Tips on Travel Insurance
The travel company, HBF just wrote a great article on tips to make your travel insurance claim easier, with some very useful information if you ever find yourself in need of making a claim. I thought they made good points with the following:
1. First, you need to be honest and upfront when you take out your policy. Some pre existing conditions can be covered by your insurance company, so check. You don’t want your policy cancelled because you didn’t mention something!
2. Make sure you read your policy. It’s a bit dry, I know, but there’s a lot of important information in there which will come in handy if you have to make a claim.
3. Keep everything! What’s to stop someone from faking an insurance claim? Insurance companies require evidence. Keep original receipts and documents related to your claim. The worst case scenario, you get home safely and make a scrap book of all your sundry expenses.
4. If you have to make a claim, be as detailed as possible. If you answer everything with enough detail, the insurance company might not have to follow up – making the payment come much faster.
5. This is probably the most annoying advice, but you have to be patient. A lot of companies have standards they have to meet, so as long as you claim is being processed within the time they specify (HBF specifies 10 days, but your insurance company might be different), try to wait.
Obviously you never want to find yourself in a situation where you need to make a travel insurance claim, but if you follow these steps your life will be much easier. I also found an article about the five most common travel insurance claims, so hopefully you can try to avoid them.
Medical claims are probably the most annoying to have to deal with. No one wants to get sick while they are on vacation. So the best thing to do is find out as much as you can about the destination before you go. Is it safe to drink the water? Any food you should avoid? Going to your destination with a little bit of research can save you a lot of grief in the long-run.
Lost, damaged, and stolen luggage is another common claim, and there are a few things you can do to help avoid it from happening to you. Some things are pretty much common sense, but you would be surprised how many people forget to put tags on their bags! Make sure you remove old destination stickers, check in your bags early, avoid flights with tight connections, and head straight to the luggage area as soon as you land. And remember, as those announcements echo around the airport “do not leave your bags unattended”.
Lost or Stolen Credit cards and money are a huge problem for travellers, but the only thing you can really do here is use common sense. Keep a photocopy of you credit cards and ID in your bags, but other than that you just need to be careful.
Finally, cancelled flights are travel delays are something that is out of your control but a huge inconvenience. Always check with the airline a few days before and the day of your flight to make sure everything is going forward. Try to fly earlier in the day, midweek, and get to the airport early.
Hopefully you are never in a position where you have to make a claim on your travel insurance, but a little common sense and thinking ahead can save you time and money in the long term!
If you are going away, you need to get travel insurance. Travel insurance is offered by a lot of companies and your credit card company might even cover you for a lot of things. However, if they don’t, go buy travel insurance. Travel insurance will protect you if you get sick, injured, lose your stuff, get your stuff stolen, or have a tour canceled on you. In short, it covers you for everything.
