Employee benefits

Many employers offer life insurance, a company pension, private medical insurance or other protection policies as an employee benefit.

This can create a tricky issue for someone who is HIV-positive as they may not want to tell their employer about their health status, but know that a positive diagnosis excludes them from most protection policies. In this situation it is advisable to request to see the application form. If the employer has a group policy, in some cases there won’t be any questions about pre-existing conditions.

However, if there are questions about pre-existing conditions then it’s advisable for the employee to go back to the employer and simply state that they have a pre-existing medical condition that they know will exclude them from the cover. They are under no obligation to say what the condition is.