How often do you receive a phone call from your people in Nigeria complaining of one ailment or the other and asking you for money to settle hospital bills? If you’re like most, this happens a lot. While many of these requests are genuine, sometimes people can take advantage and sneak in one or two fake requests because they think you have plenty money, ‘afterall no be euro you dey earn’.
What people in Nigeria don’t know is the heavy tax you have to pay. So while you’re earning ‘plenty Euro’. Revenue is also collecting their own share via taxes and universal social charge. Then there are the other deductions for pension and PRSI. Very quickly, the ‘plenty’ is depleted.
If only there was a way to verify that your people back home actually have the healthcare issue they claim and then pay directly to the clinic via a trusted partner. Better still, what if you could buy your closest loved ones their medicines directly or buy a healthcare plan that covers their usual needs? If only there was a way to send money to Nigeria for healthcare and claim it back. Here’s the story of how Yemi, an IT professional, who moved to Dublin in 2015 solved it.
Yemi first moved to Dublin for his masters in 2015. On completing it, he was able to secure a job with a tech company. He was delighted that he’d finally arrived and delightfully shared his success with his family back home. His annual gross salary was going to be €45,000 and he was happy he would start sending money back home. Imagine his shock when he received his first payslip and saw the amount of deductions in it. By the time he’d paid his astronomical Dublin rent, bills and bought groceries, the €45,000 didn’t feel that much anymore.
His family back in Nigeria didn’t see these deductions or bills though. All they could visualise was the wads of Euros he was making, and the money he’d send to Nigeria. The regular demands for money became incessant and frustration slowly creeped in. After some time, he started to reduce the frequency and amount of money he sent home, and calls too as each call ended with demand for money. Noticing this, his family started to use sickness and medical bills as the main request for cash. While Yemi thought it was suspicious, he felt bad rejecting requests for things like mama’s diabetes medicine from his brother.
This was until he heard about WellaHealth in 2022. The health technology company with presence in Ireland and Nigeria was introduced to him by a friend. The company enabled him to buy his mother’s diabetes medicines directly from a pharmacy and have them delivered to her. As part of the medication delivery service, a nurse from WellaHealth was able to check on his mother to ensure she was doing well. For his younger ones who didn’t have diabetes, he was able to buy a healthcare plan that covered their day to day healthcare needs.
Best part of all this was that he could claim a tax credit for this expense of over €245 with the payment receipt he got from WellaHealth. This meant that the money he spent on his family’s healthcare expense was all refunded to him from his tax.
WellaHealth also helped make him rest easy that a reputable company was involved in his mother’s care and that she was getting genuine medicines and not counterfeit. Finally all those phone calls of “Yemi, send money, mama is sick” has all but stopped. Yemi now has more money saved and is planning a big dirty December trip later in the year to go and enjoy Lagos.
To learn more about WellaHealth’s service for managing your family’s healthcare needs in Nigeria tax free. Visit the site or Whatsapp. They will offer you various plans for medicines, nursing visits and health insurance. They will also provide you a receipt and guide you on how to claim the tax credit making the expense essentially free for you.
