Due to my weird eye condition, I'll be getting glasses soon. Unlike Crystal, we have a really cheap (read= kind of bad) mutuelle (or complément de santé technically) that reimburses the same as the Sécu= 3€ + 3€.
Knowing how expensive glasses are, I thought "How can the government reimburse so little for something so necessary?" So I went around to several opticians and got quotes, and learned a lot along the way (this being my first pair of glasses ever).
Lenses cost more the stronger the prescription is, so since my glasses won't have the same correction for each eye, each lens has a different price. The difference might not be that much, but once I learned this, I didn't trust sales people who glanced at my prescription and then said "Oh, your lenses will cost around 120€".
I learned too that you can get really cheap lenses if you do without the anti-scratch, anti-glare, anti-dirt treatments they offer (or pick and choose, which increases the price). The cheapest quote I got for plain old lenses was 43€. Get a cheap frame and it "only" costs about 80€.
The other thing I learned is that most chains offer "forfait", or all in one deals. For a set price, you have the lenses and the frames. The catch of course is that you usually have to choose from an in-house brand of frames, so no Ray Ban, Dolce Gabbana, no Oakley possible. The frames that I saw in these collections were fine, just not name brand of course. Kind of like shopping for clothes at Monoprix or Carrefour.
After doing all my cost analysis, I think I've kind of figured out what I'm going to do. Analyzing prices got complicated because the store that offered cheaper lenses without the frames had more expensive forfaits. And the price of two forfait (for regular and sun glasses) with anti-scratch and anti-glare is around 200€, at which price most places have that "Second pair for just 1€" deal.
So it is possible to get really cheap glasses, but they'll get scratched easily (if you're like me) and you'll be blinded by the reflection while you're driving. Before getting these quotes I stopped by our complément de santé to find out if it would be advantageous to add on an option for glasses, but paying 5€ more a month (year = 60€) would increase my reimbursement to .... 62€ for one pair, so a grand total of 2€.
And I totally look like a librarian/school marm with glasses. Yeah, awesomeness....
1 comment:
sorry to hear your mutuelle is leaving you high and dry. I know I'm really lucky ours is pretty good considering the reimbursement rate for a lot of health services with the Sécu. I laughed in the lady's face at the Optician when she told me to send off the Sécu form to get my 4,83€ refunded. Im pretty sure the stamp to send it off will be more than what I'm getting back.
Still, you have to figure that glasses are something necessary to make your quality of life better. And, in my opinio, you don't screw around with eyes! I hope you are able to find something nice, within your budget :)
P.S. Does it HAVE to be glasses you get to help with your eye condition or would contacts do the same? I know contacts are so much cheaper than glasses...
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