urgent help needed re insurance

prufrock

Hi there,

My girlfriend and are due to fly to Bangkok on Monday. We've been saving for aggges for this. Our plan was to hop over the border to Cambodia and spend our holiday there. We had out intinery planned out with hotels and also a cycle tour to take us from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh.

However, yesterday morning my girlfriend discovered she is pregnant!! :j:j

We are both very happy and somewhat suprised. We went to the Docs yesterday and the Doc said they couldn't provide any malaria tablets for her now she is pregnant and couldn't advise us to travel there because of the risk. the doctor said she would write a note to this effect for any insurance claim.

We spent last night emailing all the hotels and guest houses trying to cancel everything. Most were absolutely wonderful and cancelled without charge. we did lose some money though due to the short notice cancellation charges. the big loss though was the cycle tour who were not able to refund any of the money we paid.

Thankfully most of Thailand is OK to travel in without Malaria tablets so we are busy trying to build up a quick itinery for there. (albeit on a vastly reduced budget)

I spoke to Vigin Insurance this morning to ask what we needed to provide a claim. I was told there was nothing they could do as we were still going on holiday. In our insurance contract there is the following statement:

"If you become pregnant after we have sold you this policy,
and you will be more than 32 weeks pregnant at the start of,
or during, your trip. Or, your doctor advises that you are not
fit to travel because you are suffering from complications of
pregnancy or childbirth."

My argument is that this covers us because we are no longer fit to travel to Cambodia. Virgin are saying that because we can still go to Bangkok we are fit to travel and so not claim can be made.

Has anyone had a similar experience? Or can advise what, if anything, we can do next?

would really appreciate any thoughts you have!!

many thanks
pru

HXDave

i would agree that the insurance company are correct on this one, however someone else may have a different point of view. the fact is, you are both fit to travel, just not to the place you wanted to go to. this is in effect 'changing' the holiday, not cancelling.

what sort of cancellation charges are you looking at?

prufrock

hi dave,

thanks for replying. i thought with my head the insurance was correct but had all my fingers crossed that they might have been wrong.

we have paid the full amount of money for a cycle tour we had booked. unfortunately as the cycle tour company have already booked accomodation/meals etc for the tour they cannot offer a refund. the loss there is about £700. we also had a flight from phnom penh to bangkok at the end of our holiday through airasia. i am hopefull they will be able to refund part of the flight but i'm sure there will be some sort of a loss there.
i had a hotel booked in siem reap for 4 days through expedia. they will refund 3 of the days but the forth day is their cancellation charge. so thats another £45 loss.
One more hotel has hit us with a 50% charge for cancelling the room at short notice. the others have all kindly said they will refund 100% or will not charge for cancellation :)
i think thats it. but obviously a near £800 loss is difficult to overlook without exploring all the avenues for getting any of it back. especially as we will need to book hotels etc in Thailand.

usually i'd be mortified but i think the good news definately outweighs any financial loss in this case :)

Voyager2002

Congratulations!

As for insurance, I think you are on to a loser. Apart from other issues, will she be 32 weeks gone by Monday? Or could the threat of malaria be described as her "suffering from complications of pregnancy"? If not, it seems fairly clear that this risk is not insured following the wordking of the contract.

HXDave

Have the insurance company said they will cover you if you cancel the entire trip, as effectively your doctor has advised against travel (to this area). it may be that if the insurance was to cover the cost if you cancelled the entire trip, you might be better off doing that, and forgoing the trip altogether. The only thing i would advise though is if the insurance company will cover the cost of cancelling the whole trip, do not then go book something straight away and expect to be covered by another insurance company, as all insurance companies talk to each other especially when a claim starts, and you may find yourself uninsured.

peachyprice

Perhaps too late as you've already spoken to Virgin, but if you'd have cancelled the whole trip, got your money back, then re-booked for Bangkok you would probably have been covered.

Voyager, it's the fact that she can't take anti-malaria tablets now that will mean she can't travel to anywhere with a risk of malaria, which part of the booked holiday was, and should be covered. If they don't pay out for the cancellation and let her travel without taking the tablets they risk having to pay out huge a huge medical claim.

HXDave

Perhaps too late as you've already spoken to Virgin, but if you'd have cancelled the whole trip, got your money back, then re-booked for Bangkok you would probably have been covered.

not neccesarily, as effectively the new insurance company could argue that she was travelling against doctors advice. unfortunately, it is a very gray area, and one that can involve a risk.

prufrock

thanks again everyone for your advice and your congratulations!! the latest news is the doctor wants us to check what medical cover we would have with our insurance if we did go to just thailand. it could now be that if we wouldn't have the cover for any complications that may arise from my partners pregnancy we will have to not go altogether.

peachyprice

HXDave wrote: »

not neccesarily, as effectively the new insurance company could argue that she was travelling against doctors advice. unfortunately, it is a very gray area, and one that can involve a risk.

Hmm, not so sure, the doctor won't give malaria tablets now, but she should be able to safely travel anywhere in the world that doesn't require them (OP says they're not required for Bangkok) and still be able to get insurance to cover her.

richardw

The mother to be needs to consider where she would rather be if there were medical problems, even if fully insured, UK or Thailand?