Conventional wisdom says that it’s easier to have the car fail the test, get the car fixed and then retake the test but I’ve heard stories about people whose cars failed the test for different reasons on the second go! Oh the stress!

Things to watch out for are listed on the NCT inspection checklist and include brakes, exhaust and tyres. They’re fairly thorough.

Do you have any NCT horror stories? I don’t want to hear them until after 3pm today!

Bad news! The front left tire is too worn to pass, but as Mel said in a comment below, the visual retest is free. Must ring the local garage and bring the car down to them tomorrow.

How to blog in Cork using free wifi

It’s hard to believe, but despite the really bad uptake of broadband services, or perhaps because of it, Ireland leads the way in WiFi hotspots!

Last week I had the pleasure of using the free WiFi services in Douglas shopping center to make a post on the Mallow Camera Club site. I had half an hour to kill so I popped into O’Brien’s, bought a coffee and a biscuit and settled down. I wasn’t the only one taking advantage of this generous gift. I spotted three others seated at various points around the library tapping away on their laptops. It’s something I never imagined I’d see! Yes, yes, yes. If you’ve enjoyed the use of free WiFi in your city this won’t be anything new, but this is in the “Celtic Tiger” economy where nothing is free and everything is over-priced.

So, next time your significant other is popping down to the shops, tag along. They might have free WiFi and it’ll do you the world of good to get out from behind that desk! I’m waiting for retailers and restaurant owners in Blarney to realise that free access to the Internet would draw all the self-employed Internet geeks out of their homes and into their establishments. I wonder how hard would it be to drop that hint …

After Budget 2007 I'm stinking rich

I was glued to the radio this afternoon like many people in the country listening to the Minister for Finance, Brian Cowen, announce the new budget. Also like many people I’ll be better off next year as a result of some of the changes he made.

The budget was great for pensioners and first time buyers, of which I’m one of the latter. The news isn’t so good if you’re addicted to nicotine. Still, the price of a pint hasn’t gone up. You might also be able to pay for those cigarettes with the 1% that was knocked off the top rate of tax. That extra €10/month in the children’s allowance could come in handy too.

Anyway, the country is glowing with smiles all-around, except for the opposition of course who complain that not enough was done or done in the right place. I wonder if anyone asked if Paul Stokes was going to get some?

If you want to compare how you’ll do in 2007 versus this year, then compare this 2007 budget calculator and the 2006 one. I’m not PAYE any more but if I was I’d be up a few hundred Euro apparently! Not stinking rich, but enough nonetheless.

The biggest clown in TV

Paul Stokes is at it again! Not content with barging in on a chat show last week he drove a car through a security barrier at RTE in Dublin, headed for the main doors, crashed into those before finally coming to rest a few feet away when his car bounced off the doors with the impact! He was detained by security and is to appear at Dublin District Court this morning.

If his GPS car system is so revolutionary why doesn’t he go through normal channels and develop it and create a business around it, and market the product just a little bit more sensibly? I can just imagine his conversation with a bank manager now if he does try to finance a startup.

Bosco.. where are you? All is forgiven!

(via Damien)

AIDS – Don’t Die of Ignorance

Today is a very important day in world health. December 1st is World Aids Day and each year is dedicated to a different theme. This year’s theme is “Stop AIDS; Keep the Promise – Accountability” and you can find out more about how the theme is chosen and who chooses it on avert.org

Irish television viewers will see a “high-profile television campaign warning about the rise of the Aids pandemic in Ireland” over the next few months and that may hopefully encourage people to get tested and improve awareness of the disease according to breakingnews.ie.

Some charities would prefer a softly-softly approach because the viewing public has become immune to distressing scenes but I can’t bear to hear the opening score of the following drink driving advert because of how it ends.

If you’re wondering, bloggers all over the world are talking about AIDS. Get into the conversation and make a difference.

It’s also my birthday today, and in a selfish sort of way, I wish they’d picked another day to raise awareness of AIDS! It’s a bit of a downer hearing about the AIDS epidemic in the media on my birthday, each and every year on this day. I guess the message is getting through, somewhere, hopefully.

Check the voting register before December 9th

Check the Register The deadline to check if you’re on the voting register has been extended to December 9th so if you haven’t checked, you have a few more days to do so. Type your name and address into the form on Checktheregister.ie to find out if you’re one of the 300,000 voters knocked off the list! This is especially important if nobody has called to your house with a voting form. Even though you may have been on the register for years, some councils have been overly enthusiastic about deleting voters.

It’s a little fiddly doing the check, but not too painful. When you visit the site above you’ll have to click through to the council managing your area. I checked the Cork County Council site and had to click another link which opens a new maximized window with the form. On a large wide screen that looks really silly! All it needs is 600 pixels.

Lesotho table quiz tonight

My brother Donal and his girlfriend Celine are heading to Lesotho next April as part of a charity effort with the ISPCC to renovate a school and build a playground for kids there. They’re holding a table quiz tonight in the Spailpin Fanach to help raise funds.

Donal’s also looking for spot prizes. They have a few already and sponsors will be mentioned on their charity.ie page. I want to make it sweeter for people to help. If you run an online company and would like a link on the sidebar of this PR8 website, with traffic of almost 3,000 page views a day for a month, drop me a mail at donncha @ ocaoimh.ie (or ring me if you have my number) – we need to have the spot prize tonight, in about 6 hours time.

  • Online gift vouchers or something I can print out would be best.
  • The audience is probably not technically minded, so free hosting would be useless. An Amazon or other online retailer voucher on the other hand would be great.
  • I have three slots for your links. According to Text Link Ads a link on my site for a month is worth $275. I’m willing to sell these slots to sponsors for €100 each.

Time is running out. You have six hours. That’s 6pm Irish time, or mid-morning EST! Thanks for your help!

I’ll be there, with camera in hand of course, although I’m useless at quizzes so I don’t know who’ll want me on their team. Don’t tell anyone ok?

See how easily you can get rich?

News this morning is that elected politicians in Ireland “will receive more than €1,000 for every day they sit in the Dáil.” Not bad eh?

“Get Elected” was one of the 30 ways to spend your SSIA on Eddie Hobbs’ show recently. He suggested that investing your €20,000 in an election attempt was a great way to invest your lump sum. Given that a TD will earn more than €103,000 that’s a great investment if you have the hair and height for it!

According to today’s Irish Independent, the average basic wage for a TD will increase to more than €103,000, while a golden handshake, amounting to €4.7m, will be paid to TDs and Senators who lose their seats in next year’s general election.

I'm still shaking

This morning I almost went straight into the side of another car on a bend.

I drive Jacinta into work and on my way back via Sunday’s Well I got a strong smell of petrol on the quay. It was raining with water pooling at the side of the road and the tell-tale rainbow of the petrol on the road was everywhere. It hadn’t been there a few minutes earlier and traffic was backed up going out of the city. The wrong way considering it’s the morning and we had been stuck for 15 minutes going in ten minutes previously.

Driving up a hill that’s been plastered with petrol is no fun. Other cars were getting stuck, we were stopped and people were getting impatient. I heard the beeping of a horn from somewhere behind me. We weren’t going anywhere and my view was blocked by the van in front of me. Finally the car in trouble started off again so I let go of the hand brake and pressed the accelerator. Nothing, I barely moved. In desperation I slammed on the hand brake again and took a breath checking my rear view mirror to see how much space I had. I tried again, the speedometer said 20mph but the car was barely moving. I heard an awful whining sound and slowly the car inched forward. Finally the tires gripped the road and slowly I made my way up around the corner. The road was clear ahead of me and I had another obstacle.

There’s a steep hill up and over Sunday’s Well and too late I saw the rainbow hues on that bend but I was committed. Slowly I advanced forward, turning the wheel with the corner but to my horror the car kept going forward, right towards a car. I stopped quickly. Thankfully the brakes held, switched off the ignition and hit the flashers before jumping out in case something had happened to my steering. No, the wheels were turned left but had been skidding on the slick petrol film on the road. I got in and abandoned my attempt to go up the hill, instead taking the longer route down the North Mall and up Blarney Street. At the top of that street were the signs of petrol again but it’s level ground and the road is more porous and didn’t present a problem.

I’m only now calm and not shaking. It gave me an awful scare and I’ll be heading into town a different way this afternoon. The Gardai were called and they had received a few calls already. I passed a Garda van on the way home so hopefully they were on the way down to direct traffic and help people.

I’m glad I’m home.

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