> History of the company

Pojišťovna VZP a.s. was created as a subsidiary of Všeobecná zdravotní pojišťovna České republiky on 16 January 2004. The company registered office has from the start been Prague 7 - Holešovice, Jankovcova 1566/2b, postal code 170 00.
The foundation of the company was closely bound up with the amendment to Act 363/1999 Coll., on insurance, which in section 3 paragraph 2 dissolved the possibility of other legal entities undertaking insurance activities under a special regulation and restricted these activities to joint-stock companies or cooperatives. These changes came into force on 1 January 2004.

This meant that Všeobecná zdravotní pojišťovna České republiky (VZP ČR) was no longer entitled to perform the insurance activities of a contractual (private) health insurance provider.

However, the contractual health insurance provided by VZP ČR still had a footing in the Act on Public Health Insurance, which permitted these activities to be undertaken up until the accession of the Czech Republic to the European Union, i.e. until 1 June 2004.

VZP ČR had been providing contractual health insurance – the insurance of medical expenses abroad and foreigner’s health insurance – since 1993 and had created a strong position for itself on the market. In the sphere of foreigner’s health insurance it occupied a very important position in the social safety net, since foreigners who did not meet the conditions for inclusion in the public health insurance scheme had no other possibilities of paying for health care than by cash directly to the health centre which treated them.
Under the terms of a decision taken by the Management Board of VZP ČR the company resolved the problem posed by the amendment to the law by establishing a joint-stock company as its subsidiary. The following steps were taken within the process of creating an independent company, namely Pojišťovna VZP, a.s.:

On 1 May 2004 the insurance activities of VZP ČR in the sphere of contractual health insurance were terminated, and the role of active insurer was transferred to the new subsidiary with the corporate name Pojišťovna VZP, a.s., which at the same time took over the insurance stock. However, VZP ČR remained the main distribution network of the insurance products offered by Pojišťovna VZP.

Despite a demanding transformation process, the impact of the entry of the CR into the European Union on the insurance products offered, and the expenses involved in setting up the new company, in its first year of independent operations on the insurance market Pojišťovna VZP, a.s. attained very positive financial results.

All of the financial resources deposited in the subsidiary of VZP ČR were exclusively accumulated from the operation of private insurance and not resources from the public health system.