Hi, i did join hbf for a year which is the time to qualify and i am getting my sleeve done on the 13 th dec in bunbury,all i have had to pay out of my own pocket is $1600 ,. when i was on the hunt for this procedure i was told the public system has a very long wait,up to 4 years and you can do that long wait and then have something change in the government system which may put you right back to square one,so i took their advice and joined hbf,my year is up and it went very quickly,four years is a long time.$2600 sounds way better than the 20k.i think it is a bit risky waiting the four years escpecially as things get changed in public system,i do appreciate the fact that this is the only option for many out there though.