To cancel this holiday? (Yet another thread)

[BorneBackCeaselesslyIntoThePas]

We have a holiday all booked and paid for that should start in four weeks time. My wife has fibromyalgia, arthritis and we’ve always taken out holiday insurance for these. But now there is a new condition, without TMI an upset stomach. It’s quite low grade and hadn’t stopped us doing most things, but because the doctor has referred this, we won’t be able to get medical insurance for any medical issues.

So should we cancel?

We don’t really know the impact of the new condition (maybe nothing, maybe serious) My wife has a EIHC and we could get basic cover, but I keep seeing us (a) stuck in a hotel room because of illness or (b) stuck in a foreign hospital or (c) coming home early.

Advice please

Because if we book the insurance too far in advance then we’d probably have to change the medical notes later. And in this case (a new undiagnosed condition) they would cancel the medical cover which gets classed as ‘imposing special conditions’ which might make getting insurance difficult next time as its one of the questions they ask. But if we leave it until now then it’s normally simpler

So maybe take out travel insurance with one company on the basis of existing conditions just after you book the holiday; then you could simply take out a second policy, with a different company, if the health conditions change. You don't cancel the first policy, you simply don't claim on it either. But it means you only take out the second policy if you actually have to do so. Some years you'll win.

No, it's much more usual to get the insurance at a later date. Unless you're a regular travel with an annual policy.

It is for a lot of people but not a sensible choice.

@Gth1234 not necessarily. It you don't a have pre-existing condition it generally would be okay BUT if anything untoward happened in the interim and you had the bad luck to have to make a substantial claim or cancel your holiday, then it could possibly be an issue. I am only surmising though.

18 months ago we had to make a claim on our insurance as I unfortunately needed medical treatment while on holiday. We had all the necessary paperwork and receipts. Call them when we got back, they authorised payment over the phone and said they didn't require evidence which surprised me.

Have you tried Get Going? Found they cover most medical stuff

try holidaysafe. they quote based on a detailed view of existing medical conditions. I have a chronic disease and its declared and covered. Worth a look?

I have a chronic illness, I always declare it to the travel insurance company and pay the uploaded premium.

The advice is always to book travel insurance at the same time as booking your holiday, as if any further medical conditions come to light that were unknown at the time of booking the policy you will usually be covered by the policy in the event you need to cancel due to the unknown condition.

Cancellation forms a huge part of the travel insurance policy, most people tend to buy last minute, thinking they just need the medical cover while abroad etc, which is of course important but the cancellation element is important too.

Good that you have EHIC cards.

I hope your wife is well enough to go on holiday. Good luck.

you won't have an issue getting cover for existing conditions. your issue is the undiagnosed one. My friend has the same problem (referred to hospital and waiting for tests) and therefore cannot get insured due to the unknown nature of the problem.

will you get tests + diagnosis before you go? you could take the insistence out at that point. or just take ehic if she feels fine in herself.

Don’t travel uninsured, that would be mad. Either cancel or pay to see a specialist sooner.

OP here. Oh god, the latest saga

My wife had a referral to hospital for a stomach issue

And then because of the problems getting insurance she has decided to cancel the referral because no referral = no problem, right????

As far as I can see this makes things worse, if we got insurance then is something we’re to happen the insurance company would look as her notes and see exactly what she has done and guess why she has done it!

To be fair she says the problem is much better, but to my mind having started the process we should see it through

Comments?

Are you heading to Europe? If so with ehic cards you will be ok, but you need to get some kind of insurance, use a specialist company used to multiple conditions but agree to use ehic first in emergency. Outside of Europe you need to find better aka more expensive insurance

If it flares up she still won't be covered and may invalidate any insurance at all even if unrelated.

We don’t have an existing policy, but even if we did the new condition would invalidate it (we’ve checked this)

I find this very odd. We have an annual policy with our bank. Last summer I was fitted with a Pacemaker and rang to add this to my existing ailments expecting either refusal or vast charge. I was told holidays already booked were covered, but to mention when renewal was due. Nothing about invalidation.

Charge on renewal: extra £32 on the annual worldwide policy..

The OP's insurer, whoever it is, seems to be one to avoid.

I think you're getting an unfair ride on here OP.

Depending on where you're going I'd probably risk it and just go, but take out a policy for the existing conditions only with no mention of the stomach issues.

I may have this completely wrong but by cancelling without insurance you won't get any money back anyway. If you can have some funds in reserve in the event that your wife does need treatment or you need to fly back earlier then I'd go for it in your shoes.

Unless you've had multiple incidents on holiday previously in which case disregard the above!

are you going to Europe?

Your only option is to get a private referral and see a specialist ASAP to hopefully get a diagnosis. Insurers won’t cover a referral of unknown diagnosis - how can they, they don’t know what condition they are covering! But it’s in her medical notes so cancelling the referral is pointless and won’t make an insurance policy suddenly become valid.

Our well known medical insurers tried to pull a fast one on us. Despite taking out insurance well in advance, my son then had major surgery and they tried to say cancellation was invalid. Soon put them right, but its destroyed any trust I had in them to actually pay up if we needed them to.

For those late to the show, here's the story so far.

We booked a holiday, but before we could book travel insurance my wife developed a stomach issue which needed further investigation by the hospital, and undiagnosed condition = no travel insurance.

We thought about what to do over several nights, and then my wife in a moment of misplaced enthusiasm decided to cancel the hospital referral to get the travel insurance, and then re-instate it afterwards (I think the police call this sort of thing fraud.) We managed to cancel the cancelation, so we were back at square one.

And now we are all up-to-date, please read on.

After even more thought we decided, what the hell, my wife has a NHS card, we'd probably be all right. We would go on the holiday. So we were all set for two weeks of sun, sea and the occasional early night – right?

Wrong

Because while all this was going on my wife developed a sore throat, only instead of getting better the pain spread down into her chest. We went to the doctor, and the attentive reader will be unsurprised by the diagnoses – a chest infection. We decided this was really a message from the gods ('in the name of me don’t go') and decided to cancel the holiday. And because my wife has no travel insurance we'd lose the entire cost of the holiday – right?

Wrong

Because it turns out I didn’t read the small print on the annual mufti trip policy I took out last year. And according to the insurance company – even though the holiday would take place outside the cover of the policy – it had been booked inside that period and would cover cancelation, great news – right?

Wrong

Because while all this was going on my wife got the date for the hospital investigation. Its in two months' time - one week before we were due to fly to America (note the past tense)

In unrelated news I'm having the house checked to see if its built on an Indian graveyard

As the youth might say, FML

I'm confused. You can now get a full refund on the cancellation of the holiday, and your wife can now go ahead with the hospital investigation? She can also take the opportunity to go back and request that referral again. I'm sorry if I'm missing something! I hope your wife does get some answers in terms of her health.

Also, not that I'd ever encourage it, but you can simply not declare the undiagnosed condition so long as no proper treatment/referral has taken place: if the insurer requested a subject access request, you could ask the GP to deny it on an ethical basis and simply submit a written letter to request only the records relating to the diagnosed conditions. You are also legally entitled to request the data be sent to you, for you to then send to the insurer - this does not make a policy null - and you may choose what to disclose from that point. Most policies do have to allow for amending of the records provided to them, by either GP or patient.

Can you get insurance that excludes this condition? I.e. You could claim for everything else but not that. Doubt you will claim for other conditions either. It's really theft/loss of items, delay, cancellation and accident /unforeseen illness cover you need.

sergeilavrov

but you can simply not declare the undiagnosed condition so long as no proper treatment/referral has taken place

Absolutely, that’s why I was horrified when I found out what my wife was planning to do (cancel and then reschedule) It seems like every week there is another story in the papers about a claim being denied because some minor historical ailment has been missed when applying for insurance. Declare everything is our mantra