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.

That sounds useful. DD has just spent 9 months abroad and wants/needs to travel again in the summer. She's struggling to find travel insurance that doesn't insist you have spent 6 out of the past 12 months in the UK, but maybe those would.

DH's suggestion was 'not to worry about it'. I don't operate like that.

I think the point is you take out the insurance when you book, but for the period you are away, then you are covered for cancellations

I had a nightmare travelling with a new bf who had a heart attack in Cyprus, 3 hr op and no insurance!
Hospital threatened to take our passports, boarding passes, credit cards. Luckily put him on mine, but It was so stressful and had to sort/organise repatriation myself. Not 1 word of thanks from his family for saving his life and his/their bank balance. Make sure people you travel with have insurance, or do not go away with them, be my advice

OMG! 😱
How absolutely awful (but I'm wondering if his family were relieved that he was your problem and not theirs? 😬)

I’ve just set up a family WhatsApp chat for travel docs. Both DC. Have insurance but I wouldn’t have know who with, policy details etc.

I also had this conversation with DC when they started going away by themselves - I reminded them that we don't know enough people to go fund a medi vac helicopter!!

Exactly.

As a parent, you aren't going to leave your dc alone in a foreign hospital with no means to pay for treatment or to get home, are you ? So it would become the OP's business.

An annual policy really is a pittance for a young healthy person in their 20s as well - especially as a fraction of 3 foreign holidays in the space of a year.

Not all child-free people are unaware that the love and concern you have for your child doesn’t stop on their 18th birthday. However you appear to be one of the ignorant ones.

Of course a decent parent would not leave their young adult child struggling abroad in the event of an accident or illness. They would want to support them to return. Insurance is a way for family to avoid exorbitant costs. The OP is being responsible. Hope this thread has taught you something.

Middle age?! I sorted insurance out when I was at university and onwards. My friends did too.

Travel insurance is the same as any insurance its a gamble

I rarely use it within the eu. Emergency health is covered by EHIC and the chances of a young person dying abroad needing repatriation is super slim.

Presumably the young man got home safely as this thread is over two months old.
@Maddy70 Personally if one of my children were lying in a hospital bed anywhere in the world I would want to be at their side........ EHIC or its replacement covers 70% of medical expenses (NOT all of them...... people in France take out private insurance to cover them for the 30% remaining, and I imagine it's the same elsewhere in Europe), but there is no provision for hotel bills for a family member to stay with the patient or flights and hotel bills for someone to fly out to them if they were travelling alone.
A friend's 22 year-old daughter was knocked down by a car in Canada - fortunately she had travel insurance which paid for her Dad to fly out (she was in intensive care and they really didn't know whether she would make it or not) while her Mum looked after the rest of the family and the admin and when she was well enough to travel the insurance paid for a business class flight on a scheduled airline and an accompanying doctor ...... cheaper for them than a special plane.
My children knew the young woman and so they listen to me when I nag them about their travel insurance.

So foolish not to have travel insurance. When I was a kid my dad had what looked like a minor fall off a windsurfer bust his back and we could not travel home on the coach from the South of France as planned. The whole family ended up getting flown home in an air ambulance. The cost of that plus medical bills and the rest of the family’s additional accommodation were covered by travel insurance. I was always told we would have had to sell our home to pay the bill without insurance so am pretty evangelical about it to this day.

You did the right thing tearing a strip off your son!

Yes he's fine. Both dcs have annual travel insurance now.

It’s not interfering it’s being sensible! If her son has an accident etc the family are the ones who will be sorting the mess out if he is not able to do it himself!

And if you get ill the week before and can’t travel? Have an accident, land in hospital and can’t travel? A relative dies and you can’t travel? Or you get ill on hospital and have to change your flights..

you get your passports stolen, or your bag with your phone. Or the hotel goes bankrupt and you need to pay out for new accommodation.

insurance is not just for medical costs.

Many people, including adults, don’t realise what a problem not having travel insurance can have. Even with insurance you can end up with situations that we don’t get in the UK, a friend was taken ill on her flight to a country in South America. An ambulance was called to the airport, but before they agreed to take her to the hospital they said she had to pay them upfront in cash, so wheeled her to a cash point. They were very pleasant about it, and gave her a valid receipt which she claimed back on her insurance ( luckily she was very well covered). She had funds to cover it, but it was the last thing she expected or wanted when she was feeling really poorly.

I know the OP's DC is now long back from his trip but to those who can't be bothered with travel insurance, please read on.

We went to the USA in 2007 - 2 adults late 30s/early 40s and 2 DDs aged 8 & 6. All in rude health. It was the trip of a lifetime with visits to friends in California then the Grand Canyon, Disneyland etc. I bought a travel insurance policy for £52 a couple of days before we left, On day 5, DH's appendix burst. We were by then in N Arizona in a fairly rural area in a motorhome. I drove him to the closest hospital who thankfully realised how serious it was. DH was taken by helicopter 250 miles to Tucson where he had 4 operations over the next week and spent just over a week in ICU followed by a week on a normal ward. We missed our flights home and as he had to be able to lie flat, he needed a business class flight. The total bill was over $250k. Our policy had an excess of £100. The insurance company paid for all but that £100.

If you can afford whatever that $250000 is in today's money, good luck to you. We now have an annual policy which covered the DDs until they were 21. I think DD1 has her own annual policy now as she has done some travelling this year and asked who ours was with. Both of them remember the whole episode very well and are avid followers of Martin Lewis's advice to buy it ASAYB (as soon as you book).

I agree but i always pay on credit card so get some protection via that

Why would my phone being stolen prevent a holiday

I can afford to sustain flight changes but i have never had to yet. As i say its a gamble like ny insurance

Dh sat waiting for dsis at French airport last week.

He got talking to a couple whose dsis was flying back to the UK.
She had arrived 7 weeks earlier for a 2 week holiday.
After 2 days she was vomiting and very ill. Taken to hospital by air ambulance.
Had infection and gallstones, got sepsis, icu.

No insurance.
Not even a EHIC, they had to get an emergency one.
They have no idea yet what the bill will be.

Her profession - travel agent!

It wouldn’t prevent a holiday, but if it gets stolen while on holiday that comes under your travel insurance. Same with bags, lost cases etc. back in the day a friend got his really expensive camera nicked- insurance paid out.

i couldn’t afford to lose an entire holiday if someone broke a leg and couldn’t go. Well I could, but why risk several thousand pound for the sake of £20.

same as house insurance, or any other really, when you need it you are thankful you have it.

@Nouvellenovel that's mad😳