Trip interruption insurance

[travelplanner70]

I have trip cancellation insurance, but it only covers for illness or death. I need insurance for trip interruption in case one leg of my journey is late causing me to miss my connecting flight on a different airline. (Not too uncommon nowadays) I hope you can help me find a cost-effective, reputable company for this. Thanks.

 

[philemer]

The answer is right above your post on the main Travel page. It says "Sticky: Travel insurance advice". The links in there will lead you to ins. that includes trip interruption. TravelGuard is popular with some.

Phil

 

[mtwingcpa]

I'm also concerned about missing connections, unexpected delays, etc. But, I note that most travel policies require rather L-O-N-G delays before they will pay off (typically 3 - 6 hours for "delay", 12 - 24 hours for "interruption") and therefore if you have planned your connections closer than that, they may not pay no matter what. At least, that's my understanding of the situation.

 

[Carolinian]

In flipping through the options in the sticky, all of them seem to require buying travel medical insuranace as part of their plan. This is useless for me as my employer provides great medical and medical evacuation coverage, so that just duplicates what I already have.

What I need is a policy where I don't have to waste my money to duplicate medical coverage I already have. I am looking for trip interruption / trip cancellation coverage, not coupled with medical of any type. Baggage coverage would be acceptable but not preferred. I am also looking for an annual plan. Anyone able to recommend someone with such a product?

 

[ciscogizmo1]

In flipping through the options in the sticky, all of them seem to require buying travel medical insuranace as part of their plan. This is useless for me as my employer provides great medical and medical evacuation coverage, so that just duplicates what I already have.

What I need is a policy where I don't have to waste my money to duplicate medical coverage I already have. I am looking for trip interruption / trip cancellation coverage, not coupled with medical of any type. Baggage coverage would be acceptable but not preferred. I am also looking for an annual plan. Anyone able to recommend someone with such a product?

Did you try insuremytrip.com I think it even has a section where you can exclude medical insurance for the quote.

I'm surprise your policy provides for medical outside of the U.S. I know my claims it does but it has huge deductibles and doesn't pay for all medical evacuations services. It pays on a case by case bases so, the medical part could cover all other expenses like emergency plane flight home for people in your party, etc... I'm sure you coverage doesn't pay for those in your party that need to go home with the sick or injured person.

 

[pammex]

Just in case a point to know if you travel to Mexico. You may have coverage but many of the hospitals here require either payment upfront from you or a substantial deposit. Then you can take it up with your insurance providor, so if traveling to Mexico might be a good thing to have.

 

[Carolinian]

I work for an organization that has offices in 72 countries, and am based in Europe myself. The medical policy I have at work, is therefore, specifically designed to provide coverage for US citizens living abroad. In addition, they provide a seperate evacuation policy that not only covers medical emergencies but natural disasters, civil unrest, etc. So I am extremely well covered on those fronts

What I really want to cover is trip interruption / flight cancellation on my personal traveland in an annual policy, not the aggravating and expensive trip-by-trip variety. I cannot find such an animial at insuremytrip.com

Did you try insuremytrip.com I think it even has a section where you can exclude medical insurance for the quote.

I'm surprise your policy provides for medical outside of the U.S. I know my claims it does but it has huge deductibles and doesn't pay for all medical evacuations services. It pays on a case by case bases so, the medical part could cover all other expenses like emergency plane flight home for people in your party, etc... I'm sure you coverage doesn't pay for those in your party that need to go home with the sick or injured person.

 

[Dave M]

I seriously doubt that you'll find such an annual policy. I don't believe there is a way for an insurance company to price such a policy because of the uncertainties of how many times (i.e., how many trips) during the year the insurance company would be at risk. Thus, the cost is likely to be so high that only those who travel almost every week might deem it worthwhile. And those would be the people most likely to decide to self-insure rather than give profit to the insurance companies.

Even if such a policy had existed, I think the sponsoring insurance company would likely discontinue offering the product now, considering that this summer is likely to set all time records for airline delays and cancellations. Airline employee reductions, reduced numbers of flights and fuller planes will all add to the likely causes for delays, misconnects and cancellations.

 

[dougp26364]

Most of the time the restrictions on when they will pay are so tight it's useless coverage. The one and only time I needed it to pay out it didn't. The cause of our delay was a fisherman's strike in Spain that had all the ports blocked. We missed our flight home by over 12 hours and our return home was interupted by over 24 hours. Still, it did not pay because fisherman's strike was not a listed peril. Most of these policy's are NAMED peril rather than any peril with the listed exceptions. They are VERY narrow in scope of when they will pay.

I have searched for such a policy as what you mention and have never found it......even on insuremytrip.com. Some credit cards will provide some degree of coverage for you as far as trip interuption/trip delay/lost bags but, like all other forms of trip insurance they are pretty limited as to what/when they will pay out.

If you do find something acceptable please post it here. There are times I would have use for such a policy myself if the restrictions weren't to tight.

 

[dougp26364]

I'm also concerned about missing connections, unexpected delays, etc. But, I note that most travel policies require rather L-O-N-G delays before they will pay off (typically 3 - 6 hours for "delay", 12 - 24 hours for "interruption") and therefore if you have planned your connections closer than that, they may not pay no matter what. At least, that's my understanding of the situation.

You're not understanding it correctly. The time is not based on the length of layover you're flights are scheduled to make but on the length of time you are delayed should there be a weather issue or mechanical issues. So if you had a flight that had a 1 hour layover but, because of weather you were stuck in, say, Denver for 36 hours, then the policy would pay out based on the length of the interuption, not on the length of scheduled layover.

 

[PR1NCESSD1ANE]

I had a different question come to mind about insurance coverage for travel delay when using frequent flyer miles. I became concerned when we were flying out of Chicago on Good Friday to Ft. Lauderdale where we would be leaving on a cruise the following day. The weather was awful in Chicago that day and we were very worried that we might end up dealing with a delay or cancellation (thankfully we were fine). We purchased trip cancellation/interruption insurance for our full cost of the cruise for 3 of us (total $3,300) which did not ask us to break down what portion might be for air. Since our fights were free, we wondered if we still would be entitled to the trip interruption coverage which the policy automatically calculated at $1,750/person and use it to fly to the first port if we missed the cruise. Has anyone had any experience with making a claim and using frequent flyer awards?

 

[UWSurfer]

I filed a claim with Travel Guard for our interuption/diversion to Oakland enroute from LAX to HNL recently. After carefully reading the benefits, they supposedly pay for out of pocket expenses due to the interuption, in our case mechanical issues with the plane for six hours or more. It's since been revised to 12 hours or more. I've not received a reply for our claim $40 worth of food we bought at the airport, submitted last week.

Probably more important to us however, is getting our 1400 points refunded to us for the night we lost at the Bay Club. HGVC was waiting for the claim to be submitted to Travel Guard and I have some follow-up to do now to get those back. For the $49/year, it's probably worth having...although I may change my tune if they find an out for this relatively small claim.

I didn't turn in the out of pocket for getting home after ATA shut down as the benefits clearly state they don't cover a delay or interuption caused by a company (airline) entering bankruptcy.

 

[Lglen119]

annual travel insurance - options

There are two kinds of annual plans i've come across:

For trips related to regular travel, view Access America

For trips related to T/S, view VacationGuard.

 

[mtwingcpa]

So if you had a flight that had a 1 hour layover but, because of weather you were stuck in, say, Denver for 36 hours, then the policy would pay out based on the length of the interuption, not on the length of scheduled layover.

I understand your point, but consider this situation: Say that I had paid a large non-refundable fare for a cruise. I schedule a flight that should get me to the dock 4 hours prior to the ship's departure (thereby fully complying with the ship's requirements). However, the flight is delayed for 36 hours by a qualifying event. Assume that it is NOT practical to join the cruise in progress at a later port, so the entire cruise fare is "lost."

Assume that my travel policy has a 6 hour "delay" threshold and a 24 hour "interuption" threshold. Would you expect the policy to pay for ANYTHING under these circumstances? (Other than, perhaps, a plane ticket back home if I didn't already have one.) Note especially that the cruise departs at a fixed time and cannot be delayed or rescheduled...if you miss the boat, you miss the boat, and the entire fare is lost.

Do you, or anyone out there, have actual experience with a claim that meets this scenario? I have not yet found anyone with such an actual experience. But my own guess is that the insurance company would deny coverage because your scheduling was tighter than the thresholds they recognize. But I would love to be proven wrong (by an actual case, not merely an opinion based on reading the policy).

Added comment: In case my point isn't clear, I believe under these circumstances you would need to PLAN to arrive at the departure port at least 24 hours prior to the ship's departure in order to assure maximum coverage under your travel insurance policy. That way, if you miss the boat, you can prove that it was due to DELAY as defined in the policy and not your own (arguably poor) planning.