Travling to portugal and looking for the best travel insurance option that would cover quarantine.

Tomlaw

Hey there,

We're off to Portugal in a few days. I'm a bit confused by travel insurance covers. Which travel insurance cover would you recommend and what happens if a family member gets Covid during the holiday? Would the insurance company cover a quarantine hotel?

sheramber

What cover you have depends on what cover you purchase and what the policy document says.

Some cover for covid, some don't. Some cover for FCO advice not to travel or governments closing borders. Some don't. 

You need to check thoroughly before you buy, that they cover you are buying is what you need.


 

Tomlaw

Thanks for your reply. I’ll phrase it differently. I don’t see any insurance that covers a quarantine hotel if a family member gets Covid in Portugal and I’m worried of this scenario. Can you point me to one that cover this please? 

Sandtree

Tomlaw said:

Thanks for your reply. I’ll phrase it differently. I don’t see any insurance that covers a quarantine hotel if a family member gets Covid in Portugal and I’m worried of this scenario. Can you point me to one that cover this please? 

Have you looked at Staysure? Not a recommendation but they offer a token per day just for self isolating and "will consider" extended stay subject to their Chief Medical officer - obviously not that reassuring given you may not have a personal medical reason not to travel but clearly a wider public health and legal consideration.

With Portugal I believe you just have to self isolate rather than go to a "quarantine hotel" 

Tomlaw

Thank you, I wonder what’s the protocol for hotels/insurance if a guest gets COVID over there or if you find out that you have it at the end of your visit and can’t fly back home for 10 days. 

lisyloo

Tomlaw said:

Thank you, I wonder what’s the protocol for hotels/insurance if a guest gets COVID over there or if you find out that you have it at the end of your visit and can’t fly back home for 10 days. 

If the hotel wants to keep you then they will (for a fee of course).
where it’s mandatory to isolate you might yourself in the hands of local authorities.
it will depend on local arrangements but they may have other guests booked in.

Tomlaw

Thank you for your answer. Which insurance company actually covers this is what I’m asking. 

Sandtree

Tomlaw said:

Thank you for your answer. Which insurance company actually covers this is what I’m asking. 

Not aware of any insurer going beyond what Staysure are offering... the "problem" is that you could do a self administered latflow test, claim it was positive and get an extra 10 days holiday for free with absolutely no evidence (results on lat flow tests only show for a short period, same as pregnancy tests). With many countries having self isolation for asymptomatic patients rather than government facilities all they'd be able to tell was you extended your stay by 10 days, not if you spent that in your room or by the pool etc.

As such there will be a discretional element so they can close the door on attempted fraud without a high hurdle to do so.

onashoestring

Which? did a review of travel insurance policies and Covid cover - as far as I could see even the best rated ones don’t provide reimbursement for quarantine. 

https://www.which.co.uk/news/2021/12/coronavirus-what-it-means-for-your-travel-insurance/

This is a potential cost to factor into holiday plans at the moment- just in case 

eganandchips1

I have looked for months on any travel insurance that covers hotel quarantine and the only 1 found was offered by HSBC but only open to HSBC customers. I am not sure to what extent as the wording "We'll help out" doesn't suggest they will pay the £1800 per person it costs for quarantine 

If the country or region I am in is added to the red list unexpectedly, will you cover hotel quarantine costs when I return to the UK?

Yes. We'll cover your hotel quarantine costs when you get back to the UK, as long as the country you travelled to was not on the red list or announced it would be moving to the red list, and there wasn't any FCDO advice against travel, when you left the UK or when the trip was booked.

If I’m advised to self-isolate while I’m outside the UK, am I covered?

Yes. As long as you didn’t travel against FCDO advice, you're covered.

We'll help out with emergency medical treatment and extra accommodation and travel costs if you need to stay longer than you expected (up to the limits outlined in your policy documents).

I have also tried to find insurance if you run into lockdown problems which is likely to happen shortly but cannot find anything on that either. 

Happy for anyone to help