When to book travel insurance

soolin

As above you Insure the holiday , it doesn’t actually mean the insurance doesn’t start until the day you leave.

So if you book now for December and have a policy just for that December holiday but something dreadful (but insured) occurs in October which means you could not travel in December  then the policy will cover you, as the holiday is insured. 

Could this simple misunderstanding be why people don’t book insurance as soon as they book the holiday? 

MATTR5

freelunchtoday said:

Thank you pollycat  .

My outlay has been minimal with bookings being cancellable. 

Whereas the insurance cover is considerable.

Some insurances (car) assess people's risk by when they book, I have 2 months to play with, so.............

You are best to buy insurance ASAYB but if in your case its all cancellable with no penalty then you really don't need to and you might have an advantage to wait - eg if something like work means you can't go then you won't have wasted money on an Insurance policy you no longer need

So in your case, you don't need to buy until you have to commit to the trip financially 
This is pretty rare (most people either have to pay deposits for package holidays or have to pay for eg flights up front) so this would not be my normal advice and anyone reading this needs to note the unique situation 

freelunchtoday

My question 'when to purchase' hasn't been unequivocally answered, so I have taken the view that there is no 'sweet spot' when it comes to travel insurance.

I've insured and after scouring comparison sites found 'moneysupermarket' most competitive for my circumstances.

One tip I picked up was to delete browsing history between searches, not proven to affect anything, but you never know....

If my premium halves 21 days before I travel, I'll be back  )) .  

Brie

I'm with the no hassle annual policy brigade.  That way I don't have to wade through all the medical conditions repeatedly.  And at £80 a year including RAC, international and domestic travel I think it's a good deal.  yes - packaged bank account but that's why I opened the account - not the other way around.  

onashoestring

Brie said:

I'm with the no hassle annual policy brigade.  That way I don't have to wade through all the medical conditions repeatedly.  And at £80 a year including RAC, international and domestic travel I think it's a good deal.  yes - packaged bank account but that's why I opened the account - not the other way around.  

This is good value - Which bank account is this ? Did you have to pay extra for the pre-existing medical conditions or just declare them ? 

zagfles

MATTR5 said:

freelunchtoday said:

Thank you pollycat  .

My outlay has been minimal with bookings being cancellable. 

Whereas the insurance cover is considerable.

Some insurances (car) assess people's risk by when they book, I have 2 months to play with, so.............

You are best to buy insurance ASAYB but if in your case its all cancellable with no penalty then you really don't need to and you might have an advantage to wait - eg if something like work means you can't go then you won't have wasted money on an Insurance policy you no longer need

So in your case, you don't need to buy until you have to commit to the trip financially 
This is pretty rare (most people either have to pay deposits for package holidays or have to pay for eg flights up front) so this would not be my normal advice and anyone reading this needs to note the unique situation 

I don't think it's that rare, if eg you've got budget airline flights for £10 each way and booked cancellable accomodation (or staying with friends/relatives etc), you might only have an upfront committment of £20, and losing that would likely be less than the cost of an insurance policy. Plus most travel insurance has an excess anyway so you might lose the £20 even if you have insurance. 

Buying ASAYB is good generic advice for the majority who buy packages or booked expensive/non cancellable flights/accomodation etc and commit several hundred or even thousand up front, but not for everyone.

DullGreyGuy

onashoestring said:

Brie said:

I'm with the no hassle annual policy brigade.  That way I don't have to wade through all the medical conditions repeatedly.  And at £80 a year including RAC, international and domestic travel I think it's a good deal.  yes - packaged bank account but that's why I opened the account - not the other way around.  

This is good value - Which bank account is this ? Did you have to pay extra for the pre-existing medical conditions or just declare them ? 

In most cases the pre-existing conditions will depend on the condition in the same way as a standalone policy.

With ours (Barclays) all of our conditions are covered with no additional premiums, though at one point they just flat excluded one condition. In principle they can apply a charge just happens ours arent one of them.

One of our credit cards also gives "free" travel insurance but with that one all pre-existing conditions are blanket excluded and no option to pay to have them included etc.