Travel Insurance

[AllisonJames]

The folks on this board are so well-traveled so I thought I would pose this question.  How do you all handle travel insurance?  We take several trips per year and always get a policy for each trip through insuremytrip.com.  I am wondering if we'd be better off with some type of annual/blanket travel insurance policy but I know nothing about those.  We are in our late 50's, have decent U.S. medical insurance, but mostly get the insurance to protect the high cost of the trip for interruption/cancellation and for medical evacuation coverage.  Would love some advice as it is getting kind of time-consuming and can be pricey to cover the individual trips.  We never get insurance with the cruise line as we think it's not a very good deal/or offers enough coverage.

[snowglobe]

Unfortunately, "annual" travel insurance policies usually carry a fairly low maximum insured amount per trip. Shop around and see if the coverage makes sense to your travel pattern & per trip spend.

[jelayne]

We have a Allianz annual plan and there are others available.   We found that they have policies with higher limits than the ones we saw on-line.  We purchase a annual policy for each of us with a 15k limit each.

We take 4-5  cruises a year and so far the total cost of 1 trip hasn’t exceed the 30k combined coverage.  We figure if we have to use the policy in any give year and use up our coverage we can always buy individual plans to cover the remaining trips.  The cost of our 2 annual plans are quite a bit  less than what we would pay to insure 2 trips each year 

 

[Lottie A]

I have just had to make use of my yearly travel insurance as I had to cancel my May 28th Pursuit cruise due to an emergency hospital admission last week. I am still in hospital so couldn't even catch the ship up later. 

My upper limit is £25,000 per claim but thankfully I am nowhere near that for the cruise I had to cancel. I have never claimed before. 

 

A very valuable lesson to me to always have good travel insurance. 

 

Edited May 29, 2019 by Lottie A

[Cruise Junky]

7 hours ago, snowglobe said:

Unfortunately, "annual" travel insurance policies usually carry a fairly low maximum insured amount per trip. Shop around and see if the coverage makes sense to your travel pattern & per trip spend.

You can up it.  We have friends who just got a $30,000 + payout from BCAA and they have annual coverage.  When you pick Annual vs Individual trip you can usually set your rates that you want it to cover. 

[LuAnn]

1 hour ago, Lottie A said:

I have just had to make use of my yearly travel insurance as I had to cancel my May 28th Pursuit cruise due to an emergency hospital admission last week. I am still in hospital so couldn't even catch the ship up later. 

My upper limit is £25,000 per claim but thankfully I am nowhere near that for the cruise I had to cancel. I have never claimed before. 

 

A very valuable lesson to me to always have good travel insurance. 

 

 

So sorry to hear this!! Hoping you are better soon. I know how much you were looking forward to it!! LuAnn

[pthjudy]

I know I will get some negative posts but I have had actual experience using the travel insurance that came free of cost with my no fee credit card. We had to cancel three seven day Caribbean cruises in January due to our SIL being diagnosed with cancer and needing surgery. We did get back about half from the cruise line since it was outside of 30 days. The remainder was easily reimbursed through the credit card coverage with a note from our SIL’s doctor and completion of a simple form. It was easy and fast and as long as the cruises were booked with the card, there was no problem. We do have evacuation with our Medicare advantage so medical is covered. 

 

[Bloodaxe]

6 hours ago, LuAnn said:

 

So sorry to hear this!! Hoping you are better soon. I know how much you were looking forward to it!! LuAnn

 

We would also like to wish you a speedy recovery Lottie,

 

Eric and Christine.

[Grandma Cruising]

We have annual travel insurance through our bank. We pay for it, but it’s considerably less than we would have to pay if we went to the same insurance company for the same insurance as we are both in our 70s. They cover all our medical conditions too.

It includes 6 free airport lounges a year as well.

[Werangels]

15 minutes ago, Host Grandma Cruising said:

We have annual travel insurance through our bank. We pay for it, but it’s considerably less than we would have to pay if we went to the same insurance company for the same insurance as we are both in our 70s. They cover all our medical conditions too.

It includes 6 free airport lounges a year as well.

 

We are the same.  It is free even with some medical conditions.  Interestingly, I now pay £60 per year extra for osteoporosis yet a far more serious condition goes free.....  It’s all about fitting into their boxes!  Unlimited lounges.

[Lottie A]

8 hours ago, LuAnn said:

 

So sorry to hear this!! Hoping you are better soon. I know how much you were looking forward to it!! LuAnn

Thanks LuAnn ....I was indeed looking forward to it but looking on the bright side, it would have been much worse for me if it had all happened abroad. 

There will be other cruises for me! 

[Lottie A]

1 hour ago, Bloodaxe said:

 

We would also like to wish you a speedy recovery Lottie,

 

Eric and Christine.

Thanks Eric ....if I can recover in time I may be on your cruise yet! 

[Croooser]

We have an annual policy for medical and evac from Geo Trekker Blue:

 

https://www.geobluetravelinsurance.com/mobile/trekker-essential-multi-trip.cfm

 

We use a Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card that provides cancellation insurance for covered reasons.

 

This combination gives us basic coverage for all of our trips at a total insurance cost of $235/year. Fortunately, we have not yet had a claim experience but consumer feedback is positive on both programs. Of course, each individual should evaluate their specific requirements.

 

HTH

[Ithikan]

19 hours ago, Lottie A said:

I have just had to make use of my yearly travel insurance as I had to cancel my May 28th Pursuit cruise due to an emergency hospital admission last week. I am still in hospital so couldn't even catch the ship up later. 

My upper limit is £25,000 per claim but thankfully I am nowhere near that for the cruise I had to cancel. I have never claimed before. 

 

A very valuable lesson to me to always have good travel insurance. 

 

Very sorry to learn about your unscheduled hospital stay, Lottie A!  And, how typical of you to share this info sideways, as it were, within your helpful response to someone on these boards.  Hope to hear you're up and about and planning your next cruise, soon.

[Lottie A]

45 minutes ago, Ithikan said:

Very sorry to learn about your unscheduled hospital stay, Lottie A!  And, how typical of you to share this info sideways, as it were, within your helpful response to someone on these boards.  Hope to hear you're up and about and planning your next cruise, soon.

Thank you Ithikan. I am looking at cruises on my IPhone from my hospital bed! 

[AllisonJames]

Thank you everyone for the advice . . . can you elaborate on "travel insurance through your bank"? It seems like that might be a UK opportunity because I have never heard of that in the U.S.

 

And get well soon Lottie!

[Grandma Cruising]

1 minute ago, AllisonJames said:

Thank you everyone for the advice . . . can you elaborate on "travel insurance through your bank"? It seems like that might be a UK opportunity because I have never heard of that in the U.S.

 

And get well soon Lottie!

Yes it is UK. I bank with Barclays in the UK. They offer various packages and we have the travel plus package which gives us travel insurance  (through a well regarded insurance company), 6 airport lounge passes and car breakdown insurance for both our cars. We pay £18.50 (about $23) a month.

[LuAnn]

13 hours ago, Lottie A said:

Thanks LuAnn ....I was indeed looking forward to it but looking on the bright side, it would have been much worse for me if it had all happened abroad. 

There will be other cruises for me! 

 

You're so right...better to be at home for sure!! I'm sure you'll be "on the high seas" in no time!!! LuAnn

[Riocca]

In Azamara’s U.K. terms and conditions they strongly recommend that guests have adequate travel insurance. P&O U.K. go further and having travel insurance with a minimum of £2M medical and repatriation cover, including helicopter evacuation, is a mandatory condition of booking. While Saga Cruises provides travel insurance as standard, although it can be removed for a small discount if you have your own. 

Like others we have travel insurance provided by our bank as part of the account, which fortunately provides sufficient cover for cruises as we don’t have any fees for this particular account.

 

Lottie - sorry to hear of your hospitalisation, we hope you make a speedy recovery.

[hiccups]

On 5/29/2019 at 6:04 PM, Lottie A said:

I have just had to make use of my yearly travel insurance as I had to cancel my May 28th Pursuit cruise due to an emergency hospital admission last week. I am still in hospital so couldn't even catch the ship up later. 

My upper limit is £25,000 per claim but thankfully I am nowhere near that for the cruise I had to cancel. I have never claimed before. 

 

A very valuable lesson to me to always have good travel insurance. 

 

Oh, no!  I hope you are on the road to a quick recovery and will be sailing again soon.

[hiccups]

On 5/30/2019 at 9:22 AM, Croooser said:

We have an annual policy for medical and evac from Geo Trekker Blue:

 

https://www.geobluetravelinsurance.com/mobile/trekker-essential-multi-trip.cfm

 

We use a Chase Sapphire Reserve credit card that provides cancellation insurance for covered reasons.

 

This combination gives us basic coverage for all of our trips at a total insurance cost of $235/year. Fortunately, we have not yet had a claim experience but consumer feedback is positive on both programs. Of course, each individual should evaluate their specific requirements.

 

HTH

Thanks for this information.  I have coverage through my job, and I think we have some with our credit card, so adding this might be a good option rather than spending $200-600 per trip as we've been doing.

[Lottie A]

2 hours ago, hiccups said:

Oh, no!  I hope you are on the road to a quick recovery and will be sailing again soon.

Thank you Hiccups. I hope to be discharged from hospital tomorrow, all being well.

I am already planning my next Azamara cruise. 😄

[Trend]

Lottie good for you looking at the positive side. Always better to be at home in familiar surroundings when ill.

Dream away it keeps the spirit up.

Speedy recovery.

 

[Lottie A]

5 minutes ago, Trend said:

Lottie good for you looking at the positive side. Always better to be at home in familiar surroundings when ill.

Dream away it keeps the spirit up.

Speedy recovery.

 

Thank you Trend. You are right and what helps even more is loving and caring family and friends to help me through it. 

[Benthayer Gonbak]

On 5/29/2019 at 11:06 AM, snowglobe said:

Unfortunately, "annual" travel insurance policies usually carry a fairly low maximum insured amount per trip. Shop around and see if the coverage makes sense to your travel pattern & per trip spend.

 

 

Thats pretty much what my TA told me.  And yes they had had one customer who had had to be evacuated from Europe to the US.  Because of his condition he could not fly commercial so his bill was $350,000.   Covered by an Allianz package.

 

I looked and couldn’t find something that would compete, for a year policy.  In January we collected for the second time on a cruise care policy.  The first time we needed to cancel within 90 days.  The heart surgeon didn’t think going to Mexico 4 weeks after bypass was a great idea.  The second, that I’m still filing was my MIL having a ruptured aneurism,  followed 24 hours later by a leg amputation.  Both were Caribbean Cruises so we opted to the cheaper of Allianz or CruiseCare  as repatriation was a much shorter trip.   For Europe and Asia we now make sure we are covered by the higher evacuation.  And yes or the Galapagos and Machu Picchu we also used the higher evacuation, I had a walker at the time and my knee had just been replaced the year before.