This holiday insurance requirement is ludicrous and should be changed

[Sunshineandoranges]

I have just been watching Rip Off Britain. It seems that almost every holiday insurance has a clause which says that in the event of a sudden bereavement meaning you need to cancel your holiday ( the man’s father had died suddenly), you are only covered if you had declared any pre existing conditions the deceased person had. So according to that logic many couples would have to declare not only their own health conditions, but four possibly elderly parents. My adult children don’t even know some of my pre existing health conditions. The presenter said anybody taking out holiday insurance should declare all pre existing conditions of anybody whose death might mean cancellation of holiday,even minor health issues to cover themselves. So, lovely family spend thousands on holiday, granny dies so they have to cancel,no insurance cover unless the company agree to make a goodwill payment. Admiral Insurance refused to pay and wouldn’t change that decision. So, AIBU to think something needs to be changed about this?

Insurance companies are the devil incarnate, but I don't think this is actually that unreasonable.

If you can claim due to a bereavement, the insurance company need to risk assess the likelihood before quoting you. Someone whose parent is terminally ill and likely to die in the next year booking a holiday is obviously much more likely to claim than someone who has no elderly or sick relatives.

It should definitely be explicitly asked on the form though rather than just expecting you to declare it with no prompting.

That's awful. I think the law needs to change so insurance companies cannot penalise people for not declaring something which doesn't impact on the claim; i.e. in your case, unless the illness was eczema related, they should have had to pay out. Until then, I'm on Luigi's side.

Grumpy a big thank you for making me understand insurance! Think I’ll be holidaying in the uk this year!

I have to say, it’s put me off even trying to get an insurance.
I have a complex medical history. Lots of small things over the years. There is no way I’m not going to forget some if them. And there is the ‘borderline’ results etc….

What’s the point if the chance is they won’t cover me anyway…..

I don't have cervical cancer ( or a cervix anymore) after operation for it 3 years ago and been clear since. The insurance companies still want to charge me extortionate amounts , even if I exclude cancer cover from the policy. Last quote was £2800. Now I'm not being funny but if I had a reoccurrence it's not something that would need to be treated as an emergency anyway, it could wait until I was home

I’m sorry I’ve put you off (and you too OP). I should probably have mentioned there are specific medical travel insurance companies that do cover more complex & significant health issues for travelling abroad - you might need this on top of standard cover for things like lost luggage, delays, thefts abroad etc. We got details of a decent insurer (it was years ago so I don’t have the name handy) who took every listed detail about my elderly parents’ health issues about 13 years ago. They’d both had significant health issues, including my dad taking ill in Spain, needing an Op & being repatriated home after 8 weeks, only about 3/4 years earlier. Because it was a one off holiday, the premium was affordable. If you were to buy a year’s worth of cover, it wouldn’t be. And so if you’ve one big holiday you want to go for, in theory it shouldn’t be that expensive. But it’s been a while & I don’t know what the current market is like on that.

I don’t want the hassle cos I’ve been put off by the work I’ve done. But I do need to remind myself I’m only seeing the things that have gone wrong. That does skew my view on it. I guess my last word on it is, it’s all doable as long as you ask plenty of questions, get a proper understanding of what’s covered & what isn’t. Prepare for what you know isn’t covered (don’t take expensive items abroad, most policies have limit which means your expensive head phones or iPad wouldn’t be covered if lost/stolen/damaged). And always travel with a credit card with a lot of credit accessible - just in case.

It’s absolutely doable & it just takes knowing the pitfalls to try and ensure they don’t ruin things in the event something happens which means you need help.

And one last thing - unless this cover has disappeared, always, always get cruise cover. The easiest claims I dealt with were ones where the cruise ships didn’t dock as planned due to bad weather. It happens a lot, and all that’s needed is confirmation from the ship/travel co that the specific destination that was part of the holiday didn’t happen & you get a pay out for every port you don’t dock at. If the weather is bad, and it happens a few times, you can end up getting a decent chunk of money back (from memory it was either £150 or £250 per person, per port).

This is why it is worth paying a small amount extra for better standard holiday insurance. I had a miscarriage on holiday at 12 weeks a couple of years ago, and was astounded by how good our insurance company were. Kind, professional, and no quibbles over anything whilst we were away or at home.

Used them again for a different trip, where my husband had his phone pick pocketed. And again, excellent, no quibbles.

I'd say the name but then I may be accused of being spam. But just think of a well-known high street store that used to use a sexy voice for their food adverts.

I was speaking to a funeral director recently who said a big change has been funerals aren't set at the first available date anymore and people wait until they've had holidays, etc. I didn't watch the programme but if someone has already died and they're choosing not to go a week later that's very different from saying I couldn't leave because I was told they'd die while I was on holiday or they died the day before we left.

This happened to me sadly, the Post Office covered it all (not all the hol, I mean my financial loss) and didn't need any disclosures. They were good. It was not an unpleasant experience to deal with them in the aftermath of the most traumatic time of my life.

How do insurance companies get your medical details during the claim process? Surely you need to give consent? What happens if you don’t do that?

It is infuriating when things like high BP and cholesterol levels are well controlled, mine are too, but I’d rather declare them and pay the relatively small extra amount in the grand scheme of things,than not and end up with them not paying out if anything did happen, I declare everything as you can guarantee they will find some way to link your bad back to your heart condition otherwise.

The ins co provides a mandate allowing them to approach your GP to ask Qs on any medical condition relevant to the claim. If you don’t want to share info, the claim is declined, as failure to provide the information required breaches the T&Cs of the policy, and is an automatic decline. The Qs asked are proportionate to the claim only, and are relevant to Qs that confirm whether cover applies or not. Your entire medical history isn’t included. It’s just limited to what was asked in the original proposal form, and the claim submitted. So if the proposal form asked for any/all issues that warranted a GP visit in the previous 2 years, your GP will only answer Qs covering that period. The information is then assessed in relation to the medical issue that warrants the claim, and as long as there’s nothing missed out, and nothing was withheld when the policy was taken out, the claim should be accepted.

This is a general explanation of how it works. When you see stories of people stuck somewhere with expensive medical bills & struggling to find a way to get back home, it’s usually because something relevant has been missed, or they’ve not taken out cover before going abroad. I’ve seen a few stories in the press where even I can’t fathom the logic behind the decisions so it’s not fool proof & there’s certainly some questionable logic at times.

It just illustrates that where you can, ask all the Qs you need to, to try and understand the cover you’re taking out or have as part of some benefits package. The best you can do is just ask all the Qs to make sure you understand as best as you can, and give all the right information before you buy the policy/update your ins co on relevant information.

You can get a print out from your GP of every appointment and meds that you have had, there was no cost when I needed one to renew my disabled parking badge. It went back years, covering my previous GP, to the 1970s I think. I just phoned to request one, spoke to one of the secretaries and that was it! I found it very useful when booking my insurance recently.

I decided which company to use by going on a comparison website for holiday cover with medical conditions then phoned them up to go through all the questions. I was able to discuss what was relevant rather than try to work it out for myself. I did not choose the cheapest company but went for the fourth in the list as it was a company I recognised - The Post Office.

I forgot to mention that I had a d&c back in 1989 as it was not on my medical print out as I’d gone privately so I phoned the insurers back the next day. Luckily I was told it would not increase my premium as it was so long ago and was not a chronic condition. But I am covered even with a lengthy list of ailments and previous issues - high blood pressure, allergies, arthritis, TIA leading to some loss of vision due to blood clot in retina, I take bp meds, statins, anticoagulants, antihistamine and high strength painkillers daily and use aids to help me walk!

However it’s cost me almost £600 for a nine day visit to my sister in the US.

Your entire medical history isn’t included. It’s just limited to what was asked in the original proposal form, and the claim submitted. So if the proposal form asked for any/all issues that warranted a GP visit in the previous 2 years, your GP will only answer Qs covering that period.

Thats fair enough, my travel ins company only asked for 2 years of info, and that’s what I supplied. I was concerned, after reading this thread, that they’d just want 2 year’s info from me, but then potentially penalise me for not disclosing something that happened years ago (even though they hadn’t asked me to go back that far)

Or you go on the NHS app…. And you have all your visits to the GP listed.
You know exactly what the insurers would see.

But as some PP said, it’s not just the obvious. It’s also ‘I went to see the GP for some GI issues. It went away, no diagnosis given so I didn’t mention it’ situations.
Like I had pain in my fingers. Bloods done, no issue so not RA. Dismissed by GP. And … the insurance decides it was the first sign of auto immune disease/neuropathy/whatever so I should have mentioned it??

I did mention every visit to my gp, even for vague issues and negative tests, every appointment was listed in the printout.

I have not used the NHS app since Covid times, I must have another look at it.

I am so anxious about medical insurance being declined that I go over the top in covering everything. I now have an up to date record in Notes on my phone which I plan to update following another appointment or change in medication.

I seem to remember the wording said something along the lines of you wouldn't be covered if a close relative had a known condition which was likely to mean you would have to cancel or return home early at the time you booked your holiday or were due to travel/had travelled. We used to go on holiday without our severely disabled DD and we absolutely were not covered for anything related to her. So if she had taken ill or died when we were due to go away or whilst we were away, we lost our money if we cancelled or paid ourselves if we had to return home early.

It's a pretty grey area though. MIL is 97. We fully expect and hope she'll see 100 and beyond. But I can just imagine our travel insurer trying to wriggle out of paying up if we cancelled a holiday because she died as we were due to travel - just because of her age. I will add she still lives independently, is physically healthy and doesn't even have carers - so I'd see the insurers in court!

Sorry I know this wasn't the main point of the thread, but am grateful for it as it made me consider and check some travel insurance I took out for a specific trip in the summer. As I clicked through from a price comparison website I didn't remember specific questions about GP visits, medications and conditions,

I phoned them and disclosed autism diagnosis for my dc, prescribed melatonin, a blood test/previous glandular fever for another dc and weight loss medication for myself. My insurer was not too interested in prescriptions it was more about medical conditions, they asked in my view sensible questions about the autism such as level of independence. Anyway, there was happily no additional premium to pay but am glad to have peace of mind now.