What Being a Sanitas Approved Partner Means for 247 Expat Insurance Clients

247 Expat Insurance holds approved partner status with Sanitas, one of Spain’s largest private health insurers. The label sounds like marketing, but it carries practical consequences for the people we contract policies for. This note sets out what the partnership actually delivers, and how it differs from buying the same brand of policy through a generic comparison site.

Why the Sanitas name matters

Sanitas was founded in 1954 and has operated in the Spanish private healthcare market for more than seven decades. Since 1989 it has been part of the British BUPA group, the international healthcare organisation headquartered in London. That ownership structure is one of the reasons Sanitas is widely recognised by British expatriates: the underlying group is familiar, the financial backing is substantial and the company has invested heavily in its own hospitals, dental clinics and diagnostic centres across Spain.

For an expat audience, that combination — a Spanish-regulated insurer with British group ownership and a directly owned care network — is part of what makes Sanitas a default choice. Being an approved partner means we sit on the broker side of that relationship, with direct access to the company rather than going through an intermediary.

What “approved partner” actually means

Approved partner status is granted by Sanitas to brokers who meet its training, compliance and service standards. In practice, it gives us:

• Direct broker access to the Sanitas contracting platform, rather than routing applications through a third party.
• The full Sanitas product catalogue, not a cut-down selection.
• Defined service-level expectations for quotes, applications and contracting.
• A named broker channel for after-sales queries, renewals and product changes.

That structure is the difference between a price comparison engine that hands you off after the sale and a broker that remains the point of contact for the life of the policy.

The full product catalogue we can place

As an approved partner, we can contract any of the core Sanitas products an expat is likely to need. The main lines we work with are:

• Sanitas Más Salud — the everyday private medical product with full access to the Sanitas network, designed for residents and families who want comprehensive cover at a competitive premium.
• Sanitas Premium — the upper-tier product with expanded cover, higher reimbursement options and broader provider choice for those who want a wider safety net.
• Sanitas Residents — the policy written specifically to meet the requirements of Spanish residency applications, with the certificate wording that consulates expect.
• Sanitas International Students — the product designed for student visa applicants, where proof of enrolment or matriculation is part of the contracting process.
• Sanitas Más Senior — the specialist product for older applicants, where standard health products either decline or load the premium heavily.

Within those product lines we can configure the co-payment structure. Sanitas offers both no co-payment versions, where the premium is higher but each consultation is covered in full, and co-payment versions, where the premium is lower and a small fee applies per visit. The right choice depends on how often a client expects to use the policy. We walk clients through both options at quote stage rather than defaulting to whichever is cheapest on a comparison table.

What clients get that a comparison site does not provide

A generic comparison website can quote a Sanitas premium. What it generally cannot do is the work that surrounds the policy.

NLV-compliant certificate wording

For Non-Lucrative Visa applicants, the consulate requires a specific form of words on the insurance certificate: full cover, no co-payments, no waiting periods, no deductibles and coverage in Spain. We request that certificate directly from Sanitas, in the exact wording the consulate accepts, and provide it before the visa appointment. Clients who buy through a comparison site often discover at the consulate that the generic certificate they were sent is not accepted.

Direct contracting through the broker

Because we contract directly via the Sanitas broker channel, there is no intermediary platform in between. Applications are submitted, accepted and confirmed within our service-level windows, and renewals stay with us rather than reverting to a call centre.

English-speaking claims support

Policy documents and customer-service lines in Spain default to Spanish. We provide English-language support for claims queries, authorisation requests, appointment routing and renewal questions, so clients are not left negotiating a clinical issue in a second language.

Honest product matching

If a student needs proof of studies before Sanitas International Students can be contracted, we tell them and either help them obtain it or move them to Sanitas Residents. If an older client needs Más Senior rather than Más Salud, we say so. A comparison site sells whatever is clicked.

The short version

Approved partner status is not a badge. It is the operating arrangement that lets us contract Sanitas policies directly, place the full catalogue, issue the certificates Spanish consulates require and remain the point of contact for the lifetime of the policy. For clients, that means fewer dropped handoffs, the right product for their situation and English-language support when something needs sorting out.

247 Expat Insurance is a registered insurance brokerage operating in Spain. Information in this article is for general guidance and does not constitute a formal product recommendation. Product availability, premiums and certificate wording are subject to Sanitas underwriting and Spanish regulatory requirements at the time of contracting.