When the Lifetime Health Cover loading goes: the ten year count
Enter how long you have paid your loading and its rate: the calculator counts the months left and what the loading will still cost you before it drops.
Loaded years still to go
72 months
Keep your hospital cover without a break and the 20 % loading stops after 72 more months.
| Loading per year, cheapest policy | $241 |
| Still to pay at that rate | $1,446 |
| Cancel now and rejoin later | the 10 years restart |
Prepared by Radif Partners · How the figures are built · thresholds read on ato.gov.au, premiums from privatehealth.gov.au data · not tax advice
A Lifetime Health Cover loading is not for life. Once you have paid it for 10 continuous years of hospital cover, your insurer removes it and your premium falls to the standard price, for as long as you keep your cover. The ATO puts it in dollars: join at 40 and you could pay 20 % more each year for 10 years; join at 50 and it is 40 % more for 10 years. Breaks allowed under the days of absence rules do not reset the count, but they do not count towards it either, so a two year gap pushes the end date back two years. The Ombudsman's example of Kaia shows this: a 6 % loading from November 2005, nine years and two months of cover, two years abroad, then 297 more days of loading before it was removed in January 2018. If you cancel after the loading has gone, a new loading can apply when you return.
Ten years, measured how?
PrivateHealth.gov.au says the loading is removed once you have held it on your hospital cover for 10 continuous years. Three rules shape that count:
- It starts when you first pay the loading, on the day your hospital cover begins.
- Permitted days without hospital cover, within your 1,094 days of absence or while overseas, do not break the continuity, but they are not counted as years with cover.
- Using up your days of absence breaks it: the ten years start again from the day you rejoin, on a new loading.
The ATO page on the loading adds the warning that applies after the end: cancel your cover once the loading is removed, and you may have to pay a loading again on a later policy.
Kaia's count, with a break abroad
Kaia, born on 7 March 1972, takes out hospital cover on 17 November 2005 with a 6 % loading, three years over 30. She cancels on 24 January 2015 to go overseas, after 3,355 days, nine years, two months and seven days of continuous cover. She does not return to Australia for more than 90 consecutive days until she comes back for good on 24 January 2017. She rejoins on 26 March 2017, pays her original 6 % for another 297 days, about ten months, and the loading is removed on 17 January 2018. Her two years abroad neither broke the count nor shortened it.
Months left on your loading
Loaded years still to go
30 months
| Loading per year, cheapest policy | $169 |
| Still to pay at that rate | $422 |
| Cancel now and rejoin later | the 10 years restart |
What the ten years cost at each loading
The total depends on the loading and on the policy carrying it. The table uses the cheapest and the median single hospital policies in Tasmania that avoid the Medicare levy surcharge, in the PrivateHealth.gov.au file of 1 October 2026, with premiums rising each year by 4.41 %, the 2026 industry average.
| Loading | Joined at | Cheapest policy, first year | Cheapest policy, 10 years | Median policy, 10 years |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 % | 31 | $24 | $295 | $562 |
| 10 % | 35 | $121 | $1,475 | $2,811 |
| 20 % | 40 | $241 | $2,949 | $5,623 |
| 30 % | 45 | $362 | $4,424 | $8,434 |
| 40 % | 50 | $482 | $5,898 | $11,245 |
| 70 % | 65 or over | $844 | $10,322 | $19,679 |
The column on the right is the reason many late joiners start low. On a median policy, a 40 % loading costs $11,245 over the ten years; on the cheapest exempt policy, $5,898. Both remove the loading on the same date. Upgrading the policy once the loading has gone costs the standard price only.
Couples and the ten years
On a couple or family policy the loading is the average of the adults' own loadings. PrivateHealth.gov.au shows, with the case of Archie, that a person's loading is removed after their own ten years of continuous cover, even on a shared policy. When one partner's loading is removed, the average falls: a couple with 22 % and 12 % pay 17 % on the policy, and once the first partner's loading has gone, 6 %. A partner who joins the policy later brings their own loading and their own start date.
The same logic applies to a dependant with a disability who is counted as an adult on a family policy: PrivateHealth.gov.au says such a person keeps their loading when they move onto a parent's policy, and can have it removed after ten continuous years of hospital cover, like anyone else.
Planning the last years
Because the end date is fixed by the start of the loading plus ten years of cover, it is worth writing it down. If you joined on 1 March 2019 and never had a gap, your loading ends on 1 March 2029. A gap of 200 permitted days moves it to around mid September 2029. A gap that exhausts your days of absence wipes the count and starts a new one with a higher loading. Before cancelling in the final years, compare what you would save with what a new ten years would cost: the days of absence page gives the loading you would come back with.
The full set of rules is on the Lifetime Health Cover loading page, and the way couples share a loading is set out there as well.