Holiday insurance not paying out

agatha1983

My boyfriend and I booked a holiday a few months ago now. We hadn't been away in years and could barely afford it but felt we needed to get away. A short time after booking the holiday I learnt that my father had only a couple of weeks to live. My dad has had kidney failure for over 15 years now and in more recent times has become frail. This was however unexpected. We cancelled the holiday to be by my dads side and he passed away on the day we would have left for our holiday. The insurance company has turned down our claim, reason being that my father had an illness when we booked our trip. I can not understand how anybody could be so thoughtless and insensitive. I have never claimed on insurance and can not understand how they can not pay out when our circumstances are so sad. Can they do this? Please can somebody help?

iamana1ias

agatha1983 wrote: »

My boyfriend and I booked a holiday a few months ago now. We hadn't been away in years and could barely afford it but felt we needed to get away. A short time after booking the holiday I learnt that my father had only a couple of weeks to live. My dad has had kidney failure for over 15 years now and in more recent times has become frail. This was however unexpected. We cancelled the holiday to be by my dads side and he passed away on the day we would have left for our holiday. The insurance company has turned down our claim, reason being that my father had an illness when we booked our trip. I can not understand how anybody could be so thoughtless and insensitive. I have never claimed on insurance and can not understand how they can not pay out when our circumstances are so sad. Can they do this? Please can somebody help?

Yes. Your father had a pre-existing condition.

Insurers are not charities. You agreed their policy terms.

vaio

it depends on what the terms & conditions say, can you post a link to the T&C or company

Generally I'd have thought a sudden and unexpected deterioration in a long standing condition would be covered. You say he had long standing renal problems, is that what he actually died from?

McKneff

It will all be in ther Terms and Condition which unfortunately, most of us dont read fully.

Its not thoughtless, and nothing to do with how many times you have claimed in the past.
Its business.

And I'm sorry you lost your dad so suddenly.

vikingaero

vaio wrote: »

it depends on what the terms & conditions say, can you post a link to the T&C or company

Generally I'd have thought a sudden and unexpected deterioration in a long standing condition would be covered. You say he had long standing renal problems, is that what he actually died from?

They would probably have covered the long standing condition if they had the chance to underwrite it.

Unfortunately it seems that the OP never read the T&Cs and never gave the Insurer a chance to offer or decline cover.

Doozergirl

That's so sad. I'm very sorry.

In the same situation as you, our travel insurance paid out. My mum suffered with MS for years and whilst she was affected very badly by it, her death was a shock suprise. There wasn't an issue with pre-existing but she died a week before we were due to go - I don't know if that made a difference?

Who is it with? My experience of one high street bank is they will do what they can to support you as a customer and try to do what is fair for you.

vaio

vikingaero wrote: »

They would probably have covered the long standing condition if they had the chance to underwrite it......

Is this the case?

vikingaero wrote: »

......Unfortunately it seems that the OP never read the T&Cs and never gave the Insurer a chance to offer or decline cover.

Whatever the details surely something as important as exclusion of pre-existing conditions should be one of the clear and unambiguous questions asked as part of the proposal process? Or at the very least communicted clearly to the proposer

dacouch

Actually Vaio is on the right tracks, there are a few Insurers that ask questions about the health of the travellers but not the immediate family even though the policy could potentially cover cancellation claims due to ill health / death of an immediate family member. The part about a sudden change in health for an existing condition is not necessarily a goer.

If the op could tell us who the Insurers are we could check the exact wording on existing health conditions and whether it asks about immediate family who are not travelling. It's a fairly long shot but worth looking into

dacouch

Please click spam on beemuu's post as they have inserted a link to help there own website

vaio

Done already…….

Another thought is to put their email address [EMAIL="info@quotezone.co.uk"]info@quotezone.co.uk[/EMAIL] where the web bots can find it and then hopefully some of the spam that I get will be diverted to them

jhorsfield30

I had to cancel a holiday due to a family member becoming ill due to heart problems, this was a ongoing condition, but I simply had a specialist write a letter stating the condition and that was that.