Travel insurance not valid due to illness

2hearts

Hi,
the short story is, we booked travel insurance with fit2travel for the family for a trip to the USA.

On the morning of the flight out (literally at the gate) my 16 year old son became ill, throwing up with a by of a temperature. As he was sick at the airport Virgin Atlantic said he couldn’t fly, but as the flight was boarding there was no time to get him checked by a doctor, nor were we aware that this was something that could be required.

According to the small print in our insurance if he was refused travel by the carrier for any reason, his insurance is now invalid and we can not claim for his replacement flights.

Is this right, or is there anything we can do? Irrespective of the small print it seems counter intuative to me that my son can not claim on insurance for being too sick to fly.

Any advice you could provide us with would be appreciated.

Thanks

dacouch

That is not correct if it's a medical reason.

Did you go to your Doctor asap and if so will the Dr provide a letter (If required) confirming your son was unfit to travel?

NB you have not given us much information, the Insurers may have said part of your family travel and the rest catch up at a later date if the illness was short term.

What was the illness?

How long before he was well again?

huckster

If you did not get your Son checked by Doctor to confirm illness, then you are in difficult position, as you then have no proof of this. All the Insurers know is that you say your Son was sick and the airline refused to let your Son on board. The reason for the sickness could have been anything.

You have done nothing wrong here and faced an impossible situation to deal with. Most people would not have known, what they had to do. Which is to get the Airlines groundstaff to provide documentation to show that your Son was refused on the flight because he had been physically sick and looked unwell. Then the next step is to see a Doctor/nurse as quickly as possible and some airports have medical staff. They could have done some basic checks and provided something in writing, which they may have charged for. You then have documentation for the Insurers to help with claiming.

2hearts

Our son began vomiting in the business class lounge about an hour before the flight so it was not possible to engage a doctor before the flight. However flight crew were not happy to board him (understandably).

He was driven home and visited the doctor the next morning. The doctor run a series of blood tests and cleared him for travel two days later saying it was a bug.

I’m sure the doctor would provide a letter.

uk1

I believe Fit2Travel is a part of the TIF operation. You might wish to search TIF group and it's claim handling history and search for news. Re-check it is part of TIF and then look at Trustpilot. If so they were reported by The Times for fraud and their "doctors" investigated by the BMA.

https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.tifgroup.co.uk

There are a few threads on this forum. Good luck.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5926543/holidaysafe-front-page-of-times-newspaper-20-nov

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4044379/holidaysafe-travel-insurance-your-feedback

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5929830

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5933800/how-to-find-a-non-tif-group-travel-insurer

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5926994/holidayrisks-com



Cached as the original that referred to TIF was deleted by the company probably due to adverse publicity .........

Our Products - Fit2Travel

https://www.fit2travel.co.uk/static/aboutus/our-products

Travel Insurance Facilities Group (TIF) was founded in August 1996. Operating from offices in Kent, TIF is a specialist travel insurance full lifecycle service ...

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ConMan

If your son was ill the day before, and the doctor said he couldn't fly, then presumably the insurer would pay. As such, I feel this is an unfair term they're relying on. Raise a complaint and go to the FOS if they reject it.