Taking out travel insurance can ensure you get financial and practical help if something goes wrong on your trip. Unfortunately, illness, theft or accidents can happen anywhere. Although travel insurance is not compulsory, it is highly recommended and the good news is that nowadays, it’s relatively inexpensive.
What Should My Travel Insurance Cover?
To ensure that your needs are covered by a travel insurance policy, you may want to check the following:
- Emergency medical treatment, hospitalisation and repatriation (being returned to the UK)
- 24-hour emergency assistance – some insurance companies offer an around-the-clock helpline in case you have a serious problem
- Personal liability – if someone is injured or their property is damaged by you or something belonging to you, they could make a claim against you
- Having to cut short or cancel your trip, as you may be liable to pay the full cost or part of the cost if you cancel
- The replacement cost of your personal possessions, including money and documents – your policy will specify limits
- Scheduled airline failure insurance (SAFI) – this may be useful if you are travelling independently and are concerned about extra costs you could face if your airline went bust
- You may need to take extra cover for activities that are commonly excluded from standard policies, such as jet skiing
- Cancellations – a good insurer will cover you if you have to cancel or cut short a trip due to certain unforseen circumstances such as accident, illness, pregnancy (unknown when you buy the policy), jury service or witness summons, home emergency (e.g. fire, storm or flood, burglary), redundancy, strikes or bad weather (affecting the departure of flights or ships). Again, check your policy for this
What May Not Be Covered By My Travel Insurance Policy?
Always check the exclusions in a policy and if it doesn’t cover what you want, ask the insurance company to increase the cover or shop around. Common exclusions can include:
- Most policies will not cover drink or drug-related incidents
- Most travel insurance policies now cover terrorism. Where possible, ensure that your policy does not exclude terrorism, especially if you are visiting a higher-risk country
- You must take reasonable care of your possessions or your policy will not cover you
- Some policies may not cover pre-existing medical conditions, or you may have to pay extra. It is important to check the policies’ Key Facts Policy Summary to find this out
