Older Holidaymakers

Senior citizens are one of the most likely groups to holiday abroad,
but it is also this group that can have the most difficulty in getting
an affordable deal on travel insurance.
There are insurance companies that specialise in providing cover for
the over 65’s, as well as a number of non-specialist policies available
that cater for the older traveler.
However, some insurers no longer offer multi-trip annual travel insurance
cover to older holiday makers, meaning that the older generation are
often excluded from the cheapest travel insurance options available.
There are now a range of providers that offer cheap travel insurance
for the older holidaymaker, however some customers still find
themselves having to pay much higher premiums for the chance to go
abroad due to the increased risks associated with their age group.
Because of the higher cover prices for their age group, many are tempted to make the trips without taking out travel insurance in order to avoid paying a high price for cover which may exclude existing medical conditions.
The stereotypical view that older holidaymakers have an increased
risk of falling ill or having an accident whilst on holiday makes it
difficult for the older traveler to find an affordable travel
insurance deal.
In the event of complications happening whilst on holiday, treatment
can be expensive – not too mention the costs involved when booking an
earlier flight home.
However, with a wider variety of specialist providers now offering
affordable deals, older holidaymakers now have more options when it
comes to selecting travel insurance for overseas excursions.

Travel Insurance

Some times here at cheapest travel insurance I run across an article I think is important enough to share. It doesn’t make any difference whether you live in the UK, America or any other part of the world, the guidelines should be all the same. The most important thing is you can enjoy yourself, have a safe trip and do these things at the best price you can possible get.

Hopefully the article below can save you some time and give you a guideline on taking out travel insurance.

Taking out travel insurance is an important part of planning a trip abroad and will protect you against the cost of any unforeseen events.

The benefit of cover
A good travel insurance policy will ensure that any unexpected medical bills are paid and that you can get home in an emergency. Even routine surgery such as an appendectomy costs around £7,500 in Europe, according to insurer esure, increasing to £25,000 in some parts of America.

It may also meet the cost of new baggage if your luggage is lost or stolen, and compensate you if your trip is canceled, your travel delayed or you miss your departure.

Medical costs
You should take a European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) with you, but this shouldn't be relied upon exclusively in the event that you fall ill or suffer an accident abroad.

This pays for free medical treatment in EU countries, as well as Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, but it will only fund you up to the level of free treatment given to locals. You could find this is significantly less comprehensive than the NHS, leaving you with a big bill - and it won't cover the cost of repatriation.

Cost of cover
It's now cheaper and easier than ever to get travel insurance, with some single trip policies only costing around a fiver. But remember that cheapest is not necessarily best, as the cover might be inadequate and the service a little thin.

Start with price comparison sites, which give you a range of quotes to choose from with varying levels of cover for your situation. Check out moneysupermarket.com, Confused.com and guardian.co.uk's compare and buy service.
Buy your cover directly from the insurer rather than from a tour operator or travel agent. It will be cheaper, and if anything goes wrong you will have recourse to the Financial Ombudsman Service to claim compensation.

Factsheet: Travel insurance | Money | guardian.co.uk

Airline-sold travel insurance: what's it worth? - Tips- msnbc.com

People who never before considered travel insurance might look back on this turbulent summer as the one that pushed them over the edge.
And if you’ve shopped around for an airline ticket lately, you can’t help but have noticed that somewhere in the process your airline has offered to sell you what looks to be a fairly cheap travel insurance policy, usually for $9, $12, $15 or a similarly affordable amount, per trip.

Should you bite? Not until you read the policy carefully, and Airfarewatchdog.com has found that seeing a copy of the policy before you buy requires quite a bit of mouse-clicking.

Such as the 'Trip Protector' sold by Northwest, have one serious flaw: They don’t cover cancellation of your trip because of the airline’s financial default. Also, most don’t cover pre-existing medical conditions under any circumstances.

Some may not even cover airline-caused delays in their trip-interruption clauses.In any case, travel insurance, whether bought from an airline or online travel agency, or the insurer directly, often is less protective than it sounds.

Trip interruption, for example, is very narrowly defined. Usually, it covers only an interruption after your trip has begun, so if you’ve put down a $1,000 deposit for a trip and a month before departure the airline “interrupts” your plans by announcing that it no longer serves your origin or destination cities, then you’re on your own.

It's the same thing for trip cancellation: You can cancel your trip for a limited number of covered reasons, but if the airline cancels your route, that's not covered. An interesting loophole in one policy we saw: If a family member (say, your son) gets injured in an amateur sporting event (say, a football game) you won't be covered if you decide to cancel your trip.

Spirit Airlines, for example, sells insurance for $12 per domestic flight, which seems very reasonable. There’s one major problem, however: You’re not covered if Spirit should go belly-up.

Policies bought directly from insurance companies

Compare that with a policy bought directly from a major travel insurance company.
AIG Travel Guard's 'Essential' plan costs about $24, depending on various factors, for a typical domestic trip by air, but as with Spirit’s insurance, there’s no coverage for default. For that, you’d need to upgrade to an Essential Expanded policy, and then to abide by a "14 Day Wait" clause, which means that the airline would have to default more than 14 days after the date you’re your coverage went into effect.

For full default coverage with fewer (but by no means no) loopholes, you need to buy AIG Travel Guard's more expensive standard and then add an upgrade that includes coverage not only for situations in which the airline might suddenly disappear, but also acts of terrorism and pre-existing medical conditions.

The bottom line is that, to be really protected, a better insurance policy covering a typical trip by air — just the air travel portion, not hotels or a cruise — might cost more than $40. That's a far cry from Spirit’s $12, but look at the differences in the two policies.

Spirit's policy can be called, politely, minimal. There's a flat $300 for cancellation or interruption — read on, you'll see this is absurdly low — $500 for travel delays (doled out at amounts of up to $100 per day), a $500 reimbursement for loss of baggage or travel documents, and a $100 pay-out for baggage delay.

AIG's 'My Travel Guard' policy, on the other hand, covers the entire quoted trip cost in case of cancellation or interruption; $1,000 in case of stranding for return air; $500 for unreasonable delays (but a maximum of $100 per day); $10,000 for medical expenses in the case of accident or sickness; $100,000 for emergency evacuation and — how grim! — the repatriation of remains; $500 compensation for loss of baggage; and $100 for baggage delay. It also provides options to purchase a plethora of upgrades.

Airline-sold travel insurance: what's it worth? - Tips- msnbc.com

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How to save money: Travel insurance | Money | The Guardian

* Patrick Collinson * The Guardian, * Friday June 20, 2008 * Article historySimple saverBuy car hire insurance in the UK before you leave. The alternative? You arrive at the airport and the car hire desk presses you to buy an additional policy, sometimes costing £10 a day. They say that if you have an accident, you're liable for (say) the first £1,000 of any damage unless you buy a "super-CDW" (that's Collision Damage Waiver) policy.But there is a much cheaper way of insuring your hire car. Buy an annual policy back in the UK - they cost around £50 for Europe, or £110 including North America - which covers your liability for the car hire excess, not just if the car is stolen but also for some damage. Find policies at insurance4carhire.com, worldwideinsure.com and dailyexcess.com.Advanced saving tips1. Avoid paying pointless travel insurance step 1Obtain a European Health Insurance Card from ehic.org.uk or at your local Post Office. This has replaced the old E111 forms and gives you reduced-cost or free medical treatment in EU countries plus Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland.Step 2Check your home insurance policy. Many have clauses that already cover personal belongings (eg your suitcase) outside the home.Step 3Check your private medical insurance policy, if you have one. These frequently cover the cost of treatment incurred abroad. For most holidaymakers who travel to southern Europe once a year, the only real benefit that travel insurance brings is cancellation cover. Ask yourself if that is worth paying premiums which are often £100 or more for a family.2. Buy an annual policy If you are travelling outside the EU, it's essential that you buy insurance. Annual worldwide multi-trip policies always make sense if you go on more than one trip a year. Buy at one of the comparison sites, and aim to pay no more than £40 (individual) or £60 (family). That's about what many companies charge for insurance for a fortnight in Spain! But don't just opt for the cheapest policy - those tend to have a limit on baggage claims of £500 or even less, and are hardly worth buying. In a recent Which? test, the best buy was TravelPlanDirect's £23 Europe-only policy for an individual under 65 (£45 family), or £38 for worldwide cover (£59 family) from Travel Insurance Web - both deals are only available online.Single-trip policies are only worth buying if you are traveling just once or maybe twice a year, and not going to the US - although they can be better value for older travelers (see below).3. Don't buy insurance from a travel agent, or your bank estate agents' travel insurance offers are nearly always ludicrously expensive: you can do much better online. As regards banks, customers with "premium accounts" such as Lloyds TSB Platinum have travel insurance included in the cost - but this is an expensive way to buy it. Ditch the account (they can cost upwards of £300 a year) and, again, buy online instead.4. Check those definitions one of the more common complaints to Guardian Money is that an insurance company has refused to pay for a cancellation caused by the serious illness or death of a close relative. Many insurers exclude anyone but immediate family from the cover, and will also refuse to pay out if the holiday was booked when the person already knew that their relative had fallen ill.5. Older travelers, beware Travellers over 65 and with pre-existing medical conditions have the thorniest travel insurance issues. It's crucial to declare any information, such as a pre-existing illness, that an insurer might use to calculate your premium. One tip: don't assume that the businesses or charities which specialize in the over-50s market are always the cheapest. They rarely are. Prices for insurance start to rise once you hit 65, and become alarmingly expensive past 75, even if you are fit and healthy. Travelers making several trips a year should still aim for an annual policy - but the savings over several single-trip policies are marginal, particularly if you visit America.The Which? survey's best buy for the over-75s was from Intune (intunegroup.com), a wholly- owned subsidiary of the charity Help The Aged, and any profits go to support charitable activities. The Intune policy has no upper age limit, and will cover many pre-existing medical conditions. Companies recommended by Which? for single-trip insurance include Columbus Direct and Golfguard. Both companies have upper age limits of 79.6. And if you do have a medical condition ...Cover My Travels (cover my travels.co.uk) has been praised, but will only give you a good price if the condition has been stable for more than 12 months. Others worth trying are 24DrTravel (24drtravel.com), Freedom Insurance (freedom insure.co.uk) and Medici Travel (medicitravel.com). If you have recently been in hospital, try Bradford & Bingley at bradford-bingley.co.uk/insurance/travel.Of course, if you travel in Europe only, the free European Health Insurance Card (EHIC) is useful for anyone with a pre-existing condition (ehic.org.uk).Quick stats Recommended levels of cover you should take out on a typical travel insurance policy ...£2 million medical expenses£1 million personal liability£3,000Trip cancellation£1,500Baggage lost or damaged£250Stolen cash source: money supermarket.com planet saver Climate sure, the insurance arm of Climate Care, a carbon-offsetting company, offers travel cover which promises to cut your carbon footprint. It uses part of your payment to offset emissions created by your journey. Contact climate sure.co.uk.

How to save money: Travel insurance | Money | The Guardian

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Cheapest Travel Insurance

I created this blog to see if I could bring some attention to the cheapest travel insurance. In the past I have traveled to a few places and bought travel insurance and felt good that if something happened I would be covered and my family would be well taken care of. I am not so sure about those facts anymore.

I know you can find or purchase insurance on just about anything from Planes, Trains or Cruise ships.
You can buy travel insurance to cover your luggage and your life. But the key is which one is legit, and will pay off with out having to hire a lawyer and go to court..

Travelers are purchasing travel insurance policies through their agents, and some purchase on line. Now whether you purchase travel insurance on line, or from the travel agent is a matter of preference.
You could be paying a premium and getting less coverage.

I think most of us purchase travel insurance for the peace of mind and not always for the insurance coverage.
Remember, when selecting the best and cheapest travel insurance it is critical that you are covered for your trip. This will give you piece of mind.
I think that there are a number of ways to check and make sure your selection of a travel insurance company is the right one.
The following is a list of things to consider in purchasing cheap travel insurance on the web or any where else could save you a lot of time and trouble:
If you are using a local travel agent, pick up the phone and call the travel agent and ask what comp[any to use.
Ask your agent for any feed back on whom ever you chose, this could save a lot of heart ache. Positive feed back or negative, either way you are better off.
Even though you would like to purchase Insurance and save the money, the cheapest may not be the best choice, consider if that is the wisest choice.
Try and make your choice ahead of time, we tend to make mistakes by choosing when we are in a hurry.
Look at it this way; When you buy almost anything, you ask around for feed back. Just be sure and ask the right people.
I know the cheapest travel insurance is a free one, check it out first. You might be glad you did
So the cheapest travel insurance is just a matter of what you pay for
Remember there is no better person that will watch out for you better than yourself.
Good luck and good traveling.
John