How do I buy travel insurance?

There you are, sat at the travel agents, feeling very pleased with yourself. You have just booked yourself one peach of a holiday for yourself and your family of four. You are going to the exact place that you wanted to go, to the exact hotel that you had dreamed about, you have the flight times you'd want from the most convenient airport and you have a lot to be smug about.

Then the travel agent fixes you with a cold stare and says "can I have details of the travel insurance that you have arranged then?" You fidget, stare at the floor and then in a barely audible whisper reply that you haven't yet got around to arranging travel insurance. "Well, you'll really need it, and luckily for you we have a travel insurance policy for you, at only £150 that suits all of your needs," returns the travel agent with a voracious look in his eye. Pleased with the bargain you have on your holiday, you add £150 to your bill and walk out of the agent feeling that you have done a great service to yourself. Well, don't feel that, because you've just given back a lot of what you gained.

It's simple, travel agents are not specialists in travel insurance, they sell holidays. Thus, they will charge you about two or three times more for travel insurance that may not even be such a good product. The reason they like to suggest you have no option but to buy travel insurance from them is really because they can earn meaty commissions by persuading you to sign up for their travel insurance at the same time as you pay for your holiday.

Before November 1998, travel firms could use the rather nifty marketing ploy of give you a discount on your holiday package should you take out their travel insurance policy. The government made this illegal in November 1998, yet travel agents may simply refuse to book you a holiday should you not give them insurance details. They may not tell you that you can sign a firm stating you will be making your own travel insurance arrangements. Since a normal holiday discount is about 15% and a normal family holiday may cost £1000, in the example above the discount of £150 is more or less wiped out by the cost of the insurance policy which is typical of a travel agents charges for a family of four, even though you might only pay £30 for the same policy from an insurance broker.

So you should shop around the internet especially and check you have the right cover whatever you are paying. It could be worth it.

© AskFinancially.com 2008

Travel Insurance

Insurance & Loans

Copyright

How do I buy travel insurance?

© AskFinancially.com 2008

Travel Insurance

Insurance & Loans

Copyright