Do I have to try to reclaim from credit card before claiming from travel insurance?

ernie-money

I have a Nationwide Flex Plus insurance claim, that's been going on since March. There's been loots of toing and froing - after being told that the claim was being paid, I have since been asked to resubmit most of the evidence, to prove that I did not in fact stay at any of the hotels we had booked in America, although I've provided confirmation of all cancellations and it clearly wasn't possible to travel there anyway. Now they are telling me to contact my credit card provider to try to reclaim all my losses from them instead, before they will consider my claim at all. I am slowly losing the will to live - I just don't understand why they have waited four months to tell me to contact my credit card company, shouldn't that have been the first thing they did? And why am I paying for travel insurance, if they are referring me back to the credit card company - do I really have to start trying to claim everything back from them now and wait for the outcome before I can get the claim with Nationwide reassessed..? 
Would be most grateful for some info or advice!

missile

Yes you do. I have credit card and insurance with NW. I booked using my NW credit card and they estimate 6-8 weeks before they process my charge back request.

Alan_Bowen

I am sorry to say that insurers are using every excuse in the book to avoid liability in the current environment, many will think hard before renewing existing contracts of insurance. If you used credit cards to book, you should make a claim for refunds, if you used a debit card and you were due to travel in March, you may be out of time as there is a deadline of 120 days, but the delay is entirely the fault of the insurers so they should indemnify you doe to their incompetence

ernie-money

Thanks for confirming. I guess that will add at least another few weeks to the processing time, I really am losing the will to live... just checking though, if I booked a non refundable hotel, parking etc, would the credit card company actually still be liable to repay, or is it a waste of time trying?

meduk1

I've been told the same by my NW insurance.  Like you had to wait about 2 months for them to get in touch after I submitted all of the evidence before they asked me to submit section 75 to credit card first and get in writing if they are unwilling to pay out.  Means I'm now about 4 months into a claim and just waiting for AMEX to get back to me - no SLA's on that though

missile

ernie-money said:

Thanks for confirming. I guess that will add at least another few weeks to the processing time, I really am losing the will to live... just checking though, if I booked a non refundable hotel, parking etc, would the credit card company actually still be liable to repay, or is it a waste of time trying?

Did you cancel? As far as I know, USA have not closed any hotels. You should first ask hotel to refund. It is not their responsibility you could not travel and thus will reject a charge back request from your CC. You should obtain written confirmation and present that as evidence to your insurer.
Presumably you are talking about parking at the airport in UK? Similarly airport car parks have not closed and you ought to contact them and then CC for a charge back I expect they will reject and similarly you will need to present this to claim on insurance.

missile

Many insurers make it hard to claim and I am sure this is deliberate as they know many will give up.
I have learned from experience that the cheapest is never the best.

sheramber

But the services are available.
You can park at the airport to go to countries that are open such as Ireland.   Those who are  travelling for essential purposes  can use the car parks.  The fact that someone is going to a country that will not them in is not the  responsibility of the car park.
 Similarly , if they could not travel  because they were ill the car park would have no responsibility  to refund them.

The hotel is open for guests so again there is no responsibility on them to refund unless a refundable booking had been made. 
Chargeback  is not insurance. It is  for services not provided. If the hotel and car  park are  open then  the service    is provided
If  an insurance policy covers being unable to travel due to FCO advice or other government intervention then that is where you would claim.

ernie-money

missile said

Did you cancel? As far as I know, USA have not closed any hotels. You should first ask hotel to refund. It is not their responsibility you could not travel and thus will reject a charge back request from your CC. You should obtain written confirmation and present that as evidence to your insurer.
Presumably you are talking about parking at the airport in UK? Similarly airport car parks have not closed and you ought to contact them and then CC for a charge back I expect they will reject and similarly you will need to present this to claim on insurance.

I had to cancel the bookings, as our flights were cancelled & hence we were unable to travel. I obtained refunds where possible and submitted an insurance claim for the amounts I could not get a refund for. I have provided the insurance company with written confirmation of cancellations from all providers, including the ones who wouldn’t issue refunds. I’m just wondering why they are asking me to claim via my credit card, when it’s me who requested the cancellation, due to not being able to get there - it doesn’t seem like the sort of scenario that would qualify for a claim, as the provider hasn’t broken their side of the contract? I guess I can still contact my credit card company and ask them to confirm in writing that I can’t claim through them, but it seems ridiculous & only serve the purpose of dragging the claim out even longer..?

ernie-money

sheramber said:

But the services are available.
You can park at the airport to go to countries that are open such as Ireland.   Those who are  travelling for essential purposes  can use the car parks.  The fact that someone is going to a country that will not them in is not the  responsibility of the car park.
 Similarly , if they could not travel  because they were ill the car park would have no responsibility  to refund them.

The hotel is open for guests so again there is no responsibility on them to refund unless a refundable booking had been made. 
Chargeback  is not insurance. It is  for services not provided. If the hotel and car  park are  open then  the service    is provided
If  an insurance policy covers being unable to travel due to FCO advice or other government intervention then that is where you would claim.

That is precisely what I thought, but 4 months after submitting my claim, I have been told that they will not consider any of my losses until I have attempted to claim from my card provider...

missile

ernie-money said:

I guess I can still contact my credit card company and ask them to confirm in writing that I can’t claim through them, but it seems ridiculous & only serve the purpose of dragging the claim out even longer..?

Spot on. They don't like to pay out and will spin it out as long as they can. That is exactly why they refuse to consider your claim until you have exhausted all other options.