Travel insurance

[Lindah1]

AIBU to be so confused, hoping someone can help. Two questions really.
First - last time I went to.buy travel insurance and couldn't decide whether to buy annual or the weeks holiday only, the person on the phone said if we bought annual and started it from the start of our holiday ( to get longer out of it) we would not be covered if we needed to cancel between now and then??? Surely if you bought it for just the week it would be the same problem?otherwise no one could cancel unless their holiday had started? Really didn't get it.
Secondly- when you buy travel insurance you are meant to, (or are you?) keep them up to date with anything medical which occurs during the policy (talking about annual policy here). So every time one of the family goes to the doctors I phone them, sometimes they charge more sometimes they don't. Last time I didn't have a definite diagnosis for something they were not happy and said they needed to know what the problem was. We were just about to go on holiday so I said it was prob x otherwise they were going to invalidate the whole policy.
Recently went to a consultant about something and he said I was fine for that complaint, I mentioned travel insurance and he said tell them nothing, there's no diagnosis, even though investigation had taken place. I'm so confused . Thanks for reading and if you can shed light on anything please do xx

Anyone?

Im in the same boat-phoned post office travel insurance folk to tell them about recent scan, authorised insurance all fine. Going away again and wondering if I need to tell them and declare it-think I will otherwise the alternative could be scary if anything went wrong.

I have worked in travel insurance
First point- we only offer an annual option so can’t really help- cover would have started from the day you took the policy so even if you didn’t have a holiday booked. And then if you cancelled or something happened and you couldn’t go you would be covered.

Second point we didn’t ask to be updated regularly about conditions but our caveat was ‘if you are travelling against medical advice it’s a no’ so for example you may have a known condition or be under going tests- as long as no one has said you can’t travel it’s fine- and if you did have to make a claim we may have asked for a letter from your gp/spec confirming that in their medical opinion you were ok to travel and this illness was unexpected

First point - a single trip policy will start as soon as you pay and you will be covered for your dates. You will also be covered if you have to cancel before travelling. On an annual policy you will be covered for the year from the date you choose. If you have a holiday booked in 2 weeks time for example you should start your policy immediately to cover incase of cancellation up to the date you are due to travel. If you started it on the date you were due to travel then had a heart attack for example you would not be covered for cancellation of that trip.
Point 2 - you should always update if there is any change to your medical conditions. Many policies will automatically exclude conditions under investigation. Undiagnosed conditions tend to be excluded until something is diagnosed usually because there is nothing to be screened to determine if there will be cover or not. So if you’ve had pain in your leg say, been to the doctor and they say there is nothing wrong, no medication given and no follow up then I wouldn’t phone my insurer. If you’re awaiting further tests however and due to travel before these are complete I would inform the insurer.
Hope that helps!

Thanks all for replying. Sounds like I need to continue telling them everything. Regarding the starting date, so are you saying that for single trip you are covered from today's date if you need to cancel, but for annual you are only covered from the starting date of the policy, even though the trip is the same?

For single trip insurance you have taken a policy for that particular holiday. You tell them the dates you're out the country but you're covered for cancelling that trip at any time. An annual policy covers you not a particular holiday so you are covered for a year from your start date no matter that the holiday is or when it falls in that year.

The only difference for annual is you can choose the start date to be later. If you have a holiday booked in the future it's best to start your cover immediately (in case something happens between now and the holiday which would stop you going eg close relative in hospital). For both single trip and annual (if you start right away) it covers you right away. You can always just choose to start annual at a date in the future if you know you're not going to book holidays for a while (eg runs out in Jan but you know you're not going on holiday til July and would book it in April you could choose the start date in April)

With medical conditions it depends on the wording of your policy. If they ask you to disclose changes to your health or underlying /long term conditions, or anything under investigation, or just anything at all. They basically just want to know anything that will increase the risk if you having a claim when you're away. So if you have a sickness bug a fortnight before you travel, this is a self limiting illness and not going to affect chances of getting ill when you're away so no need to tell them (even on an annual policy). If you've been getting a run of sickness bugs and the doctor thinks there may be an underlying condition causing them then you would need to disclose this. If you generally have a weak stomach and are frequently sick but have never needed treatment then I wouldn't disclose this as not diagnosed, not under investigation, and no medical records. Basically you want to avoid the situation where they turn down a claim as you didn't disclose something (that they can prove, and they will check medical records) that MAY increase chance of a claim. It's tricky with health as one condition / set of medications can increase the likelihood of other conditions so always best to err on the side of caution if you are unsure