Admiral Travel Insurance believe vouchers from Emirates is a form of refund?

Guy7452

My travel insurance with Admiral covers for FCO advice and I had the travel insurance in place before the FCO advice changed to 'all but essential travel' for flights departing on 21 March with Emirates. The wording is 'We will pay up to the policy limits shown in your policy schedule for irrecoverable costs'. The flight was not cancelled but I was forced to try to cancel following the FCO advice, acting responsibly. I received an email back from Emirates offering me vouchers/rebooking and Admiral believe this is classed as a 'refund' and a 'recoverable cost', so have said they won't pay out a refund to me. I haven't accepted the vouchers from Emirates yet. Are they correct on this that a voucher/rebooking is a recoverable loss?

The definition of recoverable losses in the policy is "Any losses or expenses that you can recover from elsewhere, or are more specifically insured by another insurance policy"

• I paid via credit card so could do a section 75 but fear they may have the same answer

Do I have a case here or should I take the vouchers? Emirates are state-owned by UAE so more protected form going under than some others.

Browntoa

It's a grey area .

Technically Emirates should fully refund within 14 days  . Instead they issued a voucher

Technically the travel insurance should pay out if you cannot claim back the cost but they argue that the vouchers are a refund.

Credit card companies are also taking the stance that the vouchers are a refund so they won't accept the claims.

payless

Flight not cancelled - means emirates don’t have to offer refund if ticket was non-refundable ( but like most are trying to be fair).  As such sect 75 is not a valid route.

I think insurers are being unfair - as many people can’t travel again. 

Nebulous2

It’s worth making a formal complaint to the insurer and if they still won’t move then refer it to the ombudsman. As they offer formal complaint mechanisms you are as well to use them. This has a long way to run and will be challenged robustly from some people. 

Life__Goes__On

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Guy7452 said:

• I paid via credit card so could do a section 75 but fear they may have the same answ

My thoughts on the matter
There is a route you could go down the credit card company, it might work it might not.
They legally they are correct, the flights flew so that is the contract fulfilled
BUT if you take it to the Ombudsman, their ruling takes into account what the law is and what is also "fair"  a court can't do that.
So they will look at  was it "fair"  for you to  fly while they was a travel ban.
Contract your credit card company , explain that you do not think it is "fair" for the reasons above even though it flew
If they refuse ask for a "Letter of Deadlock" that you will give to the Ombudsman
Feel free to come back for any further advice of this matter.
BTW this method is totally free

P.S.  you can try refunds though other routes just as long as you don't keep more than one payout.