chris rowlands asked:

Taking out travel insurance before heading off for a holiday outside the UK should be an easy task. But how do you ensure that you get a good deal?

There are two key ways of doing so.

The first is always to shop around. Prices vary considerably between insurers and your personal circumstances can make a huge difference to the policy.

The second is to ask yourself how many times you intend to travel within a year. If you are certain you will only travel once, then cheap travel insurance can quite easily be found in the form of a single-trip policy for as little as £9.

If you intend to travel two or more times then this could prove to be expensive, especially for families.

This is where a multi-trip policy will come to your rescue. Many family policies cover not just the adult couple but several children. They can be found for as little as £23 for a single person and allow you to make several trips abroad during the year.

As you can imagine, if you intend to travel abroad three times a year and pay £9 each time, while a multi-trip comes in at around £23 per person, you’ve just saved £4.

This might sound like a small saving but as you start to increase the number of trips per year and the number of people travelling on one policy, the saving you make on your travel insurance becomes much bigger.

However, there is one crucial point to remember. While we all like to find the cheapest travel insurance before we go abroad, we shouldn’t lose sight of the reasons for buying the cover in the first place.

It can be easy to look only for the cheapest policy in an effort to save money, but the reality is you could be missing out on vital aspects of cover.

For example, you must remember to check a prospective holiday insurance policy to ensure all the features you require are covered. You should look to have cover in the following areas: cancellation, medical and emergency, baggage, theft and personal liability.

You should seek medical cover to the value of £1 million when travelling in Europe and £2 million in the USA. Hospital bills can escalate extremely quickly and it is not unheard of for tourists to be quite literally bankrupted.

Of course some of these options can be taken off the policy if you do not need them, such as baggage cover and cancellation, although I suggest you think carefully about this beforehand.

One tip that may be worth remembering is that some household insurance policies also offer cover for personal items that are taken out of the home. In turn, this means you may be able to do without the same cover on your travel insurance policy, making it slightly cheaper - but do check your home and contents terms and conditions first.

Finally, remember that all insurers base the cover they offer on what is called “utmost good faith”. This means that for them to pay out on a claim they must be satisfied you were completely honest with them when you took out the policy.

The two key areas where this applies is in previous medical conditions, which should be declared at the outset, or the insurer may not pay out. Also, don’t fall for the temptation to over-claim for a loss: adding a non-existent MP3 player or an iPod to the claim could render your policy void.

To recap on the main points: shop around to find the best prices, choose a policy type according to your travel frequency, be sure you have the level of cover you require and last but not least, remember to be honest with all details given.

Glen

tini_kitty_la asked:


I’m planning to go to Paris and several provinces of Spain. Should I get travel insurance? Any good suggestions on companies?

Melanie

search rankpros asked:

With summer around the corner and many people already planning their winter getaways for the holiday break, many individuals are stick searching for some form of travel insurance.

Unlike many other forms of insurance that are, in general, long term commitments that affect the traveler’s daily life, travel insurance is generally a short term insurance, being bought, used and canceled for the duration of an individual’s week to month long trip.

As such, while it is very important to have that kind of security when you go on trips, it is also something you only need for a short while, so incredibly high cost insurance is less useful. As such, one of the best ways to find that type of short term insurance is to buy travel insurance online.

Benefits of Finding Travel Insurance Online

There are several benefits of buying travel insurance online. For starters, this type of insurance is generally purchased at the last minute. There is often little time for paperwork or preparation, and knowing you are insured rather than leaving for your trip and finding out your insurance forms were not properly completed can be both stressful and dangerous.

When you get travel insurance online, you can fill out the forms and receive the confirmation right away, so you will know that you are insured before you leave for your trip, since the approval process can be almost immediate or in as little as 1 or 2 days.

In addition, if you are willing to get travel insurance online, you can purchase it right when you purchase your plane ticket. This will prevent procrastinating to find a company and the forms which may result in the individual or family forgetting to purchase the insurance before the trip.

One of the biggest benefits of travel insurance online, however, is actually due to the weakness of the insurance. Because people purchase travel insurance with a heightened sense of urgency (especially as the trip draws near), many less than reputable companies try to take advantage of that urgency by forcing ridiculously high rates or coverage with a great deal of fine print. This is true regardless of whether you get your  international medical insurance online or offline.

But travel insurance online allows you to compare coverage costs and plans far more easily, because it becomes a simply matter of clicking and comparing. You can view the plans of any number of companies, find out how trustworthy they are by searching for online reviews, and compare prices easily by filling out some basic information.

You also save time, because finding even one or two offline companies can take several hours, and quotes and approvals can take several days. If you are getting close to your trip or you are simply too busy to waste that much time on finding traveler’s insurance, it can be frustrating to wait for this process to play out, especially if you find out days or weeks later that the costs are too high or the coverage too weak.

Online Travel Insurance has several benefits that make it preferable over using offline businesses. It is easier to compare rates, signing up is instant, and you can far more easily spot the disreputable companies.

Franklin

Elleanor S asked:


hi,
Im originally from Zambia but currently in the uk on a work permit. I am planning on goin to spain next month, where can i get my travel insurance from? Most places i have looked at are for UK residents only!

Aaron

robthomas1710 asked:


Going to the Rugby World Cup semi final tomorrow. Does anyone know if I can get travel insurance to cover me for just 2 days? I need it cheap otherwise I won’t bother.

Pamela

Ron Mark asked:

Many people will ask if Travel Insurance is necessary or required at all. Like all types of insurance, Travel Insurance too requires a premium to be paid, and many families and individuals are averse to paying a premium for this insurance. Most families, couples, and individuals who travel at least once a year for annual holidays or several times a year on short trips of a few days, or even day trips, are unaware of the fact that opting for Cheap Travel Insurance is a safeguard and risk management against a loss during travel.

Many people who travel extensively for business, or travel writers who travel extensively, are aware of travel insurance and make appropriate arrangements for insurance, but the majority of citizens are unaware of the necessity for Travel Insurance, or just what it means. Travel Insurance basically covers medical expenses incurred during travel, insurance against financial losses such as nonrefundable pre-payments, and many other losses that a family or individual may incur while travelling, either within the country, or even internationally. This does not mean that a family or individual has to pay a heavy fee or premium for this insurance. There are Cheap Travel Insurance options available from many insurance firms, according to requirement.

The necessity and requirement for Travel Insurance is the same as for other types of insurance like Life Insurance, Car Insurance, Property insurance, etc. The basic principle of opting for insurance is safeguarding against loss. Take for instance Car Insurance; if your car is damaged due to an accident or floods, or any other reason covered in your car insurance policy, the insurance company pays for the repairs. The same principle applies for Travel Insurance. But the types of losses an individual or family could face while travelling is the most common question that arises.

There are many risks and situations where losses could be incurred while travelling and the most common risks are medical expenses incurred if an individual or family member is sick or injured during travel, emergency evacuation or repatriation due to conflicts in the country visited, overseas funeral expenses in case of death, accidental death, injury, or disablement benefits, cancellation of flights or other paid for transport, cancelled hotel bookings, etc. An individual or family can opt for Cheap Travel Insurance packages and select a package, which covers the risks that they think need to be covered, which in turn decides the premium to be paid for the insurance.

There are many insurance companies that offer numerous, comprehensive, Travel Insurance packages, but they also offer Cheap Travel Insurance packages according to client requirements, and every individual and family planning on a holiday or a short trip should make adequate arrangements for proper insurance. It is better to be cautious and safe with insurance, than to be sorry for not opting for insurance and having to bear a financial loss in case of cancellations, delays, medical emergencies, etc.

Gladys

Carys Robshaw asked:

Europ Assistance has been making strange demands of its customers before agreeing to pay out on travel insurance claims.

One woman experienced this first hand when she was rushed to hospital during her holiday with suspected thrombosis. There was no time to call her insurer beforehand, so she contacted them the following day.

She was told that the best thing to do was to pay for her treatment on the spot and then claim the money back from Europ Assistance upon her return to England.

As soon as she arrived home after a three day stay in hospital, she submitted a claim for £500 and sent it off with all the required documents, including a three page medical report.

Europ said that the claim would be settled within five days. However, after five days, she still had not heard anything from her insurer. After much delay, the company finally contacted her and said that they could only process the claim if she paid to have her medical report translated from Finnish into English.

“Nowhere in their policy was it mentioned that if I required medical attention abroad, the records must be translated into English at my own expense” said the shocked customer.

When asked company if this was usual company policy, Europ Assistance replied that they were unsure. All the spokesman could confirm was that “certain languages couldn’t be handled in-house, as the company use staff with foreign language skills rather than professional translators.”

“This case is frustrating because the doctor’s report needn’t have been written in Finnish had the client requested otherwise, but she didn’t so we found ourselves in a stalemate situation,” he continued.

Eventually, Europ Assistance paid the claim, but not without much deliberation and distress caused to their customer.

Brittany

ouleixia asked:


I am a Canadian citizen, I pay my taxes and my medical bills on time and I am still considered a resident of Canada. I have been in China for over a year and my previous insurance ran out - which didn’t matter because I am covered in China by the school I work for. Now I have to go to Ghana for a week. I’d like to buy travel insurance, but all the sites I’m finding say that you must be in Canada to buy the insurance. I can’t go home first! What should I do?

Maurice