Travel Insurance: Don’t cruise without it!

[cruisequeen4ever]

Thank you all! Yes, my family and I keep being grateful that this happened at home and not at sea or on a far away island.

 

 

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[Sammigar]

I was absolutely glad we had travel insurance coming back from our last cruise. It was a Sunday, and our flight kept being delayed as they hoped to get the power restored in the Atlanta airport. After numerous delays, our flight ended up being cancelled. When they made the announcement, they also stated that no one would be able to rebook a flight for any earlier than Tuesday. So we were stuck in Ft. Lauderdale for 2 days. Thank goodness we had travel insurance that included trip interruption as it covered the cost of our hotel, meals and car rental for those two days.

[elliair]

Travel Insurance and Travel Agents- lots of strong opinions on both sides of both issues. Definitely no one size fits all for either, of course

 

we're travel insurance, no travel agents

 

you?

 

and noone's opinion is going to change anyone elses':cool:

 

We're retired and have never been in the insurance business. I do believe in Murphy's law though. No one is exempt from anything screwing up your vacation.

[nini]

It appears that "Antsp" is stereotyping (those Americans).

[geoherb]

I have about 80 cruises under my belt. Let's say each cruise would have cost $500 to insure that's forty grand !!!!!!!!!!!! I've saved forty grand so I'll continue to self insure as long as I keep up my evacuation insurance which is an annual policy for 2 people at approx. $400 annually.

Our insurance has never been anywhere near $500. We did not pay that for the two of us for our last three cruises combined.

[neverbeenhere]

Our opinion is buy the evacuation coverage; we travel 12 -18 weeks a year.

 

Also, it is certainly not one of the best investments that anyone can make. It is insurance, calculated to cost you more than you will receive in benefits. Very few folks will ever collect any benefits from a policy. Better than a lottery ticket.

[jakey2004]

Our insurance has never been anywhere near $500. We did not pay that for the two of us for our last three cruises combined.

 

Agreed! I haven't even hit $500 in a suite.

[chisoxfan]

Great points on the need for having insurance. Unfortunately I believe many (excluding the informed pax who follow this board) do not understand the different types of insurance. Clearly medical and evac are critical but one also needs to be aware of policy limitations (some of the cruise line policies have woefully low caps for evac) and exclusions for injuries derived from what many might feel are 'typical' activities (various water sports).

 

Many credit cards do cover trip cancellation so this may not be a need and focus can be made on more critical medical and evac coverage.

 

After many years of cruising and buying different policies we have found that coverage through my employer medical and 'included' coverage of 100,000 evac and 12,000 trip cancellation through a CReserve card offer reasonable protection.

 

Happy Cruising and Holidays.

[Pickels]

For Sunsetbeachgal...

You say you had to cancel a cruise due to a health issue and received costs back from the insurance. Was this from the cruise line or your own travel insurance. If it was from your travel insurance, was it because your cruise line would not reimburse your cost?

[Arizona Cruz Chic]

OP...sorry you had to cancel, hope you are on the mend and feeling better.

 

We never cruise without travel insurance, used it 3 times, paid back every penny.

We both are on medicare, it does not cover you out of the USA, we buy insurance, peace of mind!!!

 

For those who say, Oh, I have great insurance and I will be covered, good for you, but, think again...what if you had to cancel a day or two prior because you fell and broke a leg, car accident, family emergency....glad you can afford to lose the cost of your cruise.

 

***

[sunsetbeachgal]

For Sunsetbeachgal...

 

 

 

 

 

You say you had to cancel a cruise due to a health issue and received costs back from the insurance. Was this from the cruise line or your own travel insurance. If it was from your travel insurance, was it because your cruise line would not reimburse your cost?

 

 

 

I purchased insurance via my travel agent and the policy was with Allianz. I canceled inside the cruise lines schedule for any reimbursement so I filed with Allianz. Of course since it was medical they required doctors statement that I was unable to travel during cruise dates.

 

 

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[lstone19]

For those who say, Oh, I have great insurance and I will be covered, good for you, but, think again...what if you had to cancel a day or two prior because you fell and broke a leg, car accident, family emergency....glad you can afford to lose the cost of your cruise.

 

That last line is really the point - can you afford to lose the cost of the travel. Different people will have different tolerances. I may be comfortable losing all of a $X trip while someone else is not. So one person's "right" answer is not right for someone else.

 

 

In the end, insurance is all about minimizing variance. Essentially, better to lose a small amount for certain (the insurance premium) rather risk losing a much larger amount although it is more likely you lose zero. As a result, and although it may seem paradoxical, the more you travel, the less likely it is for cancellation insurance to make sense. If you travel a lot (a lot being enough so that it is more likely than not that you will have to cancel a trip at some point) and have the expected rate of cancellations due to covered reasons, then you are likely to have paid more for the insurance than you benefit. In which case you would have been ahead by not insuring.

 

Example (and these are completely made up numbers and are not intended to be actual insurance premiums or claims rates): you take 10 $1000 trips. The travel insurance company expects 10% covered cancels and charges 12% of the cost ($120 for these $1000 trips) for insurance (they have to charge more than the likelihood of cancelling or they'll be losing money). And you find that just as they expected, you have to cancel one of the trips. If you take the insurance, you pay $10,000 for the ten trips, $1,200 for the insurance, and they refund $1,000 for the one cancel for a total outlay of $10,200 for the ten trips booked and nine taken. But if you go naked on the insurance, you just pay $10,000, no insurance cost, no refund for the cancelled trip for a total outlay of $10,000. You're $200 ahead despite having cancelled a trip with no refund.

 

 

Note that the above was primarily about cancellation insurance. While the same argument can be made for medical and evacuation insurance, there is much more variance as the risk is much larger although less likely to happen (at least something that will pay towards the upper end of the policy limit). Therefore fewer people are likely to be comfortable going without insurance for medical and evacuation.

[mbglib]

Great points on the need for having insurance. Unfortunately I believe many (excluding the informed pax who follow this board) do not understand the different types of insurance. Clearly medical and evac are critical but one also needs to be aware of policy limitations (some of the cruise line policies have woefully low caps for evac) and exclusions for injuries derived from what many might feel are 'typical' activities (various water sports).

 

Many credit cards do cover trip cancellation so this may not be a need and focus can be made on more critical medical and evac coverage.

 

After many years of cruising and buying different policies we have found that coverage through my employer medical and 'included' coverage of 100,000 evac and 12,000 trip cancellation through a CReserve card offer reasonable protection.

 

Happy Cruising and Holidays.

 

What is a CReserve card?

[lstone19]

What is a CReserve card?

 

 

 

I think he means Chase Sapphire Reserve (Reserve, not Prefered which does not have the same included protections) although the last I knew, cancellation coverage was limited to $10,000, not $12,000.

 

 

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[mbglib]

I think he means Chase Sapphire Reserve (Reserve, not Prefered which does not have the same included protections) although the last I knew, cancellation coverage was limited to $10,000, not $12,000.

 

 

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That is what I supposed. I have this card too, but the medical coverage is not enough in my opinion. The original poster did say he had medical coverage elsewhere. Thank you.

[mbglib]

There are two types of insurance for travel. One is for health and injury - which is what we carry as an annual policy for the reason that you state above. The other is for travel interruption - which is what the OP is referring to. We do not buy that one because we cruise soooo much that the cost for our 200+ cruises would be way more than the loss of one cruise. Of course, everybody has a different history and future, thus different choices to make regarding insurance.

 

Do you have a recommendation for an annual policy for health and injury? Thank you.

[chisoxfan]

That is what I supposed. I have this card too, but the medical coverage is not enough in my opinion. The original poster did say he had medical coverage elsewhere. Thank you.

 

Yes Chase Sapphire Reserve offers a 100k evac (sorry if not clear but was unsure of posting rules regarding this).

It is a 10,000 travel cancellation insurance but I not very focused on this since with frequent flier air and hotel we rarely come close to this amount on our cruises.

 

Medical was through my company and I learned they had evac as part of this also.

 

That said my point was that insurance was critical but sometimes adequate coverage is out there for no cost and also that cruisers need to be focused on what is important to them. ie a cruise policy might be very expensive and cover things like cancellation for any reason but be sorely deficient on coverage for medical or evacuation.

[mbglib]

Yes Chase Sapphire Reserve offers a 100k evac (sorry if not clear but was unsure of posting rules regarding this).

It is a 10,000 travel cancellation insurance but I not very focused on this since with frequent flier air and hotel we rarely come close to this amount on our cruises.

 

Medical was through my company and I learned they had evac as part of this also.

 

That said my point was that insurance was critical but sometimes adequate coverage is out there for no cost and also that cruisers need to be focused on what is important to them. ie a cruise policy might be very expensive and cover things like cancellation for any reason but be sorely deficient on coverage for medical or evacuation.

 

Thank you for the clarification. Do you know of any way to buy only medical insurance for the cruise or annually? All other aspects of the CSR seem satisfactory. Have you read that the evacuation must be coordinated by an agent of the insurance? I have looked more closely and have found this the case in almost all evacuation policies. Have you ever known anyone who was evacuated and how this worked? Thank you.

[lovevacadays]

Sorry to read you had to miss your cruise but it looks like you have a great attitude about it.

 

I used to cruise without insurance and then about five years ago I started always purchasing insurance. You just never know what might happen and just like any insurance we buy it is great for peace of mind.

[riclop]

DH and I were supposed to fly to Florida tonight for our favorite place to spend Christmas/New Years...at sea. Unfortunately life happened, and I ended up having emergency surgery and am unable to travel. Am I of the age many associate with the importance of getting travel insurance? Nope; I’m just in my 30s. It doesn’t matter how old or young you are, don’t cruise without travel insurance! I’m extremely sad that I won’t get to celebrate at sea this year, but thankfully I have the peace of knowing we will recoup our costs...and I’m still alive to cruise in the future!

 

Merry Christmas fellow cruisers! [emoji319]

 

 

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A very good idea, hope you are well.

[critterchick]

I only carry an anuual evacuation insurance policy which is where the costs are exorbitant if you're in need of a helicopter evacuation. The actual cost of the cruise is minor in comparision and i self insure or will "eat" the cost if i cancel during the penalty phase or miss the ship. I have about 80 cruises under my belt. Let's say each cruise would have cost $500 to insure that's forty grand !!!!!!!!!!!! I've saved forty grand so I'll continue to self insure as long as I keep up my evacuation insurance which is an annual policy for 2 people at approx. $400 annually.

 

Our insurance has never been anywhere near $500. We did not pay that for the two of us for our last three cruises combined.

 

We have seen prices of $59pp for a short cruise up to $6kpp per person to purchase a policy covering single trip. That last one was for Antarctica. We decided not to purchase a specific policy for that one (or for most of our cruises) because we have worldwide medical coverage thanks to DH's 23 years in the Navy, and used a credit card with decent insurance (including coverage for a sick pet) to pay for the trip. But not everybody has that.

 

I would estimate that we have saved about $30k over more than 100 cruises and countless domestic flights, land trips, etc. The one time we had an issue that caused us to miss our flights home from Zimbabwe, it wasn't covered by the travel insurance because it was a political event. So I'm not feeling the need to change our M.O.

[esper10]

Yes Chase Sapphire Reserve offers a 100k evac (sorry if not clear but was unsure of posting rules regarding this).

It is a 10,000 travel cancellation insurance but I not very focused on this since with frequent flier air and hotel we rarely come close to this amount on our cruises.

 

Medical was through my company and I learned they had evac as part of this also.

 

That said my point was that insurance was critical but sometimes adequate coverage is out there for no cost and also that cruisers need to be focused on what is important to them. ie a cruise policy might be very expensive and cover things like cancellation for any reason but be sorely deficient on coverage for medical or evacuation.

 

I have a chase sapphire credit card that provide insurance. I didn’t know that it also provides being picked up by helicopter for example. Glad to know that. We also buy sometimes the insurance that the ship carry but not sure if it is only for cancellation or inturaption also? Any one know? I once checked on medical insurance and it was SO EXPENSIVE. How do you managed to get medical insurance so inexpensive?

[chisoxfan]

Thank you for the clarification. Do you know of any way to buy only medical insurance for the cruise or annually? All other aspects of the CSR seem satisfactory. Have you read that the evacuation must be coordinated by an agent of the insurance? I have looked more closely and have found this the case in almost all evacuation policies. Have you ever known anyone who was evacuated and how this worked? Thank you.

 

I would suggest you visit insure my trip.com where you can find many competing types of policies along with their terms, I imagine that you could call them to answer your specific questions.

[lstone19]

I have a chase sapphire credit card that provide insurance. I didn’t know that it also provides being picked up by helicopter for example. Glad to know that. We also buy sometimes the insurance that the ship carry but not sure if it is only for cancellation or inturaption also? Any one know? I once checked on medical insurance and it was SO EXPENSIVE. How do you managed to get medical insurance so inexpensive?

 

 

 

There is Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Sapphire Preferred. I believe only Reserve includes the medical and evacuation coverage. It has a $450 per year annual fee (but your first $300 in travel charges per year are rebated so net $150). If your card does not have a $450 per year annual fee, you do not have Reserve and therefore, I think do not have the medical and evacuation coverages.

 

 

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[mbglib]

There is Chase Sapphire Reserve and Chase Sapphire Preferred. I believe only Reserve includes the medical and evacuation coverage. It has a $450 per year annual fee (but your first $300 in travel charges per year are rebated so net $150). If your card does not have a $450 per year annual fee, you do not have Reserve and therefore, I think do not have the medical and evacuation coverages.

 

 

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The Reserve only has $2500 in medical. :-(