New Travel Insurance discussion area

FH_Brit

kathyg - deffinately yes it does sound too cheap - cruises have a reputation of being the most expensive premiums (as the cost of getting you to hospital should the need arrises can be astrnomical by either helicopter or duiverting the ship) as luci says above make sure not only that amount of medical but be sure it covers medical re-patriation.

FH_Brit

Further - I just tried World First and got near but not as low as you say but without cancelation and PEMC. I suggest you call them before you buy to make sure that all is covered.

ValerieB

Has anyone any thoughts on the insurance that Easyjet offer?

dacouch

Its an "Ok" policy not great and not poor, however if you take cover with Easyjet the Legal Expenses part of the policy excludes you claiming to sue Easy Jet for instance if you had an injury that was their fault.

Most tour type companies have a similar exclusion so I would alway recommend not taking cover out with your provider as you never know.

casca

I'm looking to buy travel insurance for a friend who's coming from South Africa to the UK and will be going to Ireland and France. Does anyone know of a UK insurance provider (that will accept my UK credit/debit card for payment) that will insure someone who's not UK resident?

Thanks!

moneysavingrob

I just bought a travel insurance policy with Columbusdirect as they are now including scheduled airline failure insurance (SAFI) in all their policies, single trip and annual, at no additional cost - so you're getting it for free (while it costs £5 with protectmyholiday). The cover would include a refund of the ticket cost should an airline be unable to fulfill its obligation to its passengers due to financial failure, prior to the them travelling or provides for the cost of a return ticket in the event that the insured passenger is outside the U.K. at the time of the financial failure occurring. It also covers Hotels, Car ferries etc so it suits me as a rarely book through a travel agent etc. It's also reassuring booking through a trusted brand with a call centre so I can complain if things go wrong.
well chuffed with this find!

THFC1882

hey guys!

I'm going interrailing around Europe in August and i'm currently trying to sort travel insurance. Most policies (cheap) seem to have a £100 excess. At most i'll be carrying 100 euro in cash and my rucksack with £360 rail card/passport/cards/clothes.

Is there any value in me paying for the removal of excess in the policy? This seems to drive the cost up to £45ish on most policies.

Also does anyone have any recommendations of a good policy for interrailing?

Thanks!

FH_Brit

moneysavingrob wrote: »

I just bought a travel insurance policy with Columbusdirect as they are now including scheduled airline failure insurance (SAFI) in all their policies, single trip and annual, at no additional cost - so you're getting it for free (while it costs £5 with protectmyholiday). The cover would include a refund of the ticket cost should an airline be unable to fulfill its obligation to its passengers due to financial failure, prior to the them travelling or provides for the cost of a return ticket in the event that the insured passenger is outside the U.K. at the time of the financial failure occurring. It also covers Hotels, Car ferries etc so it suits me as a rarely book through a travel agent etc. It's also reassuring booking through a trusted brand with a call centre so I can complain if things go wrong.
well chuffed with this find!

Rob - the biggest point that you mention is the airline financial failure part. BEWARE these policies normally only cover SHEDULED airlines, and normally not CHARTER flights (that many holiday flights are). If you are outside the UK when an airline fails, then if you booked through ABTA travel agent, or the airline is a member of IATA you won't normally be left stranded. Some of the biggest names in holiday flights are charter (Thompson, Thomas Cook etc) check policy or ask the insurance company (NOT your travel agent) to show you in the policy where cxharter and scheduled airline are covered.

With all due respect to protectmytrip, if they are charging £5 for airline failure - I suggest that this is a bit of a rip off - they know that Joe Public" will think his flight is covered when they know that in the case of a claim they will have a concrete clause not to cover your claim and therefore earning £5 extra because "Joe" don't know!

Columbus are a reputable and trustworthy co (as far as one can say regarding insurers) and I deal with them professionally.

See my other thread that has some useful Travel Insurance info:
Click Here for must-read information: Medical & Travel Insurance

donnawood

FH_Brit wrote: »

Rob - the biggest point that you mention is the airline financial failure part. BEWARE these policies normally only cover SHEDULED airlines, and normally not CHARTER flights (that many holiday flights are). If you are outside the UK when an airline fails, then if you booked through ABTA travel agent, or the airline is a member of IATA you won't normally be left stranded. Some of the biggest names in holiday flights are charter (Thompson, Thomas Cook etc) check policy or ask the insurance company (NOT your travel agent) to show you in the policy where cxharter and scheduled airline are covered.

With all due respect to protectmytrip, if they are charging £5 for airline failure - I suggest that this is a bit of a rip off - they know that Joe Public" will think his flight is covered when they know that in the case of a claim they will have a concrete clause not to cover your claim and therefore earning £5 extra because "Joe" don't know!

FH Brit

Sorry to point out but your totally wrong and mislead in your above comments.

You seem to be confused by package bonded holidays and non packaged bonded holidays. Chartered flights in the main 99% of them are chartered by tour operators who have to by law protect the consumers against financial failure of the package and those companies would be companies with an ATOL (i.e Thompson and Thomas Cook) so yes there is no need to cover them through airline failure insurance.
Just because you book through an ABTA agents or the airline is an IATA airline does not mean you are protected as you point out. In fact i can walk into an ABTA agent today and book a lufthansa flight who are an IATA airlines and if they went bust I would not be covered unless the ABTA agent had scheduled airline failure insurance.

Also you suggest "that many holiday flights are" charter - this is far from the truth, in fact there are very approximately some 12 million charter flights a year and the low cost carriers excluding all the other airlines that offer scheduled flights are some 100 million. Its these scheduled flights that are not covered, especially if you book direct with the airline and if you book through a travel agent you only covered if the travel agent or ATOL holder has taken out cover themselves.

On the protectmyholiday comments i do not understand the comment, does not make sense but one observation i made from Robs blog is that the cover provided on the Columbus Direct policy is Scheduled Airline Failure Insurance ONLY whereas the protectmyholiday covers not only the ailrine but all other parts of the holiday like hotel, car hire, excursions, train, ferry etc.

FH_Brit

Donna - Your opionion and of course you are entitled to it. I work within the medical/travel/insurance business and my comment about what is Chartered and Scheduled is the Civil Aviation Authority's view (they know better than you and I).

ABTA and IATA do offer SOME protection, no matter what you think. I would only say to Rob or anyone reading this, is;
a) Anyone can post here - there is no guarantee of correctness in ANY post.
b) Caution should be given to ANY and ALL information read here.
c) The best way is find out for yourself and use these posts as guidance only as to where to find out.
d) I have, and I am sure many others as well, had to deal with people who read on posts like this some missinformation and end up paying for someone else's error.

Donna - Please note that my posts are full of BEWARE, CAUTION, MAINLY, SOME, I SUGGEST etc. etc. that is because I never claim to know for certain (no one can, they do NOT know the poster's exact circumstances or even if the poster has worded their qestion right).