New to the insurance idea. Questions?

[Gert2011]

Wow, there are some knowledgeable people on here and I’ve read all the posts on this page over the last two days. Thanks for your input.

 

We have never had travel insurance before but am thinking we probably should on a Mediterranean cruise in mid June which we have to pay in full 3/20/12 from Costco. We are also going on a missions trip in UK when we get off the Epic and haven’t determined if we will ride a train from Barcelona to UK or fly. We will have insurance through our church for the missions part, 6/27 to 7/7 as that is mandatory, but I haven’t a clue on what it will cover.

 

We purchased our air fare on our own over to Spain and back to US through Delta with points for one of us and cash for the other. Our Delta flight is scheduled to arrive in Barcelona 8hours and 20minutes before the cruise is scheduled to leave. (9:40a.m. to 6:00 p.m.)

 

Both of us are young 53/49 and don’t have pre-existing conditions that I know of.

 

I guess I don’t want to miss our cruise with only eight hours of spare time flying half way around the world. (Less than eight hours I would suppose because you have to be on the boat before a certain time so maybe more like six hours)

 

My question is what costs do I put in for the amount? Just the cruise costs? Cruise and one air fare of half of one air fair? Unknown costs at this time for travel from Spain to UK?

 

The policy that Costco is pushing pays $2000pp for trip delay 5 or more consecutive hours and $2000pp for missed connection of 3 or more hours if I am reading the policy correctly. (Travel Guard - National Union Fire Insurance Company of Pittsburgh Pa)

 

I have until 3/21 (for pre-existing) I guess to get this all determined out and will be leaving in a few days for 5 weeks with a 14 day Hawaii Cruise (with no insurance probably) in the middle of that 5 weeks.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

[cruiseco]

Wow, there are some knowledgeable people on here and I’ve read all the posts on this page over the last two days. Thanks for your input.

 

We have never had travel insurance before but am thinking we probably should on a Mediterranean cruise in mid June which we have to pay in full 3/20/12 from Costco. We are also going on a missions trip in UK when we get off the Epic and haven’t determined if we will ride a train from Barcelona to UK or fly. We will have insurance through our church for the missions part, 6/27 to 7/7 as that is mandatory, but I haven’t a clue on what it will cover.

 

We purchased our air fare on our own over to Spain and back to US through Delta with points for one of us and cash for the other. Our Delta flight is scheduled to arrive in Barcelona 8hours and 20minutes before the cruise is scheduled to leave. (9:40a.m. to 6:00 p.m.)

 

Both of us are young 53/49 and don’t have pre-existing conditions that I know of.

 

I guess I don’t want to miss our cruise with only eight hours of spare time flying half way around the world. (Less than eight hours I would suppose because you have to be on the boat before a certain time so maybe more like six hours)

 

My question is what costs do I put in for the amount? Just the cruise costs? Cruise and one air fare of half of one air fair? Unknown costs at this time for travel from Spain to UK?

 

The policy that Costco is pushing pays $2000pp for trip delay 5 or more consecutive hours and $2000pp for missed connection of 3 or more hours if I am reading the policy correctly. (Travel Guard - National Union Fire Insurance Company of Pittsburgh Pa)

 

I have until 3/21 (for pre-existing) I guess to get this all determined out and will be leaving in a few days for 5 weeks with a 14 day Hawaii Cruise (with no insurance probably) in the middle of that 5 weeks.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

 

I'm not familiar with the Costco plan but usually with Travel Guard you put in each persons trip cost separately. For example:

 

1) Per person cost of cruise + airfare

2) Per person cost of cruise + taxes/booking fees for the FF miles ticket

 

Each of you would have your premium priced separately but they would probably show it as one lump sum.

 

Before you buy call the Travel Guard phone number for the Costco plan. For most Travel Guard plans, in order to be eligible for the pre-existing condition coverage you have to insure all of your non-refundable trip costs. Are the post-cruise air/rail costs insured on the missionary policy? If so, you need a clarification on is will they consider this all one trip (one departure from home, one return to home) or can you just insure the cruise and airfare. You don't want them denying a claim because you didn't include the after-cruise arrangements (air/rail) in your insured trip cost since it sounds like you might already be paying to insure them through the missionary plan. I think you're OK not insuring the mission portion of the trip but I'd make that call just to be sure.

 

If I mis-read your post and the post-cruise air/rail are NOT insured under the missionary policy you can add those arrangements to the Travel Guard policy when you make them. There may be a 15 day time frame to do this after buying the tickets so be sure to do it in that window. The folks at Travel guard will know.

[Gert2011]

Thanks for responding cruiseco, I was hoping you would after reading all of your other responses I've read the last two days.

 

The missions trip insurance won't start until I'm already in the UK I'm pretty sure.

 

I will call Travel Guard before talking to Costco as I'm sure I would get better info from them than from Costco since they are the source.

 

Am I good on the time part if they have the 5 hour trip delay?

 

Thanks again for posting your expertise!

[cruiseco]

 

Am I good on the time part if they have the 5 hour trip delay?

 

 

Double check with Travel Guard when you talk to them but you should be OK. Way more important is the missed connection benefit. That's the one that will get you to the next port of call and cover the cost of any days of the cruise you miss. You should be OK there too. With most TG plans there might be a $1000 travel delay benefit but they'll limit that to $150/day. Assuming that missing the ship only costs you one day of the trip that means your max benefit under the trip delay benefit is really only $150. The missed connection usually does not have that daily limit so missing the ship would be covered by the entire $2000 whether the amount of the cruise lost is one day or three or whatever. So definitely be sure that your planned connection times meet the requirements of the missed connection coverage.

[Gert2011]

Double check with Travel Guard when you talk to them but you should be OK. Way more important is the missed connection benefit. That's the one that will get you to the next port of call and cover the cost of any days of the cruise you miss. You should be OK there too. With most TG plans there might be a $1000 travel delay benefit but they'll limit that to $150/day. Assuming that missing the ship only costs you one day of the trip that means your max benefit under the trip delay benefit is really only $150. The missed connection usually does not have that daily limit so missing the ship would be covered by the entire $2000 whether the amount of the cruise lost is one day or three or whatever. So definitely be sure that your planned connection times meet the requirements of the missed connection coverage.

 

Thanks.

 

I wonder what would happen after you bought insurance and the air line changes the arrival time so it is closer?

 

We have had 4 changes on our air itenerary (sp) from Delta so far, but the arriving time has always stayed the same at 9:40. One of the changes only had us at 45 min lay over at SLC, but that has since changed to almost 3 hours so as of right now, nothing is tight.

[6rugrats]

Thanks.

 

I wonder what would happen after you bought insurance and the air line changes the arrival time so it is closer?

 

We have had 4 changes on our air itenerary (sp) from Delta so far, but the arriving time has always stayed the same at 9:40. One of the changes only had us at 45 min lay over at SLC, but that has since changed to almost 3 hours so as of right now, nothing is tight.

Then you research to see if you can find a flight on that airline that would work better for you, and you call them to request you be switched to that flight.