I used some of the 10% off AARP Carnival gift cards to pay for our cruise. It didn't occur to me that this would violate the terms of many travel insurance policies till I happened to see a post that mentioned it after I had already done this. (For many policies, the terms dictate that the cruise must be paid for w/ cash or credit card.) Nationwide cruise coverage was the policy I preferred, but their terms didn't address this point. So I called Nationwide today. I was told that I would be covered if I could prove that I paid for the gift cards (receipt for the purchase from AARP + the credit card statement) , and that I used the cards to pay for the cruise (Carnival receipt). One additional point that I confirmed is that you use the total of cash that you actually paid for the cruise, not the total from Carnival in determining the cost basis - so if the cruise was $1000 & you used two $500 AARP gift cards to pay for it, you would only use the $900 that you actually paid for the gift cards in figuring out your total trip costs. Hth's!
Nationwide Travel Insurance and gift cards
in Cruise/Travel Insurance
Posted
I used some of the 10% off AARP Carnival gift cards to pay for our cruise. It didn't occur to me that this would violate the terms of many travel insurance policies till I happened to see a post that mentioned it after I had already done this. (For many policies, the terms dictate that the cruise must be paid for w/ cash or credit card.) Nationwide cruise coverage was the policy I preferred, but their terms didn't address this point. So I called Nationwide today. I was told that I would be covered if I could prove that I paid for the gift cards (receipt for the purchase from AARP + the credit card statement) , and that I used the cards to pay for the cruise (Carnival receipt). One additional point that I confirmed is that you use the total of cash that you actually paid for the cruise, not the total from Carnival in determining the cost basis - so if the cruise was $1000 & you used two $500 AARP gift cards to pay for it, you would only use the $900 that you actually paid for the gift cards in figuring out your total trip costs. Hth's!