Cruise a Disaster, and a Complete Loss

[MotownVoice]

So, we booked 2 seven day back-to-backs on MSC Musica and MSC Splendida to take mom around the Western Mediterranean a couple times. She's 80 and never been anywhere further than across the bridge to Canada, and out to California to visit my brothers. This was to be epic.

 

Now let me begin by saying that this entire debacle was my fault. I mistakenly assumed that I couldn't fill out the trip insurance application until I had flight information. So I put that off until we finally were able to book our itinerary with Delta. And incase it isn't already clear ... you should not wait to buy trip insurance. Mea Culpa, this is where those of you who wish to point out all the times I have dissed travel agencies in the past explain that an agent would have caught this mistake. And you'd be right. But next time I'll know, and I will be back to encouraging people to book their own travel, just so's you know.

 

The thing with trip insurance, especially if you're older, is the issue with "pre-existings". The Affordable Care Act may have done away with health insurance companies not covering pre-existing conditions. But it didn't stop TRAVEL insurance companies from having caveats, and I guess I don't blame them. But if you want your P.E.'s to be covered then in most cases you need to request a policy within a very narrow period of time OF YOUR INITIAL CRUISE PAYMENT (not your final payment). I violated that rule when I waited. And when I finally caught my mistake, the policy covered practically none of the worst case scenarios making the policy cost prohibitive. My blowing it off at that point wasn't the mistake. The mistake had already been made when I waited. Because the disaster that followed was connected directly to a per-existing condition.

 

The day we arrived in Genoa was the afternoon before embarkation. The itinerary I had created began with the following:

 

Arrive in Genoa, leave all luggage in *Baggage Deposit at Principe Stazione and take train to Santa Margharita, bus to Portofino, and overnight at Albergo Nacionale (Cruise Critic won't let me spell nacionale correctly with a z). And the diversion to Portofino would have been awesome. A quick, less-than-an-hour transit to unwind, have dinner. Then an hour back to retrieve the luggage the next morning and make embarkation. But things went horribly wrong before we even crossed the Italian Alps.

 

(*Baggage Deposit at Principe Stazione, or as they refer to it on their website "left luggage", is an excellent choice for people wishing to arrive a day early and overnight at a nice local hotel. Flights are kind of odd when you need to fly in to your port city. The timetables are almost always really tight. Return flights are even worse. Same day departures often means you have an hour to get from the boat to the airport. So adding a day can really take off some stress. With Baggage Deposit you can do it without lugging your over-packed steamer trunks around with you. You can get up the next morning and just kind of saunter down to the dock at your leisure, since you have until 4pm (1600) or so to get on aboard. The deposit office is located DIRECTLY ON THE TRAIN PLATFORM at Principe. A small office with a single, casual, young operator takes your bags and piles them into a safe storage. You immediately notice how many other people had the same idea when you wait in line for 5 or 10 minutes. You pay when you come back with a simple structured pay scale. €5 the first 5 hours. Just €0.70 for hours 6-7. Then finally only €0.30 an hour after that. Over night our tab was €20 which is nice, and he even kindly stacked our 6 check in bags into 3 piles of two to keep the cost down. So highly recommended option for creative booking).

 

Anyway, we never made it to Portofino. Mom started to show signs of confusion during cabin pressure changes on descent into Paris. She was creating bizarre sentences that made no sense but acting as though I was an idiot for not understanding her. Something was terribly wrong. And we still had to get on that one hour Puddle Jumper flight from Paris to Genoa. By the time we got to the train station, she was completely incoherent. I ended up having to call an ambulance and sending her to Ospedale Galliera, where she stayed for nearly the entire two weeks we were to be asea. She actually recovered from the confusion 48 hours after admittance. But they needed to track down the cause, hence the extra days for tests and evaiuation. They never did find a cause for her dimentia-like episode. It was not a stroke, there were no ischemic lesions. They are baffled. And she seems fine now as we linger at Starhotel President, Genoa waiting for our return flight to roll around.

 

But here's where it went from bad to worse. That day we admitted her I had to make some tough choices, not knowing she'd recover in two days. I canceled the cruises, and for that matter my entire itinerary. And because I had no travel insurance, I lost all $15,000.00 I paid to MSC Cruises minus taxes which they refunded when I provided proof of hospitalization. I even lost my €400 deposit for the hotel in Portofino. So yes, those of you who insist upon using a travel agent and despise my constant railing against the uselessness of them will have a field day with this. And I leave you to it. You deserve it.

 

Now here's where I whine about Delta Airlines for a moment. When mom went to the hospital I immediately emailed Delta to appeal for anything they could offer to re-schedule our flight without making us take too much of a hit. I knew the losses were all my fault up to now, so I was trying to mitigate making it worse. The best they could offer was to waive the re-schedule fees which amounted to $250 per passenger ($750). All I needed was to provide a document on hospital letterhead with a doc's signature confirming the diagnosis, and if her condition fell within certain guidelines, they'd waive the fees. Well as it turns out her condition probably did not fall within their guidelines. But no matter. After I faxed the documents they requested they just started to ignore me. Phone calls, more emails, to no avail. With the phone calls, I fell into these horrid voicemail rabbit holes that you couldn't get out of without hanging up and re-dialing the number in the US. I finally figured out I could press zero and bypass that fortress Delta throws in front of customers who are in trouble and got through to a nice girl who explained she couldn't do a thing for me. "Unfortunately you requested assistance via email. My department doesn't even recognize your case number unless you activated it with a phone call. And there isn't even a number I can forward you to, where someone with web support can talk to you. All you can do is wait for someone to answer that email."

 

Bear in mind, they answered the first two emails within an hour or so. The original request for help, and my request to clarify what format the document must be (fax, PDF attachment, postal mail, in person). They replied to that email with a brief period also. But when I actually faxed the document they asked me for, they stopped communicating with me. I mean just TELL ME. Are you going to waive the fees or not, right?!

 

So. It couldn't have gone worse except if mom had died. Although we still have the trip home. After the poisenous pen email I just sent to Delta Corporate, there's still the matter of whether they try to show me how much more of a hell they can make my life for talking back to a powerful airline company. But at this point, I'm kind of numb to disaster.

 

Moral of the story. Buy travel insurance IMMEDIATELY when you've reserved a trip. Get pre-existing coverage, even if you think it's not likely. Insurance is designed purely as a bet against things that are not likely.

 

Use the baggage deposit option at Principe Stazione if you embark in Genoa. It's a great service if you want to add travel days before or after embarkation. And it's affordable when you consider what it would be like bringing everything to a hotel with you. They don't call it LUG-gage for nothing.

 

And finally ... consider flying with someone other than Delta.

 

Did I mention the 14 hour layover in Newark?

Edited June 29, 2014 by MotownVoice

[Katgoesonholiday]

Oh my goodness! You poor poor thing! What a horrible sickening nightmare. I am so sorry to hear what you have gone through. And I think it is incredibly generous and humble of you to post this so others can be aware and avoid the same complications.

 

My thoughts are with you and your mum. And I really hope Delta does the decent thing.

[Skipper Tim]

Sorry to hear of your catastrophic episode.

 

Obtaining affordable travel insurance for the over 70's with meaningful cover becomes an increasing challenge. My mother is 76 and I found the best deal for her was via her bank (actually a mutual building society), Nationwide in the UK. Their one perk used to be no foreign transaction fees on card use abroad and this is why she originally opened her account. This changed a few years a go to free travel insurance up to age 75. In her case this was a far more valuable benefit as i struggled to find a policy for her that was not a silly price. After her 75th, Nationwide wrote to her to offer to continue the insurance for a supplement, which was a fraction of the cost of anything else.

 

I hate insurance. As you say, it is placing a bet that something unlikely but unpleasant will happen. The insurance companies always win. When is the last time you heard about an insurance company going bust? They should from time to time if things were fair. No, the headlines are always about premiums having to go up because they had to pay out for something. I never buy insurance unless I am forced to by law - with the one exception of travel insurance because the personal consequences can be a lot more than monetary. They can be life or death.

 

I also share your loathing of travel agents. I don't know why they are still in business. I haven't used one in 20 years yet they still keep the costs of some things, e.g. cruises, 10% or so higher than they would otherwise be.

 

So, to add to your hard-earned advice, I would say have an annual travel insurance policy in place always. This covers your trip from the first element you book. I actually have two policies in place: 1) the cheapest possible annual travel policy that covers medical claims globally and nothing else; and 2) an extension to the household contents insurance (I added my name to it) which covers 'possessions temporarily removed from the home' globally. The latter has much more generous coverage of things like bikes, cameras, phones and computers - the things of value that I am most likely to claim for - than you can obtain at any price with travel insurance for a tiny add-on premium. I am not bothered about travel delay, missed connections etc. because I, like you, gauge the risks and allow sufficient time. If anything goes wrong, it is likely to be within the window i allowed and it will be clearly somebody else's fault - duty of care etc.

 

I hope the episode has not put you and especially your mother off travelling. There is a lot of World to see.

Edited June 29, 2014 by Skipper Tim

[moomoocow]

Motown I feel so badly for you. There but for the grace of god go I. My mother (who is in her late 70's and has lots of PE's) chooses to go on holiday without travel insurance and each time I constantly worry it will be the end of her.

 

I am really sorry for your horrible two weeks. Just because you failed to practice what you preach there is no need for anyone to have a told you so moment. And they won't.

 

My sympathies and thoughts are with you. If there is anything at all we can do to assist then please let us know.

 

 

 

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[AmoMondo]

I am so sorry to hear about his. It is a complete nightmare. It is also very laudable that you come on here and are so honest about the mistake you made with your insurance. I really do hope people take heed. Too often on here, people take a different slant on situations like this, blaming cruiselines and hotels for terrible customer service when they won't refund them.

 

I have an annual policy so I always have cover in place. My only PE is asthma and that is declared and I have to pay an add on to be covered. My ister has MS and she cannot get cover very easily at all, even excluding a claim related to MS. Seems like they think she is more likely to have a plane be delayed or an airline lose her baggage. People are living longer and many continue to travel, yet availability of travel insurance for the over 70s in this country, gives people a very difficult choice of takingnthe risk of travelling uninsured/not fully covered or not travelling at all.

 

I hope your mother is recovering well from the ordeal. That flight home must have been beyond nerve wracking for you all.

 

Thanks for sharing your experience.

[sidari]

MV ... I know we do not always see eye to eye but i was sorry to hear the troubles you encountered and i doubt anyone here would wish that kind of issue on anyone.

 

Luckily we both have Insurance with our banks but i do not know if this applies just in the UK.

[KirkNC]

Sorry to hear things went so poorly. Hope your mother recovers quickly.

[buggins0402]

It's a long shot but what CC did you make your trip payments on? The Chase United Explorer card has trip cancellation insurance included. There are some pre-existing limitations but they are not onerous - if there has been no changes in the condition for the previous 90 days and it had been controlled by medication PE's are covered.

 

Now that we have this CC, we're just buying a GeoBlue travel medical and making sure we charge the trip cost on the Chase card. Some other cards may have this benefit - but I know the Delta Amex isn't one of them.

[MotownVoice]

It's a long shot but what CC did you make your trip payments on? T...

 

Great thought. It was just my local credit union's Mastercard. So nothing particularly progressive there.

 

But you just brought up another excellent point to make, and that is to know the benefits of your debit or credit card inside and out, and how to make it work for you. That's not something that would have even occurred to me before this.

 

Thanks for all of the empathy. It was nice reading it.

[cruisetrail]

MotownVoice,

Sorry to hear that and thank you for sharing it with us.

Your information may be helpful for many.

Best wishes to your mom.

 

For those traveling with their parents.

Unless it's contraindicated, a low dose aspirin should be taken before flight.

Simple exercises, walking from time to time, adequate fluid intake during long-haul flights is very important. It facilitates blood circulation and prevents dehydration.

 

The likely scenario was: lower pressure in the cabin > less oxigen > TIA (Transient Ischemic Attack).

With the first symptoms of the problem flight attendant help is required - they must have portable oxigen tanks.

Edited June 29, 2014 by cruisetrail

[Skier52]

MotownVoice,

Sorry to hear that and thank you for sharing it with us.

Your information may be helpful for many.

Best wishes to your mom.

 

For those traveling with their parents.

Unless it's contraindicated, a low dose aspirin should be taken before flight.

Simple exercises, walking from time to time, adequate fluid intake during long-haul flights is very important. It facilitates blood circulation and prevents dehydration.

 

The likely scenario was: lower pressure in the cabin > less oxigen > TIA (Transient Ischemic Attack).

With the first symptoms of the problem flight attendant help is required - they must have portable oxigen tanks.

I'd be very careful about giving out medical advice on a forum, even if it is only to take a low dose asprin.

 

There could be severe consequences, for the adviser, if someone takes the advice and a mishap occurs, particularly if the person giving advice has no relevant medical qualifications. Even if they do have the relevant qualifications giving advice without any knowledge of the "patient(s)" is treading on dodgy ground

 

The advice about the physical aspects eg. exercises is sound and usually found in the aircraft's flight information booklets

Edited June 29, 2014 by Skier52

[Beamafar]

So sorry to read about your unfortunate experience - as someone who has travelled with elderly parents (all of my MSC cruises have been with Mam & Dad) I can, to some degree, imagine the trauma you must have been through.

 

On my recent Splendida cruise Mam became extremely ill (gallstones which had gone undetected for 5 years as they were in the liver ducts. She'd had her gall bladder removed almost 40 years ago as a result of a similar problem of non-detection) and Dad wasn't much better (we ended up pushing him about in a wheelchair he became so frail. Turned out he was suffering from heart failure as a result of a build-up of fluid in his body - he ended up in intensive care the day after we arrived home from our trip) so, while we didn't have to cancel the cruise as this all developed while we on board, I can still empathise with your plight.

[alexkrn46]

with difficult situations we have gone to the airport and talked to alive agent, in the old days you could go to a ticket office. Hopefully your mom is feeling better and thanks for your information,

 

Ps have you gone to delta twitter page or Facebook page?

[alexkrn46]

I'd be very careful about giving out medical advice on a forum, even if it is only to take a low dose asprin.

 

There could be severe consequences, for the adviser, if someone takes the advice and a mishap occurs, particularly if the person giving advice has no relevant medical qualifications. Even if they do have the relevant qualifications giving advice without any knowledge of the "patient(s)" is treading on dodgy ground

 

The advice about the physical aspects eg. exercises is sound and usually found in the aircraft's flight information booklets

 

We have the same rules here in the US, about giving medical advice, both my parents had life threatening reactions to low dose aspirin. Fluid management is tricky due heart failure, even walking on a plane for an elderly person could lead to a hip fracture, best advice comes from a physician

[Willow1686]

I'm really sorry to hear about your disaster, and thank you for biting the bullet in telling us about it to help others. I very much hope your wife has made a full recovery.

 

I have a yearly policy which covers pre-existing conditions, and it's certainly not cheap, but I'd be crazy not to have it; on the other hand my daughter is a medic so I get a lot of pre-travel advice from her.

 

I have anaphylactic reactions to aspirin, so she's pretty clear about that one, but she's happy for me to follow the plane advice on hydration, wandering about the plane, and wiggling my toes when I remember.

 

The downside is that she would cheerfully forbid me to travel if she was unhappy with it, even if a GP is happy for me to go...

[Willow1686]

We have the same rules here in the US, about giving medical advice, both my parents had life threatening reactions to low dose aspirin. Fluid management is tricky due heart failure, even walking on a plane for an elderly person could lead to a hip fracture, best advice comes from a physician

 

Though a physician knows very well that elderly people suffer hip fractures all day everyday with nary a ship in sight. I think there's a difference between common problems wherever you are and problems which are specific to the location..

[buggins0402]

Great thought. It was just my local credit union's Mastercard. So nothing particularly progressive there.

 

But you just brought up another excellent point to make, and that is to know the benefits of your debit or credit card inside and out, and how to make it work for you. That's not something that would have even occurred to me before this.

 

Thanks for all of the empathy. It was nice reading it.

 

Sorry to hear you won't have that avenue to make yourself whole financially. Knew it was a longshot, but given the Chase connection to the old NBD was hoping it might work.

 

As an aside to others, there an insurance board on CC. There are some insurance companies that will write policies at final payment - but the cost is a bit higher. I'm just someone that has read many threads on these matters, but by no means an expert. The insurance board does have some people chipping in who really know their stuff.

 

Hope your Mom gets back on her feet and can enjoy a nice Italian dinner before you return....or perhaps a trip to Portofino.

Edited June 30, 2014 by buggins0402

[American Bear]

So, we booked 2 seven day back-to-backs on MSC Musica and MSC Splendida to take mom around the Western Mediterranean a couple times. She's 80 and never been anywhere further than across the bridge to Canada, and out to California to visit my brothers. This was to be epic.

 

Now let me begin by saying that this entire debacle was my fault. I mistakenly assumed that I couldn't fill out the trip insurance application until I had flight information. So I put that off until we finally were able to book our itinerary with Delta. And incase it isn't already clear ... you should not wait to buy trip insurance. Mea Culpa, this is where those of you who wish to point out all the times I have dissed travel agencies in the past explain that an agent would have caught this mistake. And you'd be right. But next time I'll know, and I will be back to encouraging people to book their own travel, just so's you know.

 

The thing with trip insurance, especially if you're older, is the issue with "pre-existings". The Affordable Care Act may have done away with health insurance companies not covering pre-existing conditions. But it didn't stop TRAVEL insurance companies from having caveats, and I guess I don't blame them. But if you want your P.E.'s to be covered then in most cases you need to request a policy within a very narrow period of time OF YOUR INITIAL CRUISE PAYMENT (not your final payment). I violated that rule when I waited. And when I finally caught my mistake, the policy covered practically none of the worst case scenarios making the policy cost prohibitive. My blowing it off at that point wasn't the mistake. The mistake had already been made when I waited. Because the disaster that followed was connected directly to a per-existing condition.

 

The day we arrived in Genoa was the afternoon before embarkation. The itinerary I had created began with the following:

 

Arrive in Genoa, leave all luggage in *Baggage Deposit at Principe Stazione and take train to Santa Margharita, bus to Portofino, and overnight at Albergo Nacionale (Cruise Critic won't let me spell nacionale correctly with a z). And the diversion to Portofino would have been awesome. A quick, less-than-an-hour transit to unwind, have dinner. Then an hour back to retrieve the luggage the next morning and make embarkation. But things went horribly wrong before we even crossed the Italian Alps.

 

(*Baggage Deposit at Principe Stazione, or as they refer to it on their website "left luggage", is an excellent choice for people wishing to arrive a day early and overnight at a nice local hotel. Flights are kind of odd when you need to fly in to your port city. The timetables are almost always really tight. Return flights are even worse. Same day departures often means you have an hour to get from the boat to the airport. So adding a day can really take off some stress. With Baggage Deposit you can do it without lugging your over-packed steamer trunks around with you. You can get up the next morning and just kind of saunter down to the dock at your leisure, since you have until 4pm (1600) or so to get on aboard. The deposit office is located DIRECTLY ON THE TRAIN PLATFORM at Principe. A small office with a single, casual, young operator takes your bags and piles them into a safe storage. You immediately notice how many other people had the same idea when you wait in line for 5 or 10 minutes. You pay when you come back with a simple structured pay scale. €5 the first 5 hours. Just €0.70 for hours 6-7. Then finally only €0.30 an hour after that. Over night our tab was €20 which is nice, and he even kindly stacked our 6 check in bags into 3 piles of two to keep the cost down. So highly recommended option for creative booking).

 

Anyway, we never made it to Portofino. Mom started to show signs of confusion during cabin pressure changes on descent into Paris. She was creating bizarre sentences that made no sense but acting as though I was an idiot for not understanding her. Something was terribly wrong. And we still had to get on that one hour Puddle Jumper flight from Paris to Genoa. By the time we got to the train station, she was completely incoherent. I ended up having to call an ambulance and sending her to Ospedale Galliera, where she stayed for nearly the entire two weeks we were to be asea. She actually recovered from the confusion 48 hours after admittance. But they needed to track down the cause, hence the extra days for tests and evaiuation. They never did find a cause for her dimentia-like episode. It was not a stroke, there were no ischemic lesions. They are baffled. And she seems fine now as we linger at Starhotel President, Genoa waiting for our return flight to roll around.

 

But here's where it went from bad to worse. That day we admitted her I had to make some tough choices, not knowing she'd recover in two days. I canceled the cruises, and for that matter my entire itinerary. And because I had no travel insurance, I lost all $15,000.00 I paid to MSC Cruises minus taxes which they refunded when I provided proof of hospitalization. I even lost my €400 deposit for the hotel in Portofino. So yes, those of you who insist upon using a travel agent and despise my constant railing against the uselessness of them will have a field day with this. And I leave you to it. You deserve it.

 

Now here's where I whine about Delta Airlines for a moment. When mom went to the hospital I immediately emailed Delta to appeal for anything they could offer to re-schedule our flight without making us take too much of a hit. I knew the losses were all my fault up to now, so I was trying to mitigate making it worse. The best they could offer was to waive the re-schedule fees which amounted to $250 per passenger ($750). All I needed was to provide a document on hospital letterhead with a doc's signature confirming the diagnosis, and if her condition fell within certain guidelines, they'd waive the fees. Well as it turns out her condition probably did not fall within their guidelines. But no matter. After I faxed the documents they requested they just started to ignore me. Phone calls, more emails, to no avail. With the phone calls, I fell into these horrid voicemail rabbit holes that you couldn't get out of without hanging up and re-dialing the number in the US. I finally figured out I could press zero and bypass that fortress Delta throws in front of customers who are in trouble and got through to a nice girl who explained she couldn't do a thing for me. "Unfortunately you requested assistance via email. My department doesn't even recognize your case number unless you activated it with a phone call. And there isn't even a number I can forward you to, where someone with web support can talk to you. All you can do is wait for someone to answer that email."

 

Bear in mind, they answered the first two emails within an hour or so. The original request for help, and my request to clarify what format the document must be (fax, PDF attachment, postal mail, in person). They replied to that email with a brief period also. But when I actually faxed the document they asked me for, they stopped communicating with me. I mean just TELL ME. Are you going to waive the fees or not, right?!

 

So. It couldn't have gone worse except if mom had died. Although we still have the trip home. After the poisenous pen email I just sent to Delta Corporate, there's still the matter of whether they try to show me how much more of a hell they can make my life for talking back to a powerful airline company. But at this point, I'm kind of numb to disaster.

 

Moral of the story. Buy travel insurance IMMEDIATELY when you've reserved a trip. Get pre-existing coverage, even if you think it's not likely. Insurance is designed purely as a bet against things that are not likely.

 

Use the baggage deposit option at Principe Stazione if you embark in Genoa. It's a great service if you want to add travel days before or after embarkation. And it's affordable when you consider what it would be like bringing everything to a hotel with you. They don't call it LUG-gage for nothing.

 

And finally ... consider flying with someone other than Delta.

 

Did I mention the 14 hour layover in Newark?

 

 

 

First of all, we'd like to say that money can be replaced, lessons can be learned, but keep in mind that 'your trip ended well' as your mom is well!:)

Your 'moral of the story' is well thought!

We always buy insurance for any trip over $1500.!

Our recommendation, Its worth the money if you have children, or you are older! We are older, so we buy it!:)

[Willow1686]

And I apologise to your wife for confusing her with your mom :p My only excuse is that I was transfixed with horror...

[Linerguy]

MotownVoice,

Sorry to hear that and thank you for sharing it with us.

Your information may be helpful for many.

Best wishes to your mom.

 

For those traveling with their parents.

Unless it's contraindicated, a low dose aspirin should be taken before flight.

Simple exercises, walking from time to time, adequate fluid intake during long-haul flights is very important. It facilitates blood circulation and prevents dehydration.

 

The likely scenario was: lower pressure in the cabin > less oxigen > TIA (Transient Ischemic Attack).

With the first symptoms of the problem flight attendant help is required - they must have portable oxigen tanks.

 

This person is a self-proclaimed expert in everything.

 

To the OP...sorry to hear your plight, and am glad your mother is doing well.

[sparks1093]

OP, thanks for sharing and I am glad your Mom is okay. That's the main thing.

[Aussiegrlfl]

Oh my goodness that is so very horrible................having to worry about Mum in a foreign land is hard enough...........then losing your dream vacation is so sad............I hope it all will work out for you and your mum.......the best part is that she is ok..................and aside from the caution about advice from a possible non-professional.............a low dose Aspirin on a long distance flight is a great idea................hindsight is always 20/20.....

 

Hope you all bounce back well....and I'm kicking myself because I didn't buy insurance right up front....and then learned after in order to get the PE's you need to do it within several hours of booking........I wanted it in case my hubby has a problem with his diabetes.........oh well hopefully we won't have the same dilemma....but I won't wait next time.......

[ioneblair]

OP, you have my sincere admiration for posting this very costly travel loss....I know you know this but just to say it again, so glad your mom is well and better....that is of course the main thing....everything else you can get more of including lessons learned

 

we just were in Europe for a land trip, a week in Athens and a week in Paris and as soon as we landed in Paris our passports were stolen and my netbook damaged by the airline baggage system....just got back last night, called the main travel insurance company today and no coverage for passports but perhaps reimbursement for the computer....

 

I usually do not use travel agents but this trip was a mix....I used a travel agent for the transatlantic flights and one hotel and did the european flight and other hotels on my own....

 

I will be calling my CC company also since I used one that does offer travel insurance also which was a back up....

 

my financial loss of course if pittance with the magnitude of yours, please accept my thanks for the post and my commiseration for all you loss and experienced....better times and better travels ahead to you and your family :)

Edited July 10, 2014 by ioneblair

[MotownVoice]

Thank you for the kind replies. If someone avoids a mistake I made then this thread and the subsequent responses is worth a million bucks to me.