When choosing a travel policy you need to be sure it’s the right one for the type of traveling you’ll be doing. If you plan to snorkel in the Caribbean but the policy doesn’t cover this activity, it’s worthless for you but if you plan only to do some sight seeing you won’t need anything special and a standard policy should be enough.
If you consider the cost of travel insurance against the cost which might arise from anything as minor as being hospitalized for indigestion in a Caribbean country where your national insurance doesn’t cover you, the benefits of being covered far outweigh the costs of buying travel insurance.
Where should I buy Travel Insurance from?
If you like to buy your vacation packages via a travel agent, chances are you’ve been told already to purchase travel insurance from them. By law, it is not necessary to make such purchase but travel insurance can get you out of a multitude of problems.
Since January 2005, the insurance industry falls under the regulation of the Financial Services Authority (FSA) which means they can take actions on behalf of the consumers. However, travel agents (and tour operators) don’t fall under this regulation so if you any complaint about travel insurance purchased from a travel agent or agency, FSA won’t be able to help.
So you should purchase travel insurance from big financial providers or banks. Many companies are specialized so if you are looking for a particular type of insurance, you’ve got loads of choices. Plus you can buy travel insurance from the Post Offices or even supermarkets (Tesco).
Stand alone policies?
Lately, many companies started to offer stand alone polices, which means they protect against a risk (or a class of risks). There are stand alone flight cancellation policies which protect you in case your flight is canceled and even if the airline goes bust.
When deciding to choose a stand alone policy you need to take into account if the other risks are covered. For example, if you travel to a European country, your national medical insurance is valid abroad (for emergencies) so you can choose a stand alone flight cancellation policy. And the hotels or hostels always have some sort of cancellation policy which means you don’t exactly need travel insurance for this.
On the other hand, if you buy a bulk package, you might need to insure your entire vacation, so in this case a stand alone policy is not recommended.
Choosing a company
There are many companies which specialize in certain types of travel insurance, while others offer the standard policies. Make sure to read the fine print and ask exactly what the insurance covers. A company might be excellent for your friend who goes to Mexico to do sight seeing but if you want to snorkel and it doesn’t cover this activity, it’s worthless for you. And in some cases you will need to buy additional policies to cover all risks.
Insuractive policies are available to all nationalities but don’t cover medical expenses and emergency evacuation. Policies don’t include travel assistance either. But they do cover flight accident and accidental death (and not terrorist acts). Good choice if you are visiting cities and not planning into engaging in dangerous sports.
International Medical Group is a company offering policies to all nationalities. It covers for up to $5 million (lifetime) medical expenses, emergency evacuation, accidental death, hazardous sports (including scuba diving) but doesn’t protect against flight accident or terrorist acts. Of course there are several policies available from the company.