Travel Insurance Discussion Area

Aiadi

SampleX wrote:

Heeelp.

I don't know what to do next.

When is a return journey travel insurance not a return journey travel insurance, and only a one way journey travel insurance? When it's sold by InsureandGo..!

I've been using Insure and Go happily for a few years. I often go on short European breaks with my parents, who get free travel insurance with their Barclays Bank account (may have a Credit Card attatched), and I always used to laugh at them relying on it, while I paid for a silver policy from InsureAndGo. My point was proven during a trip this time last year, when the airline sent our bags to Glasgow, while we flew to Paris, and then got a train to Nice. We all rang travel insurance as soon as we got to Nice, they were told they had £100 emergency clothing/supplies allowance each, and Insure and Go told me I had £200. Great. The extra cost had paid off. So I continued to use IAG for all my trips, even to the point of NEARLY convincing my folks to use IAG for a recent trip.

Thank God they didn't.

On the return journey home, we had a train booked (TGV) to get to Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris, which was delayed critically due to an engine failuire (very rare in my experience). SNCF were brilliant, and because it was an 80 minute delay, they had letters already prepared for us at Paris explaining the delay for travel insurance suppliers. We missed our flights and had to pay £150 each to come home.

When we got home we put our claims in respectively.

We each requested that our documents be returned to us for our records also, and included SAE's, fully postage paid. Doing this on my last claim got me my documents back before my successful payout completed.

Within seven days my folks had received their documents back in the envelopes, and had received full payout cheques for the £150 per person or euro equivalent. I started to worry, because mine was taking longer.

First I received a letter to say 'we're busy with claims and we'll get back to you.'

Then, today, my heart sank as I opened the letter that told me that the small print in the policy wording states that the missed travel/delay compensation covers ONLY outbound legs of your journey.

In other words, as far as travel delay and missed departure are concerned, only half my journey is covered. By my calculation this means that in this respect, my one weeks journey that I paid travel insurance cover for was actually applicable for only seven hours between midnight on the day of departure, and the 7 am flight successfully taking off.

I'm at a complete loss. I can't deny that it's in their tiny print, the bit that trusting customers who read the front pages of their website don't delve through to make sure that the 'uk's number 1 online travel insurer' isn't ripping them off.

But it is found NOWHERE in their preliminary 'this is what compensation you'll be covered for with us' blurb that gets you signing up on your credit card on their website, before you actually really become aware of being sent to download a 'policy wording' booklet for your reference, and your insurance certificate.

So the freebie insurance with a crap bank account paid out successfully. InsureAndGo, premium travel insurance at a good price, took a weasel-way out of paying up.

I don't even know if I have any redress for this.

Any advice for me?

And my advice for everyone else is 'boycott Insure And Go, the 'half trip travel insurance specialists.'

Why not try and get some advice from your local trading standards officer? What happened to you does not seem to be right at all......

jap200

I have just spent ages hunting for my own thread on travel insurance covering Tesco Deals and could not find it whatever search terms I used. I have eventually found it simply by backtracking through all the threads, but I thought that it would be useful to put a link to it here as I keep seeing threads where people are asking questions about this.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=311303&highlight=travel-insurance-web

In summary - Travel-insurance-web does cover the value of Tesco Clubcard deals and/or Airmiles by re-instating them in the event of cancellation. They cover the full value unlike Tesco's own policy, which only covers up to £250 of Deals per person - a fact they keep well hidden!

Dan29

mrsa81 wrote:

I found a travel insurance company called Marcus Hearn & Company Limited, who are covering my wife and myself annual insurance worldwide for about £46. Martin has recommended Insurefor.com, which is about £60. I have checked both policies but didn't find any major difference. Does anyone know of any reasons why Marcus Hearn & Company Limited does not appear under Martin's recommendations.

Having just done a similar search, a company called Flexicover is £40 for a couple on an annual worldwide policy. TMSM is £45 and Marcus Hearn £45.90. Has anyone used any of these companies and had good or bad experiences please?

john.xs

has anyone used the primary insurance company in particular for a single trip european hol.im looking for insurance for my daughter.it seems cheap and the cover appears as good as the next companys.has anybody any dealings or can point me in right direction please!

RobertinHerts

Unlike many countries the UK Government won't cover its citizens for the consequences of terrorism when abroad only within the UK. However this is not mentioned on the Travel Insurance section of the FCO website. Following the information here and reading Moneysupermarket I can't see an Annual Policy that includes it. One policy summary does say it EXCLUDES it.

As a very rare event it shouldn't increase the cost of insurance by more than the odd pound (if that) but my existing broker, AA Insurance, won't offer it on the renewal. Surely the whole point of insurance is to cover rare events which cost more than the customer could cover themselves.

Why is no one talking about this serious omission?
Is it a lack of 'Customer demand'? And who does offer it?

Robert

saltydognl

Can anyone tell me why insurance cost for longstay 90 days and more are so much more expensive here in the uk than in europe. I have recently moved back to uk from Holland and as I was moving I went to Canada/USA for sixmonths and the quote I got from Uk was over 650 ponds so I went with a Dutch company and paid only 240 euros. Are we Brits beinf ripped off by the insurance companies?

saltydognl

Many thanks for your reply and even your backpaker insurance was more expensive than the 240 Euros that I paid for full blown insurance for the six months.
Its the same with breakdown insurance here in the UK the AA was going to charge me £56 for 5 days foreign (European) cover even tho i am a member paying over the £100 per year for the priveledge, because my car is 19 years old.
In holland I pay 160 Euros for the whole year wich includes travel in ALL european countries including the UK. 160 Euros is approx £110.

The British public is being ripped off.

cadboll

Hi!

I'm going on my honeymoon in August this year. I looking for the best travel insurance (and cheapest of course!). I know there are recommendations on the site - Insure For - for example, but I was curious to know if anyone has any advice they can offer? Any companies that you recommend?

I have a current account with A&L but they very cleverly changed their travel insurance policy to now only cover Europe!! The cruise is in the Western Caribbean, I understand I will need cover that includes Canada and America.

Thanks

saltydognl

Hi,
If you are only going for less than a month your insurance expense for this trip(Honeymoon) will be quite reasonable the costs only mount up when you want to go for more than 90 days. I sincerely hope you enjoy your cruise/Honeymoon. You should be able to arrange your cover for under the 50 pounds almost anywhere but suggest you first try your own bank, but please read the small print and if you dont like it try somewhere else.... Good luck.

Mike:j

saltydognl

Hi sorry I forgot to say that as you are going to the Carribean then yes you will need cover including the US, this does push the price up but for trips of less than a month you should get cover for less than 50 Pounds.

Mike:T