Travel insurance renewal and previous claim

JonathanB

Back in February my wife and I travelled to New York for a 3-night break. Onthe first morning my wife suddenly felt very ill with a racing heartbeat and we ended up at A&E. They kept her in from about 3pm until 6am the followingmorning, mostly monitoring her fast heart rate, giving her fluids and carrying out a blood test and a CT scan. We claimed on our travel insurance for this (although we didn't pay anything at the time - top tip, if in New York, go to NYU Medical Center!) and as far as we know everything was paid for with no issues.

On our return to the UK she went to her GP and had some followup checks - again blood tests with no diagnosis made.

At the beginning of May I renewed our annual insurance policy and at that time pointed out that we had an on-going claim. I was told that it was no issue for our renewal.

A few weeks later we booked a trip to Vietnam for the summer, not expecting her previous issue to present any problems. However a couple of weeks laterafter another blood test, her GP decided to refer her to a cardiologist withthe possibility of a diagnosis of something known as “PoTS”. As she hadn’t had any further problems like those in NY, we weren’t overly concerned.

A couple of weeks ago she had another episode like that in New York which ended in A&E again. At this point we felt that it wasn’t the greatest of plans to travel to Vietnam and I took steps to try and find out if we werecovered for a cancellation. My insurance company/broker referred me to their claims company who told me I need to speak to the underwriters who referred me back to the original company. In the end they have decided that we are not covered for an un-diagnosed medical condition as they feel we were aware of it before booking our trip, this seems fair enough I suppose, albeit a little annoying.The more annoying point is being told that at renewal time that the existing claim didn’t matter.

All in all, we’re prepared to cut our losses as I doubt there is any point in fighting – we were probably a bit daft to book the holiday in the first place.

Does the collected wisdom of the forum agree that we shouldn’t bother pursuing this any further? I guess the best I can hope for is a refund for my policy that started in May.

Moving on we’ve decided to stay in Europe and drive to France, so I’m looking to take out a new policy that will cover us (we do both have EHIC cardsas well). However, as the cardiologist appointment isn’t until we get back, andtherefore there is no official diagnosis, I’m wondering if we are likely to beable to get cover anyway.

dacouch

Do you have an annual multi trip policy?

If so could you give us the following dates.

Start date of annual travel policy.

Dates of the medical problems (Month & year will do)

Date you booked the Vietnam trip

JonathanB

New York trip and first medics issue: end of Feb
Annual policy renewed beginning of May
Vietnam trip booked a week or so later
Cardiologist referral a couple of weeks after that
A&E visit end of June which prompted cancellation

dacouch

Read this.

The medical problem being before the renewal may be an issue although I assume it was declared to them at the time of renewal.

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/49/annual-travel-insurance.htm

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/ombudsman-news/64/64-travel-insurance_cases.html

If you feel you have a case (Bear in mind the Ombudsman is very consumer friendly and has a habit of ruling on whats fair rather than what the policy says) then your path of action would be to make an "Official Complaint" which your Insurer must properly investigate and report back to you within 8 weeks. If you're not happy with their response you can then take the matter to the Ombudsman who is free to you but may cost the Insurer.

The Ombudsman is not quick so if you go down this route be prepared for a long long wait although the threat of the Ombudsman can influence Insurers decisions.

Keep your complaint polite, concise and try to avoid getting emotional, if the links I posted are relevant then refer to them in your complaint

JonathanB

Thanks for this. She was having tests (bloods mostly) from when we got back form NY through to after renewal of our policy in May. When we booked we didn't expect any issues but I suspect we were a bit silly to go ahead with it when things weren't resolved.