pre-existing conditions/insurance/new change

[Luvmyrotti]

We use travelex and purchase the coverage through our travel agent within 21 days of booking and making our initial depost. This allows us to not be subject to the pre-existing exclusion. My husband has active cancer, that fortunately is very well controlled with infusion therapy every two weeks, but the insurance is a must for us. If for any reason we need to cancel before final payment, travelex allows the premium to be transferred to another booking, less an admisistrative fee, so we're not out much.

 

Best of luck to you in your cancer battle! My husband is living proof . . . three years ago they gave us six months. Here we are, still cruising and living our lives.

[whatcruiseisnext]

We have used Travel Guard for years....since 1999. They have always required purchase of the insurance within 15 days of the initial deposit of the cruise for pre-existing conditions. Your TA has been giving you wrong infortmation. It did not just start in February.

[Coral]

Each insurance company has hundreds of policies. So one Travel Guard policy from one agency can be entirely different then what is on their website or offered by another agency.

 

My agent sells Allianz which used to be Access America. They have a policy written specifically for their agency which allows for pre-existing conditions to be covered if purchased at final payment. Their policy also includes a business clause that if my employer doesn't let me go on the trip at the last minute, it is covered. Other Allianz policies require purchase within 14 days to cover pre-existing conditions. I love this policy as insurance was always a dilemma before for me.

[Bucky3]

Sandy, so very sorry to hear what you are going through and wish you well soon. You will beat this thing, and we're going to have a fabulous cruise together.

 

Thank you so much for sharing your insurance information with us.

 

I think buying insurance is the one thing I hate about traveling. I have done a lot of research and Travel Guard has become our choice precisely because we have not had to pay until final payment. Our Travel Guard policy says as long as you are fit to travel on the day you purchase the policy, you are covered when purchasing within 24 hours of FINAL cruise payment.

 

I have the Travel Guard brochure sitting right here in front of me for our just completed Hawaii cruise, but thanks to you for the heads up, as Monday morning I'll be calling Travel Guard to find out if their new "rules" apply to this particular policy for future cruise bookings.

 

As Coral posted above: [quote Each insurance company has hundreds of policies. So one Travel Guard policy from one agency can be entirely different then what is on their website or offered by another agency.

 

INSURANCE - IT'S COMPLICATED - TO SAY THE LEAST !!

[latebloomer56]

HI,

Sorry about your cancer diagnosis. It is so scary the not knowing but concentrate on the fight. Hope all goes well for you.

We went on the TA Venice to Fla. last Oct. I had chemo the day we flew out and the day after we returned. With my oncoligist's OK of course. I don't remember the trip over and couldn't taste any of the food, but we modified all or excursions and wouldn't have missed it for the world. My Dr. helped us time all my treatments so I had 5 full ones before the trip. So it can be done in some cases and all cases are different.

Wishing you the best, Laura

[clmom]

I will also add our recent (and still ongoing) experience with travel insurance. We bought our Travel Guard Insurance at final payment and wrapped in all our travel...airline flights, hotels, cancel for any reason (DH's work can sometimes interfere with our plans at the eleventh hour). We discovered a couple of weeks ago that the regional air carrier we were using from Copenhagen to visit relatives in western Denmark went bankrupt, leaving us with worthless tickets. Thank goodness my Danish cousins were on top of the news and alerted us so we didn't arrive at CPH with no idea that this had happened. I thought, "no problem" this is why we bought such a good travel insurance policy...WRONG. Once again, because we bought this policy after the 2 week "initial deposit" grace period, our bankrupt airline tickets are not covered. It was a good wake-up call to our TA as well as us....do not assume and always read the fine print. As I pointed out, people tend to put initial deposits on cruises to secure their favorite cabins/sailing dates but very rarely do you book your airline flights within those first couple of weeks. The pending resolution is we are working with our credit card company. We disputed the payment for the airline tickets and the charge has been temporarily removed while they investigate. I will say that Travel Guard has been quick to assist us with problems in the past and we will continue to buy our policies with them in the future. Once they established that our policy would not cover the issue, they were very helpful in suggesting alternative avenues to recoup our costs.

[BlueRed]

Our family is planning to go on vacation this coming winter season. We will be riding on cruise ship. I want to have a travel insurance for that specific travel only. Is that possible?

[Budget Queen]

Just thought I would pass this piece of information along to all of you. We always purchase insurance when we make our final payment. Right now we have five cruises booked outside of final payment. A week ago I found out I have cancer and since I don't know what my treatment will be or for how long, I decided to call my TA and tell her that there might be a chance I have to cancel some of them.

 

She told me that TravelGuard changed their policy on pre-existing conditions in February. Now, no pre-existing conditions will be covered unless you purchase the insurance within 2 weeks of booking the cruise. Our Tahiti one is ok since I booked that over a year ago and the Royal one is ok because I had just booked that one 12 days before so she purchased the insurance for that one. But my three for this fall were booked in March. At first we thought we could still purchase the insurance since I had not seen the ongologist yet but the next day she call me and said it wasn't worth risking the three cruises because they can check your medical history and will do everything they can not to pay.

 

Our other option is to purchase the Princess insurance. I won't get a refund but would get it returned in a credit.

 

So, just wanted to let all of you know about this change. The FCC's are great and we have ended up canceling a couple cruises in the past but now we will need to shell out insurance up front if it is a cruise you really don't want to cancel after final payment.

 

NOt sure if all companies are doing this - TravelGuard is the only one we have ever used.

 

With all those cruses, have you ever considered an anual policy??

[Underwatr]

Our family is planning to go on vacation this coming winter season. We will be riding on cruise ship. I want to have a travel insurance for that specific travel only. Is that possible?

Do you live in the United States? If so, yes. If not, I don't know.

[Bucky3]

Sandy, so very sorry to hear what you are going through and wish you well soon. You will beat this thing, and we're going to have a fabulous cruise together.

 

Thank you so much for sharing your insurance information with us.

 

As Coral posted above:

 

I called Travel Guard this Monday morning at 1-800-826-1300, and the agent I talked to said that the policy we buy has not changed. So, as long as we buy through the same TA as before, pre-existing conditions are covered when the policy is purchased within 24 hours of FINAL PAYMENT.

 

We are not interested in any policy that requires payment with the cruise booking deposit as we book long cruises now - sometimes 2 years in advance. At our age, we're not willing to speculate about what our health issues could be two years ahead of time!

 

This policy does not cover "cancel for any reason," but other than that we are very satisfied with the amounts/limits of the coverage, and the cost seems to be comparatively well priced.

[compozer]

Bucky,

 

That is good to know. I have a few irons in the fire for a while but I will talk to my TA. Thanks.

 

Sandy

[Caribensun]

First wishing you well Compozer and there is nothing better to beat this than having a cruise to look forward to-especially a "Princess" cruise. Hope you make it on all of them. I too, had my first treatment and then cruised, the worst cruise was after the 4th and last treatment, wish I could have put it off a month or two. Onc's seem to work around treatment, would rather you went. I think the warm air helps alot and they have the best food (healthy & lots of choice) to eat. I went in the winter months and wore a mask on the plane and just careful on the ship -a suite helps, fortunately did not get noro. Is Princess Platinum as good as Travelex?

Thanks, Seadeck2

[cruis247g]

With all those cruses, have you ever considered an anual policy??

 

Compozer: I wish you the very best.

 

Budget Queen: I'm sorry to sound so naive, but I've never heard of annual travel insurance. Do you know what companies carry it? Thank you.

[hansi]

Not sure how it works in the USA, but here in the UK you can buy an annual multi trip policy which is far cheaper than insuring every trip separately.

[jcarlisle]

This thread was good to get me to re-look at our own travel policy for our upcoming British Isles Cruise. We purchased a policy through Access America (now Allianz) at the time we booked our cruise a year ago. We did it specifically so we would be covered for any pre-existing conditions that might be a problem later, and also for anything that might be uncovered after we booked the trip but before we left. With that being said, I did just look at the policy and found that it was made for just the effective dates of our cruise. It was very easy to go onto their web-site and change the effective dates to allow for the extra days in front of and behind the cruise that we will be overseas. Just wanted to post this as a reminder to our fellow CC'ers to make sure you are covered for the entire time you are gone, not just the dates of your cruise.

[Dayenu]

To the OP and readers: this is not a change. They have this policy for the last 5 years, and I don't know how long before that: pre-existing conditions are covered only if insurance purchased within 2 weeks from the time of the first payment.

 

For example, if you booked your cruise on 05/05/10 and bought air on 03/01/12 you had to buy insurance 2 years in advance! Before 05/19/10.

 

There are other insurances, other terms like 21 days - it all depends on how much you are willing to pay. There are also "for any reason" cancellation.

 

You can go to InsureMyTrip website for comparison.

[compozer]

Thanks again for all the well wishes and it is great to hear that there are so many cancer survivors here. It is another reason why we all should enjoy life, be positive and cruise as much as possible because life is too short.

 

I do need to talk to my TA. I suppose I could have misunderstood about it just changing BUT it still is good to bring this up every once in a while. I need to ask about hotel and airfare. I like to book early - 2 years for our Tahiti one and our Royal is 1 1 /2 years out but you can't book airfare that far out so I need to find out if they will be covered or if you can add them on. I hate to have to pay so far ahead especially since we like to book suites so the insurance isn't cheap.

 

Take care everyone and as I tell my friends now, PLEASE tell your doctor about all your aches and pains even when they aren't that big of a deal - you never know - they may mean something and they could end up discovering something in the early stages.

[Underwatr]

For what it's worth - tonight while I was looking on InsureMyTrip for insurance for a newly-booked cruise I came across at least one policy that still provides pre-existing condition waiver if purchased up to the final payment date. The specific policy I saw with waiver to final payment was "CSA Custom Luxe."

 

Every policy I've purchased has provided a waiver within a couple of weeks of initial payment only, so it was surprising to come across this.

[KruzPrincess]

I know this thread is about non-Princess insurance and I have purchased CSA insurance at final payment for my last couple of cruises, but can anyone tell me if Princess covers pre-existing conditions. Do they still have their cancel for any reason insurance? I'm sure that costs a lot more.

[Budget Queen]

Compozer: I wish you the very best.

 

Budget Queen: I'm sorry to sound so naive, but I've never heard of annual travel insurance. Do you know what companies carry it? Thank you.

 

There are anual policies available through the insuremytrip site.

 

I travel at min. 12 weeks per year, this year will be 17. I never insure each trip and do plenty of non cruise travel.

[Bobbye]

Travel Guard has different policies for different agencies. So what one person has done with one agency will be different than another agency. In February some of the large agencies had their Travel Guard policies changed. Previously it covered pre-existing as long as paid by final, now it must be purchased within 14 days of deposit to cover pre-existing.

[caribill]

I know this thread is about non-Princess insurance and I have purchased CSA insurance at final payment for my last couple of cruises, but can anyone tell me if Princess covers pre-existing conditions. Do they still have their cancel for any reason insurance? I'm sure that costs a lot more.

 

You can read about the Princess insurance at http://www.princess.com/learn/faq_answer/pre_cruise/prepare.jsp#Princess_Vacation_Protection

[compozer]

Travel Guard has different policies for different agencies. So what one person has done with one agency will be different than another agency. In February some of the large agencies had their Travel Guard policies changed. Previously it covered pre-existing as long as paid by final, now it must be purchased within 14 days of deposit to cover pre-existing.

 

 

Then my TA must be part of that group. I've used Travel Guard for many other trips before I had this TA and booked them directly with the company - wonder if I still could get it included if I would book it myself.

 

I've been too busy with other things but want to check out an annual policy since so far we will be gone a total of nine weeks over the next year.

 

But that is just medical, right? So we still need some insurance for lost luggage, flight delays, etc. I think I better find the time to research it.

 

caribill, thanks for the link - will check it out