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Do you buy travel insurance?
We're taking a cruise at the end of the year and did purchase travel insurance- not comprehensive but for MedEvac (which covers medical expenses, medevac, and dental emergencies).
Next year we are planning to take a trip and I'm wondering if we should get a more comprehensive insurance plan. For larger trips, we typically book 8-12 months in advance doing research 12-14 months before said trip.
1. Do you purchase travel insurance for every non-US vacation?
2. What type of plan do you pick?
3. Have you ever had to "cash in" on your travel insurance?
4. I know there are some travel plans for lost luggage, but I've read on here that some CC companies (if you use it for booking travel) will cover these expenses... is this true? What other items/services will a CC cover (so you don't "double book" by booking it through the travel insurance?)
Re: Do you buy travel insurance?
We bought it for both of our Mexico vacations, but never had to use it. On the other hand, good friends of ours found it came very handy, as a freak hurricane hit Mexico just when they were supposed to go and they got their entire trip paid back to them since they were unable to go. All of those instances were bought through Apple Vacations since that is who we booked through.
We just booked travel insurance ourselves for our upcoming trip to Italy because I appreciate the peace of mind. I checked with our credit card and they only include a policy that protects in the case of death or dismemberment up to 100,000 per person. I wanted something that would cover natural disasters, if our airline goes under, lost baggage, sickness, death, terrorism, etc.
Someone on here recommended this website: http://www.insuremytrip.com/index.html?linkId=13136. I got on there and ended up comparing a couple different companies and picked the one that fit our needs best.
Although all companies have some good reviews and bad reviews, I ended up choosing IMG due to a friend's recommendation. She used it just fine- crazy story actually. Her and a friend went to China. These huge stone dragon statue fell on her travel partner when he was getting his picture taken standing by it and basically crushed him. He was in the hospital in China for many weeks and the insurance helped him significantly. This is why I chose this one!
I usually buy some form of insurance, just to guarantee my trip won't implode. But then again, Murphy rules my world ;-)
I bought serious insurance once. It covered cancellations for any reason. I was meeting H in Port Said Egypt, but he had to sail up through the Gulf of Aden and the Somali pirates to get to Egypt.
1. No. I actually never have.
2. n/a
3. I've never had a reason to use it and regretted not having it, if that answers the question. So far I've taken 3 international trips.
4. I know less about that.
I always just buy medevac coverage. I don't bother with cancellation because I rarely book trips more than a few weeks in advance.
I would never leave the US without medevac coverage--whether it comes from my employer or I purchase it myself. No one thinks they are going to have a freak accident on vacation, but it happens and being stuck with a $250,000 bill is not something most people can easily handle.
I almost always buy trip insurance and I search for a plan that meets the needs of our current trip. When we're traveling to an island to get out of Ohio during the winter I look for a policy that covers weather-related cancellations and delays. When we went to Peru for an active vacation I got a policy that had a lot of medvac coverage because there was a real chance that we could be injured while in the Andes and need flown out. For our upcoming trip to Europe this April I got 'Cancel for any reason' coverage because I'm going with my two sisters and figured our work schedules interfering with the trip was a possibility. I have never had to use trip insurance but it is inexpensive enough that the peace of mind it provides is worth it to me.
An American Girl's Travels
1. Do you purchase travel insurance for every non-US vacation? Yes, and even for some domestic trips.
2. What type of plan do you pick? One that covers whatever we feel we need. For example, we're going to Peru this year and got a plan which covers flight cancellations/delays, hotel cancellations/closures, any potential medical expenses, natural disasters, strikes, etc.
3. Have you ever had to "cash in" on your travel insurance? Not in that we got cash, but we did have TravelGuard handle rebooking our flights after our first leg of a trip got cancelled out of the blue. They did a great job!
4. I know there are some travel plans for lost luggage, but I've read on here that some CC companies (if you use it for booking travel) will cover these expenses... is this true? What other items/services will a CC cover (so you don't "double book" by booking it through the travel insurance?) I'm not sure... I'd call as ask your CC company.
Depends on the trip. I always buy health insurance, because you NEVER know when you could be in a car accident, fall ill, etc. and out-of-country costs can be insane. I actually think people who don't purchase a basic health insurance plan (unless they have one through work or something) are crazy!
As for cancellation/delay etc., depends on the trip and the cost. We don't usually purchase it for all-inclusives because we tend to purchase those last minute and quite cheaply. For longer, more expensive trips we tend to.
We don't get additional cancellation insurance for flights unless the airline company doesn't have a rebooking/refund type policy, then we do.
No. The policy was just for me traveling from the states. I can't remember, but I think it also covered any changes to the trip for emergencies. They did say that FI being kidnapped by Somali pirates would have = emergency. If the yacht had been taken they would have paid me the price of my trip.
For H, the owner had an Israeli trained security team with a MAD on board for the trip back to France (things had gotten worse while they were in the Seychelles for the winter) and he had ransom money sitting in the bank for the whole crew (he emailed the families of the crew assuring them of this).
TTC #1 since 10.2011