nationwide travel insurance warning

skiball

hi all
i have recently had a very stressful experience while attempting to make a curtailment claim.
i will try to be brief in relaying the details.
i noticed on the main site they say that there is free travel insurance for nationwide flexaccount customers.
i am such a customer and duly recieved a letter last year informing me of the free annual cover which was again repeated for this year.
to cut a long story short i went on holiday to spain on saturday 20th june for 2 weeks and all was fine.
6 days later i got a call from home with the news that my father had been taken ill so it was a case of dropping everything and getting the next flight home.
sadly 2 days later he passed away and it was a very difficult time for all the family as im sure you can all imagine.
about a week after the funeral i decided to call nationwide to instigate a curtailment claim - with a view to putting any money paid towards another break after what had happened.
i was put through to claims who were very unsympathetic and showed a complete lack of compassion which was bad enough but then when i recieved the letter from them, (uk insurance underwriters), detailling the required documents, there was a medical certificate and medical record release form to be completed by my fathers gp.
this made me angry as i thought it was intrusive, interrogatory and basically disrespectful to my fathers memory. i dont think it is reasonable to expect someone to go through the harrowing process of getting these forms filled in.
i complained to nationwide about this and they were sympathetic but could only pass the complaint on to the underwriters who were solely responsible for any claim.
with uk insurance i didnt get very far.
basically it turns out that it is part of the terms and conditons that evidence must be supplied of medical history of the person who is the reason for me making the claim. they are not content with just a death certificate. it is my opinion that this renders the policy useless to me.
they maintained that the terms of the policy cannot be altered.
i may have been a bit naive when i got the notification of the so called free cover and didnt recieve a policy booklet though im sure now in hindsight this is available on nationwides website.

i just want to warn other nationwide customers to check the policy with them and make sure they are happy with the potential cover.

i will be taking out my own insurance from now on, as i have done for years prior to naievly availing of the so called current account benefit, that way i can be confident of the lever of cover and hopefully the level of service.

im sorry for the long post but would welcome any thoughts on my situation.

Dunroamin

You are simply being asked to prove that your father didn't die of something which related to a pre existing condition - very few insurance companies would cover this situation if that were the case.

skiball

yes thats what they are saying but he had longstanding health conditions going back at least 10 years. in hindsight i dont think i should have taken any chances and not had any holidays in all that time.
before i went on holiday he was fine or i obviously would not have went.
it would seem that if anyone who takes out or has basic or generic insurance provided by their bank has to curtail their holiday due to the illness or death of an immediate familty member, then they must be prepared to go through a process of retrospective medical accountability in order to have the policy validated.
such a process could also be construed as an easy way for the insurer to avoid payment.

globetraveller

skiball
Sorry to hear your news. I think you might find that you are not covered as the policy states that they won't cover for a close relative who has been in hospital the last 12 months or been on the waiting list. Would that be the case? If not, then if you provide what they want then you should be covered. It might seem a bit callous of them but they have to ensure its not a fraudulent claim.

I think your post will highlight to everyone to read the T&Cs very carefully, even if its for free cover. ( Of course, you may well have done this)

Voyager2002

You would face exactly the same issue with any insurance that you bought yourself.

skiball

globetraveller wrote: »

skiball
Sorry to hear your news. I think you might find that you are not covered as the policy states that they won't cover for a close relative who has been in hospital the last 12 months or been on the waiting list. Would that be the case? If not, then if you provide what they want then you should be covered. It might seem a bit callous of them but they have to ensure its not a fraudulent claim.

I think your post will highlight to everyone to read the T&Cs very carefully, even if its for free cover. ( Of course, you may well have done this)

thanks gt
i think you are quite correct in what you say. i think with the ongoing health problems my dad had there would be a chance they could avoid payout by citing some of these. he has been hospitalised once or twice briefly in the last 12 months for minor ailments due to his age (87).
therefore it simply isnt worth it to go to the extent of getting the medical certificate completed only to have it declined on an easy way out.
i didnt get a policy document sent to me just a cover letter from nationwide but i am being led to believe this was available online?
even if i had read it i probably would not have been thinking so specifically as to consider i may need additional insurance to cover this eventuality as there was really no indication of what was to come before i left.

would it be safe to say to anyone who has this insurance:
"please check the policy wording carefully. if you have any close relative who has been hospitalised in the last 12 months you may need additional cover as this may invalidate any future curtaillment claim"?

skiball

Voyager2002 wrote: »

You would face exactly the same issue with any insurance that you bought yourself.

yes im beginning to understand that but the problem is that it isnt something that is immediately obvious when takng out insurance.

globetraveller

I found the T&Cs online. I would agree that it is probably not worth going through the grief and hassle of the paperwork only for them to turn it down, as you say he had been in hospital.
Your post will help highlight this to others who perhaps haven't thought about the conditions of a "free" policy, but also to those with a paid one.

luci

The T&Cs have been on the Nationwide website since the free travel insurance was introduced about 3 years ago. You can also call up UK Insurance who will send you a policy booklet if you ask.

I did read the policy when it started and am aware of the clause which doesn't cover Close Relatives who have been in hospital in the past 12 months. For that reason I buy another annual policy every year which does cover the health of Close Relatives.

It is standard practise to request access to medical records in the event of an insurance claim. All companies do it, but just UK Insurance.