Travel Insurance Article Discussion

jumpingjackd

luci wrote: »

Try the Post Office.

I have used them a few times in past few years when children were travelling with friends or relatives.

RichardGB

Replying to Doc N and Bazzie

Having made a travel insurance claim, I can tell you what happens. You give the insurance company authority to get your medical records from your doctor. If your doctor has noted something, it's a pre-existing condition. If your doctor hasn't noted it down for any reason, it doesn't exist!
So, before you buy travel insurance, ask your doctor for a copy of your medical records. It may well cost you but maybe you can get a free copy if it's for you. I don't know about that. 'Medical records' might be only since your doctor started the computer records (i.e. the last few years) and nothing earlier. When buying travel insurance, you now know what you need to declare as pre-existing conditions.
You've now no problem if you have to make a claim because it's either accepted as a pre-existing condition or it never officially existed!
Doctors don't always note everything down. I made a claim and declared on the claim form something that happened between buying the policy and starting travel, but it wasn't shown on my medical records. This made for further complication. So, if you have to make a claim, ask for your latest medical records to go to you first before being released to to the travel insurer, then you know what to put on the claim form and what not to put there.
Another thing, if you are on a long stay, your medical bills might be significant (more than several hundred pounds) and you can be made fit to travel, most travel insurance policies allow the insurer to re-arrange your return flight for as soon as possible. Once they've flown you back to the UK, the travel insurance policy is at an end (make your own way from Gatwick to a hospital!). All the travel insurance company has to pay for is the cost of re-arranging your own flight back to the UK. Maybe not much more than £50.
Read the fine print (I do now) in the 14 days you can cancel without charge and know what you're buying.
Travel insurance companies' appeal procedures merely confirm that they have done right. Appealing to the ombudsman isn't much better. A junior deals with the matter and agrees with the travel insurance company. For the matter to be heard by a legally qualified ombudsman takes time - one year in my case and still waiting.
Look after yourself and don't expect much from a travel insurer. They're OK for a small claim and, perhaps, for a very big claim as well if you're seriously hospitalised and cannot be moved but for the middle of the road matters, you've got to watch out for yourself.

RichardGB

talk to the pre-existing medical screenign company when you try to arrange cover and see what they need. I suspect that you would do better if the stent had been in place for 12 months and no problem. Don't take a trip without full cover - costs if anything goes wrong will be horrendous and/or fatal. Delay your RTW trip until 2013 when you can be more sure your hubby will be OK and it shoudl be easier to get insurance. But watch out for age! As you get older, insurance becomes more expensive. Arrange your insurance shortly before the oldest birthday and it may cost less.

Poc

Hi
Ive booked a holiday cottage in Northumbria for 1 week's holiday in June. The company charge £28 for damages insurance to the property with a £100 excess. The policy doesn't cover cancellation insurance.

Anybody know a company which offers cancellation and damages to property insurance.

Grateful for any tips.

Shellden80

Hello

Just wondered if anyone can help with any travel insurance advice?

I'm due to go to Disneyland Paris next Tuesday but my daughter has got a terrible ear infection. I have travel insurance with my Bank, Yorkshire Bank.

Does anyone have any experience as to whether Travel Insurance would pay out for an ear infection. I've read lots of contradicting information on the internet about this and worried.

Any advice would really help.

The insurance through my bank is with Chartis

Thanks
Shelley x

linequeen

Can anyone please suggest a reputable insurance company that I could use to obtain travel insurance when we have a relative with a pre-exisiting condition that may mean we have to change our plans?

Our situation is this;

We are travelling to the US for a friends wedding next year however at present my partners mother is undergoing treatment for cancer and obviously we have no idea what the outcome may be and therefore there is a chance we will not be able to go to the wedding.

I understand that I will pay a higher premium as it is a pre-existing condition that we are aware of but I don't know which company would be best to obtain quotes from as most recommendations I have read in the forums refer to people travelling with a pre-exisiting condition rather than a relative of the person travelling.

Can anyone recommend a suitable insurance provider?

hybernia

So OK, we're not the brightest bulbs when it comes to insurance, but some of the T&Cs really defy belief. Currently, we're considering taking out a Debenhams travel policy, not sure whether to go for single or annual multi-trip, but either way, the 'Key Facts' says:

* you're NOT covered if you have to make a claim due to an illness arising in a person NOT included in the policy and whose illness is the result of a pre-existing condition; and:

* insurance cover begins in your 'home area', ends in your 'home area', and also covers trips in your 'home area' where you have booked accommodation for 2 nights or more.

Right then. Are we to take it that "home area" actually means the UK mainland? It surely can't mean that what we class as our "home area" -- within, say, 30 miles of where we live -- is the only place where we can enjoy a UK hotel break involving 2 or more nights accommodation.

As to the business of your insurance not, er, actually insuring you because someone else who, um, isn't insured on the policy falls ill, what on earth is one supposed to do to address that?

We have an older widowed sister with a health history; we also have a very elderly mother with a ditto history. Currently, both are exceedingly well though both are on permanent and continuing medication, i.e., warfarin to counter the threat of blood clotting. At a rough guess, I'd say around 1 million or maybe a lot more in the UK are on some kind of permanent medication, be it warfarin or statins or whatever.

We ourselves are, thankfully, as fit as fiddles, even though we're 65 (and only just qualify for the Debenham policy) -- but what are we supposed to do about elderly mother and sister?? Dig out their full medical histories? Supply all the details to an insurer who isn't even being asked to insure them???

Advice appreciated. Thanks.

luci

Re pre-existing conditions of those not travelling, but on whom the travel depends. You need to read each policy and search for Close Relatives under Medical.

Many companies won't cover if they have PEMC's, if they are on medication, if they have been an in-patient in the past 12 months, etc.

Direct Travel will cover "as long as there is no known reason why the trip may be cancelled". Now whether they regard a PEMC as a known reason is debatable.

https://www.eta.co.uk don't need the health of Close Relatives to be declared.

hybernia

Luci: thank you very much for that information. It certainly clarifies the situation where close relatives are concerned, though it actually has come as a shock to read it.

I don't know if there is a 'regulator' as such for the insurance industry but isn't it exactly this kind of thing which makes everyone so cynical about insurance anyway???

If I enter into a legally binding contract with a third party, I am surely entitled to know -- in large print -- the grounds on which that third party will be able to break the contract.

And I'm definitely entitled -- I would've thought -- to be told clearly and explicitly if that contract is at risk from the outset due to the health of a person or persons not even party to the contract.

Sincere thanks again, luci. As usual with insurance, I'm left fuming. :mad:

kirsty83_2

As a regular reader of money saving expert, I am all for shopping around but have come up with a problem re cheap travel insurance. My partner who is 40 had a heart attack at 36 but other than that is a healthy marathon running guy. I have just attempted to renew his medical special travel insurance, only to be told the law has changed and that they can only supply annual travel insurance to the family (me and the kids are on my policy). They refused to accept that he doesn't often travel with us (he works broad a lot and we are at home )

My query is is this correct. Does the law now state they have to insure the family or not at all? And if we already have cover that's just too bad?

Any help appreciated, and maybe a feature on specialist medical insurance as its really hard to find
Thanks