To be angry at ds1 re travel insurance

[alrightluv]

FFS I know I'm not just need to vent.

Ds1 in in his mid 20s. Good job very intelligent. He's been travelling abroad a few times and is there now.

Just been chatting to him and ds2 on WhatsApp. Talking about meerkat code for cinema. I said he should have got his travel insurance through them. He said he doesn't have it! I couldn't fucking believe it.

I've sent a load of scary shit to him. Told him to get it NOW. I'm so angry.

I laid it on the line if anything happens to him it's mad amounts to get back here.

Rant over.

Yes I had this exact convo with DS1. He tried to say he would be ok with the reciprocal card you used to have

I asked him who would be paying if he needed repatriation

He thought only people like his Nana has travel insurance, I told him it was a necessity

Martin Lewis says get insurance as soon as you book however I book 1.5yrs in advance. I'm not paying for 2yrs insurance

I'd also caution that travel insurance isn't worth the paper it's written on unless they check the exclusions and declare all preexisting conditions including any trips to gp for minor ailments. Make sure as well that they have a new GHIC card which isn't great but better than not having one.

Of particular note, motorcycle use is usually only covered if you have a full licence in your country of residency and ride a bike of at least that size. We checked it with a fine tooth comb! Quad biking wasn't included on our standard insurance but they added it during our trip for £10, no accident but was worth the assurance

I also not sure the cover is valid if you are already abroad.

That isn't how it works, you can just insure yourself for the period when you'll be away. Different if you have an annual policy of course, but that typically only works out cheaper if you plan to do multiple trips.

You call it interfering, I prefer to call it "parenting".

It doesn't just grind to a halt when they reach 18, you know! They still need help and guidance on many areas of life, whether it's employment advice, dealing with electricity bills, buying a car, insurance, tax, relationships.......

I would tell my grown ass 55 yr old friend she was a twat if she didnt get travel insurance.
But im supposed to say nothing to my 23 yr old and let them suffer the consequences?
The absolute carelessness of some people on this site is astonishing.

Yes health cover will cover your medical expenses (in many European countries), but it won't provide transport home (either rescheduled flights if you're too ill to travel when you should've left or - if you're more seriously ill - an air ambulance to relocate you to a UK hospital. Nor will it provide the rest of your family with accommodation to stay close by whilst you're in hospital in Greece / Spain / wherever. And should the worst happen, it won't fly your body home.

It won’t.

The reason for getting travel insurance out when you book is so if you have to cancel, you are covered.

There was a thread recently about someone with Tui wanting to cancel and they hadn’t got travel insurance pre holiday, if I remember correctly, and wanted to know if they were liable for the full amount.

Always get good travel insurance. A few weeks in hospital in Europe and medivac home could easily cost £50k plus, USA could £200 - £500k. I don’t know many people sitting on that kind of savings.

Working in the funeral industry, I saw the consequences of people travelling abroad with no insurance.

We have all seen the "Go Fund Me" appeals trying to fly someone home after they have had an accident or fallen ill; special transport doesn't come cheap. I would never travel without insurance.

Honestly, if you can't afford travel insurance, you can't afford your trip. It's as simple as that.

ALWAYS take out travel insurance the day you book your holiday, even if its a year away. You never know what could happen in the meantime.

Let's imagine you've booked a holiday for summer 2025. A month or two before, you've still got a while to go, so you haven't yet taken out insurance. But your kid plays football and breaks an ankle, requiring surgery. Oh shit, you can't cancel your holiday or rebook without incurring ££££. But if you had travel insurance already in place, that would protect you and you could make a claim.

Or what if you went to America and cut your finger and needed a stitch. Would you want to pay ££££££££ for a bandage? My friends sister fell off a bike in America and broke her arm - it cost £5k in hospital fees.

Or absolutely worst case scenario, you go on holiday and pass away. The travel insurance will pay for your body to come back home. I know someone that happened to - she went on holiday with her husband and he had a heart attack and passed away in Tenerife and she had to get the travel insurance to bring him home.

I also know someone who was on her honeymoon when her MIL died. Because the doctors had told the family to ring them and ask them to come home two days in because it didn't look good, the travel insurance not only reimbursed the return flight home, but also reimbursed the cost of the entire honeymoon so they could go again a year later.

I always buy my DS an annual travel policy as part of his christmas present! Have been doing this for the past 5 years. He is now 23.

well you sound like mother of the year…..not🙄
so if he had a serious accident?….you would leave your child to rot abroad? ….you sound fucking awful

i like this

You’re very right. It costs barely anything for a cheap policy. It would cost tens of thousands to get medically transported home (or whatever needed) if something were to happen.
The amount of go fund me appeals I see for people who didn’t have travel insurance and need to get home when something happens is silly, and god knows why anyone would donate when they could have just got travel insurance for a fiver before going.

When I travelled long-term I used to use world nomads travel insurance which are more expensive but were brilliant and I claimed easily twice - once a dental emergency and once when I needed to come home quickly for a family emergency.

If he gets insurance whilst already away just ensure he gets a policy that starts whilst he is already away. Most of the cheap/basic ones you have to start and finish in the UK (or wherever home is), but there will be some where you can start it once already away - world nomads allowed this.

I have trained my two since they were old enough to travel without us that they MUST take out insurance. They're on board with the idea, even if originally they only did it to shut me up.
@alrightluv It may well be that your son has insurance cover already without realising, via his bank account. It might not be world-wide or cover extreme sports but it could get him through this trip if a standard European thing?

Oh, and while we're on the subject of infantilising our adult kids get them to tell you who they're insured with. I realised recently when DS was on a long-haul trip that if anything happened to him whereby he was incapacitated (or dead) I would have had no idea who to contact to claim.

There are now insurers who will cover for trips already begun. This seems to be a recent thing, as it used to be impossible to insure once abroad.
This kind of cover is more expensive and the questionnaire much more thorough (to avoid people buying it after something has happened) but it is out there.

I agree that he should check though.

ETA one example. But if you Google, there are plenty
https://www.worldnomads.com/uk/travel-insurance?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjwjLGyBhCYARIsAPqTz1-p9yiXhTZPLv3eAmHGqHFR9-LSq_Uz5EGA0eC5AwcHpeqN0W9O2MIaAvRzEALw_wcB

Yes. Mine always forward me a copy and i do the same for them when dh and i travel.
Its called giving a shit, not infantalising.

Take care with lost luggage on the homeward bound leg though ... our case was lost last summer coming home and TUI pissed us about making us submit details of literally every item in it including receipts or photos of said items in use while away.

They then declared its in their Ts and Cs that they are not liable .

We we're getting ready to take it to the insurance company (so, factor in excess per person as the case has a bit of everyone's stuff in then the % they will deduct off value for wear and tear. = not much left) when the bugger turned up, 2 days before my birthday.

My travel insurance certainly states this too

Stay in his room? He's mid 20s!

Agree ... Providing we can afford to lose the deposit I now time travel insurance for a few days before payment of balance is due