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How do I sign up for public health insurance with the KSK?
How do I sign up for public health insurance with the KSK?

Information for artists and publicists

Sebastian avatar
Written by Sebastian
Updated this week

Are you having difficulty signing up for public health insurance? Well, if you're an artist or publicist, the Künstlersozialkasse (KSK) might just be your way into the public health system.

Once you're accepted into the KSK, you are a mandatory member of public health insurance in Germany. Usually, a KSK membership application takes a few months. But the good news is that you can register for public health insurance together with your KSK membership application. It will be pending until KSK confirms your membership.

Signing up for public health insurance

You can easily sign up through Feather by keeping in mind that you should state that you are "Employed" and when asked for the name of your employer state "KSK membership application". You should pick a start date of about six months in the future because the processing of KSK applications takes a while. The start date will be adjusted as soon as the KSK membership is confirmed.
We recommend signing up for BARMER since their process is just so quick and you will be guided through the process just perfectly.
After your signup through Feather, your social security number (SVNR) is requested and you will receive it once it was created for you.

Your insurance application will await confirmation from KSK until it can finally be confirmed.

How exactly is the process as an artist:

  1. You signed up through Feather for BARMER

    1. Go through and complete the sign-up flow. During the sign-up questionnaire, please state that you are 'employed' and that your employer is 'KSK membership application', choose a start date six months from now.

  2. Receive a preliminary insurance confirmation from BARMER

    1. make sure to mark that you are not yet insured with public health insurance but plan to become member of BARMER when KSK is confirmed

    2. state that you are privately insured in the meantime and name your health insurance

  3. Receive KSK confirmation

  4. Hand in KSK confirmation to BARMER

  5. Receive your final insurance confirmation and insurance start date

And how am I insured in the meantime?

We offer expat health insurance that covers your basic insurance needs, costs only €72 per month, and is the right type of health insurance until you can join public health insurance.

We recommend staying on our expat health insurance until you are accepted by the KSK.

Here is why:
- our expat health insurance is a cheap and sufficient health insurance to get started in Germany.

- no expensive back paying for public health insurance for all the months that your KSK application has been processing and you haven't used the public health insurance.

- if you stated in your KSK application that you are currently on private health insurance (like our Expat health insurance by Feather) your public health insurance with BARMER will begin on the 1st of the month after the KSK confirmation. You can then easily cancel your expat health insurance.

Once your KSK application is approved, your public insurance through the KSK will commence on the 1st of the following month. This means that there will be no expensive backdated payments for public health insurance and no overlap in insurance coverage!

Be aware, though, that it is mandatory to be insured with statutory pension insurance from the date you submitted your KSK registration. Our expat health insurance does not cover the pension part (only public insurance does in this case); therefore, you will have to backpay for that. Your chosen public health insurance provider will reach out to you with all the info once your membership is approved. The contribution for statutory pension insurance is 9.3% of your income.

You can read further details in our FAQ on upgrading from expat to public or private health.

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