Family insurance in statutory health insurance; application

If you have statutory health insurance, you can insure your children and your spouse or partner free of charge under certain conditions. You submit the application to your statutory health insurance fund.

Zum Antrag auf Familienversicherung über den Kassen-Navigator des GKV-Spitzenverbands

This form can be submitted electronically without signature (e.g. via a secure contact form or by e-mail) or in paper form to the responsible authority.

As a member of a statutory health insurance fund, you can insure family members free of charge under certain conditions. You can apply for family insurance for your dependants from your statutory health insurance fund.

You can insure the following family members:

Your spouse or registered partner if he or she has little or no income of his or her own
Your children up to certain age limits,
grandchildren and stepchildren who live in your household or for whose living expenses you are responsible, as well as foster children

If you as parents are insured with different statutory health insurance funds, you can choose where you insure your child or children under family insurance.

You can apply for family insurance if

you have statutory health insurance
your family members live in Germany

your spouse or life partner is insured in Germany:

is not self-employed as their main occupation or has statutory health insurance, for example as an employee or pensioner;
does not have private health insurance, for example as an employee, civil servant or retired civil servant;
is not exempt from compulsory health insurance and
earns no or only a low income. The exact income limit is set by the legislator each year.

Your children are

under the age of 18 or
under 23 years old and not yet working or
under 25 years of age and still attending school, studying or completing unpaid school-based vocational training

Children with a disability can remain permanently covered by family insurance if they are unable to support themselves as adults.

You can insure your grandchildren and stepchildren under family insurance within the age limits specified, provided they

live in your household or
you are mainly responsible for their livelihood.
Foster children living permanently in the same household are also eligible for family insurance.

If your spouse or partner does not have statutory insurance but is privately insured, for example, you may only insure joint children free of charge if

your partner's salary is below the statutory annual income limit or
your partner earns less than you.

Required Documents
- aktuelle Entgeltbescheinigung oder aktueller Einkommensteuerbescheid Ihres Partners oder Ihrer Partnerin (in Kopie), wenn dieser oder diese nicht gesetzlich krankenversichert ist
- bei Kindern ab 23 Jahren: Schul- oder Studienbescheinigung
Im Einzelfall sind weitere Unterlagen wie Rentenbescheide oder Nachweise über Kapitalvermögen erforderlich. Bitte informieren Sie sich dazu bei Ihrer gesetzlichen Krankenkasse.

You can apply for family insurance by post or - in the case of many statutory health insurance companies - hand it in personally at the office or submit it online.

Fill out the application form from your statutory health insurance fund and submit it to the health insurance fund together with the required documents. There are usually different forms, depending on whether you are applying for the first time or checking the requirements.
The health insurance company will check whether you are entitled to family insurance and inform you of the result.

You do not have to pay anything for the application.

There are no deadlines for you.

Processing normally takes around 1 to 4 working days.
In order to process and decide quickly, your health insurance fund must have the necessary information and any required documents in a complete and meaningful form.
The health insurance fund decides on applications promptly, whereby the statutory processing period is observed to protect patients' rights.
Please note that the processing time stated is an average value for all health insurance funds. It may vary in individual cases.
The exact processing time also depends on the complexity of the individual case and may be extended accordingly. The same applies if documents or records are sent to you or your health insurance fund by post.