Is Cheap Travel Insurance Good Travel Insurance? Article

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Is cheap travel insurance good travel insurance?

If you are looking to purchase single trip travel insurance or annual holiday insurance you would not want to pay more than you have too.

Author: Benjamin Hawk

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Whether you are looking to buy single trip travel insurance or annual holiday insurance you will not want to pay more than you have too. There is however a huge difference between cheap and good value and knowing how to tell them apart could be the difference between disaster and relief.

Before looking at how to spot the difference, let’s firstly look at the basic principle of travel insurance from an insurers perspective. A travel insurer sells different types of policies including:

• Single trip travel insurance
• Annual holiday insurance (also known as Annual multi-trip travel insurance)
• Longstay travel insurance (also known as Backpacker and Gap year travel insurance)
• Cruise travel insurance
• Corporate travel insurance

They sell these policies through a range of distributions including:

• Online travel insurance
• Brokers
• Travel agents
• Tour operators
• Affinity partners

Ultimately an insurance company aims to collect enough combined premiums from people buying their travel insurance to pay out the combined claims against the policy. Premiums that they have left over are the funds the insurance company has to pay the expenses of running the business and then to make a profit.

Cheap travel insurance

So with this in mind, if insurance companies sell policies too cheaply they will have more claims to pay than premium collected and will not make any profit. Therefore, it might be safe to argue that cheap policies must have more terms and conditions attaching and more importantly more exclusions to help from paying so many claims. It also makes sense that cheaper policies will have less cover with lower limits. Other ways exist of selling cheap travel insurance which include:

• Annual holiday insurance
o Lower maximum trip durations
o Maximum amounts of cover per year, not per trip
o Independent travel cover just for the first named insured

• Single trip and annual holiday insurance
o Fewer sections of cover
o Lower levels of cover
o Higher excess'

Good value travel insurance

So rather than cheap, what you should really be looking for is good value travel insurance. Clearly the term good value has a personal definition, but in respect of travel insurance things to look for include;

Ensuring that the policy has the following cover as a minimum:

• Emergency medical expenses cover to £2,000,000
• Cancellation cover to the value of the trip, unless it is a last minute booking.
• Cutting short your trip cover to the value of the trip
• Personal liability cover to a minimum of £1,000,000
• Legal expenses cover to a minimum of £10,000

Other sections and cover which is highly sought after:

• Departure delay cover to a minimum of £150
• Missed departure to a minimum of £500
• Trip abandonment to a minimum of £800
• Personal belongings single article limit to a minimum of £100
• Personal money to a minimum of £200
• Hospital benefit to a minimum of £20 per day
• Personal accident to a minimum of £5,000

As well as looking at the sections and limits, take the time to have a look at the sections within the policy wording. Most should set them out with what is covered and what is not covered. You will be surprised at how easy it is to understand.

Other things to keep in mind include; The higher the excess, the cheaper the policy, The lower the cover limits, the cheaper the policy, the cheaper the policy, the more restrictions there are likely to be and lastly a reminder – generally you should expect to get what you pay for but there are some insurance companies that the sell good value insurance products and do not skimp on the cover. In the main, online travel insurance will be the cheapest travel insurance policies as there will be less people involved and so less people needing to make money from the sale of the policy.

About Author

Benjamin Hawk is a freelance writer and has a great amount of knowledge in online travel insurance and travel insurance over 65. For more information on gap year travel insurance she recommends you to visit http://www.holidaysafe.co.uk/

Article Source: http://www.1888articles.com/author-benjamin-hawk-16324.html

Is cheap travel insurance good travel insurance?