One in four Australian private health insurance policyholders actively shopped around for a better deal in the year to December 2024. Five funds control roughly 82% of the national market. And at 45.4% of the population, hospital cover participation sits below its recent peak, according to the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority’s (APRA) June 2025 quarterly statistics. Against that backdrop, HIF and P&N Bank have marked 15 consecutive years as commercial partners of the Perth Wildcats – what HIF describes as among the longest-running commercial partnerships in the NBL.
HIF is a not-for-profit mutual insurer established in Perth in 1954. P&N Bank is a customer-owned bank operating as a division of Police & Nurses Limited. Both have backed the Wildcats since the 2011 NBL season.
Perth Wildcats owner and CEO Mark Arena said the duration was uncommon in professional sport. “Fifteen years is a long time for any partnership in sport, and it says a lot about HIF and P&N Bank that they’ve stayed with us through every high and low of that stretch. Both organisations were founded in WA to serve Western Australians, and that’s exactly the audience we play for every home game,” Arena said.
HIF CEO Greg Morris tied the milestone to the fund's membership structure. “As a WA-founded health fund, we’re passionate about supporting organisations that make a genuine difference in the lives of Western Australians. The Wildcats have done exactly that for decades, bringing communities together and creating a sense of pride and belonging across our state,” Morris said.
P&N group managing director and CEO Andrew Hadley connected the partnership to the bank’s origins. “P&N was founded in Western Australia to support Western Australians, and that commitment remains at the heart of everything we do. The Wildcats share that same connection to WA families and communities, which is one of the reasons this partnership has thrived for so long,” Hadley said.
Sport sponsorship is well-established territory for Australian insurers, and 2026 has produced several notable milestones alongside new commitments. QBE Insurance is marking 40 years as principal partner of the Sydney Swans – a deal dating to 1986 that now covers both the AFL and AFLW sides. HCF is in its 10th season as founding principal partner of GIANTS Netball, having supported the club since its 2017 debut.
New agreements are also being struck. Bupa became the official healthcare and digital health partner of the Australian Open from the 2026 tournament. Westfund renewed its sternum sponsorship of the Penrith Panthers for 2026 and 2027 – its seventh consecutive year with the club. Health Partners joined Port Adelaide FC as its official health insurance partner for 2026.
What separates the HIF-Wildcats arrangement from several of those examples is duration relative to fund size. The Private Health Insurance Ombudsman’s State of the Health Funds Report 2023-24, published in March 2025, shows HIF holds a 0.7% national market share. Sustaining a 15-year NBL partnership at that scale is a different commercial proposition than the same commitment from a fund controlling a quarter of the market.
For brokers advising clients on fund selection in Western Australia, the anniversary has a practical dimension. Under the Private Health Insurance Act 2007, members who switch funds do not re-serve waiting periods for equivalent or lower levels of cover. That portability lowers switching friction and raises the commercial weight of non-price factors: community recognition, membership trust, and fund stability.
The same Ombudsman report puts HIF’s two-year member retention rate at 75.0%. Most open membership not-for-profit funds with a comparable regional focus sit above 80% in that table. HBF – which holds 8.1% of the national market and operates in the same WA space as a not-for-profit fund – retains 88.9% of its hospital members over the same period. That gap is a measurable reference point when assessing long-term fund suitability for clients.
The milestone arrives during a sharper premium cycle than the sector has seen in years. The Australian government approved an average industry premium increase of 4.41% from April 1, 2026 – the highest since 2017, according to the Department of Health. HIF’s increase was 2.60%, below both the industry average and the December 2025 CPI rate of 3.8%, per HIF’s own rate announcement.
Members Health Fund Alliance – the peak body for more than 20 not-for-profit and member-owned health funds – reported an average 2026 increase of 3.62% across its member funds, compared with 5.12% for the three largest for-profit funds. The Alliance also noted that its member funds operate on a net margin of 2.6%, against approximately 7% for the three largest for-profit funds.
Pricing discipline has not prevented member movement. Roy Morgan data for the year to December 2024 found 6.8% of policies switched funds, and 24.6% of policyholders actively shopped around – up from 22.3% the prior year – with cost-of-living pressure cited as the main driver.
P&N Bank’s structural position adds a further layer of context. In May 2026, P&N Group and Bank Australia announced they were exploring a merger that would create an entity supporting more than 530,000 customers with total assets exceeding $30 billion. A member vote is expected in early 2027. Current brands, including P&N Bank, are to be maintained initially under the proposed structure.
Whether the Wildcats partnership would continue under any merged entity has not been addressed in public disclosures from either party.
Morris closed on shared values – though the fund’s pricing record and the Ombudsman’s retention data frame the same story in harder terms.
