11 February 2020
3 mins Read
1. No, you are not covered when you take unnecessary risks like running with bulls. And it could be argued being a spectator is taking unnecessary risks.
2. Drinking and taking drugs – yep, you are not covered.
3. Breaking the law – guess what? You are not covered.
4. Many domestic travellers think they do not need travel insurance – au contraire. There are so many instances where domestic travel cover helps. You are air-lifted from a remote location to hospital, leaving behind vehicles – travel insurance can assist with the cost of recovering the vehicles. You know the car insurance coverage that is exorbitant – well, travel insurance covers the excess and over time I have learned that if you have a hire car for three or more days, the travel insurance is worth it for car rental excess coverage alone.
5. Cancellation of flights due to bad weather is not covered by the airline so you will need to claim in on travel insurance. But make sure you get the cancellation in writing (saying it was due to bad weather). And, yes, you will need to book a room and pay for it and then claim it from the insurer.
6. A claim is not a ticket to a life of luxury. If you do need to book a room as in the example above don’t seek out the most expensive room in the city when you have actually been staying at flashpackers. The travel insurer will want evidence that this is the standard of travel you have been travelling at. Same for all dining and other related expenses you think you want to claim. It is not a ticket to excess on the insurer’s credit card.
7. Call the travel insurer as soon as humanely possible. The companies have great call centres that will be able to assist you and may have access to better information or contacts on any given situation than you do. A quick case study, my 18 year-old nephew almost wipes himself on a gap year in Cambodia. Wakes up in hospital 12 hours later, calls the travel insurer who has a western trained doctor who speaks English at his bedside in one hour. So have the travel insurance international calling number – very, very handy.
8. Travel insurers may be more effective than consular assistance. During natural disasters or political upheavals, travel insurance companies will have a team (okay, maybe one person dependent on the circumstances), dedicated to monitoring the situation and getting travellers out or giving assistance. They will also be great assistance in contacting your family members if necessary.
9. When the cruise and tour operators advise you to take out travel insurance they are not doing it for a bit of a laugh, they really want you to. Cancellations at the last minute for a personal issue which forfeits your deposit or entire payment is a real downer and the tour and cruise operators hate taking it from you… but they can’t afford not to. Everyone, and you more than the rest, would feel a lot better if you could claim it or a portion at least on travel insurance.
Also see Quentin’s Bullish lessons in travel insurance.
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This is a very good article with great reminders to travellers what is/isnt covered…but I think your use of the word “tricks” in the leading sentence “…….nine tricks of the travel insurance trade” makes it seem that the Insurers are out to get travellers , where in my experience (Im a travel agent) they generally are out to help travellers. Of course it is very hard to insure against stupidity!!
I loved your article on travel insurance and its pitfalls. My wife and I took out travel insurance over and above the travel insurance automatically provided by our credit card when we went on a planned 8 week trip in April and May. We managed to complete the initial cruise from Sydney to Seattle and then fly onto Anchorage where we were met with bad news – my wife’s mother had fallen ill and was not expected to live beyond the weekend. We contacted our travel insurer who advised us to take the next flight home and keep records of all costs. Unfortunately the trip back from Anchorage to Brisbane was longer than expected and Cathy’s mother had passed away some hours earlier.
We took some time to compile a detailed record of our planned trip and the costs incurred, and forgone because of this sad event. We negotiated with those travel companies we had booked through to achieve maximum refund possible to minimise our travel claim. When we submitted the travel claim, the insurer advised that they would not recognise the claim as Cathy’s mother was over 85 years of age. We have sought and obtained legal advice that this is discrimination on the basis of age, breaches both human rights and Australian Consumer law. We have requested the insurer review the case before we launch legal action and a major social media campaign, as this attitude towards older people severely disadvantages a growing group of travellers world-wide. The matter has also been taken up with Federal and State Tourism Ministers and their opposition counterparts. These politicians have undertaken to have their relevant departments investigate what can be done at a government level to stop such provisions.
Since alerting friends through our vast travel networks of this issue, we have been contacted by others who have suffered the same fate, and they have volunteered to join the campaign to have such an outrageous provision removed from travel insurance.
I’d be happy to hear from other travellers who have had similar experiences with travel insurance companies.
In reply to Peter Button
I too had my claim disallowed by QBE owing to my mother being over 85. We had pre-booked and paid to go to Queenstown NZ when my mother was diagnosed with late stage breast cancer and died a few weeks later. Unfortunately, we booked with an internet travel provider (Zuji) who was not forthcoming either in the refund department.
Its stressful enough having lost a loved one without this outrageous attitude to their fine print!
They are tricky though these same insurers UNDERSTAND your policy. I went to NZ for 6 weeks and a tooth badly absessed 3 days into my trip. Went to a dentist who did a root canal and temp filling and gave me a note for my QLD dentist. If I had completed my root canal in NZ would have been covered but as I was travelling around and the tooth had settled I left it for my return and paid about $800 to complete the treatment. Moral of story if you can complete treatment while covered by insurance do it as you are not covered from the time you return home.
Another catch I found when I reading the fine print of several policies: I was shocked to discover that I would only be covered for curtailing my domestic holiday on account of a sick parent if that parent lives in Australia. Having emigrated from the UK several years ago, my family is still back there. I find it odd that even though the insurance company would not be expected to fund my getting back to the UK, they would refuse to cover costs incurred on my Australian holiday.