To think that it should be illegal to go abroad without travel insurance

[AusBoundDD]

A friend has just put a plea for GoFundMe donations on our WhatsApp group as one of her cousins was involved in a car crash whilst on holiday in Spain, ending up in hospital with multiple bad fractures. He was uninsured so the family have been left unable to pay for his hefty ambulance fees, surgery, hospital stay etc. To make matters worse he isn’t fit to fly commercially and instead needs to be medically evacuated home to the UK via private air ambulance.

It feels like a yearly occurrence - someone begging for help to get their relative home after they’ve been stupid/naive enough to leave the country without adequate travel insurance. Surely it should be like having your passport - you can’t board a plane or gain entry to a country abroad without it?!

Provided that family member is aware of the risks and the costs and is able to cover those costs and not then expect donations. Fine by me.

I don’t think it should be illegal per se but people should be able to cover the costs themselves in these eventualities. They could run into the millions! Not many people can say that they can cover that!

My child has a long term medical condition and can get cover. It costs a fortune, more than a holiday to go long haul, less so if we stay in Europe. We pay it.

Ignore it is exactly what I'd do. I certainly wouldn't be contributing to someone else's medical bills because they couldn't be arsed/were too tight to pay for travel insurance for themselves.

So you'd be forcing them to accept the responsibility for their own choices - glad to hear it. Now if everyone would just do that, then there would be no need for the ridiculous concept of forcing everyone to pay higher insurance costs, just to save some people from the consequences of their own, easily foreseeable actions.

I have annual insurance, wouldn't travel without it, but I have zero trust in it.
I'm going back a few years, so things may have changed (though I doubt it), I had breast cancer, mastectomy, chemo, radiotherapy etc etc
A year later, planning a short break, I took out travel insurance
I declared it all, every snuffle, operation, investigation - you name it, it was declared.
I got cover, no problem, but they excluded any issues relating to my breast cancer diagnosis.
Knowing there would be nothing immediately life threatening, I went ahead.
I fell off a bus when it jerked forward as i was getting off, and broke my ankle. Thanks the Gods for insurance and cracked on with life.

My claim was rejected by the insurers, because they claimed my bone debsity/strength had been depleted by the treatment I had received for cancer, and therefore was more prone to breakage than the norm. As it was 'related' to my cancer, it was excluded from cover.

Now, right or wrong, would you have expected that?

Screwed my finances ☹️

I'm well over the outrage now, but every time I renew my insurance I resent the money suckered.

another problem is insurance companies not paying out. People find out they have brain tumour but because they had a blood test for menopause and didn’t declare it - they are denied cover!

We have joint annual worldwide cover via bank account it's something like £15 per month then we have to pay an extra £35 a year because my husband is an insulin dependent diabetic with arthritis and a bowel condition. So chronic conditions don't necessarily add a huge amount.

Where are these go fund me pages that are causing so much stress to people, surely you just ignore them, I have seen the odd sad face in the papers but not these pages, do you have to seek them out.

It already is a legal requirement for some people, before I had a British passport I had to prove I had insurance to go to a few places on holiday.

It could be like care insurance, self insurance still legal, but that money is ringfenced and held until the person returns home.

I have pre-existing conditions so mine is a little bit pricier than most, its still affordable, and as I don’t lie when I take it out when I have needed to use it it has always been smooth sailing.

No you dopey doris! Churchill are an insurance company!

Yes I do, I also send over a pdf of my medical notes as thats easier to get everything recorded. If you have pre-existing conditions you get used to doing it really. You can however get a broker to do it for you, which still often works out cheaper in the end.

i think a lot of people on this thread have a completely false sense of security with having travel insurance. If you are paying £10, £20 the reviews might look good for the cost of the cover, but what are the reviews like from them who had to claim?
The travel insurance my parents took out (five star de facto rating, Martin Lewis recommended for people with medical conditions, absolutely not the cheapest on the market) were absolutely terrible.
The insurance company dr (who had previously been suspended by the gmc and only recently re admitted) tried to argue with the EU drs what the medical best course of action would be as they didn’t want to pay.
we were extremely lucky to be able to pay for a second opinion in the uk, and pay for a medical repatriation back home for surgery.
the insurance company wanted the cheapest option and not the one with the best clinical outcomes, and wanted a treatment against the Drs who were with him’s medical advice.
From another two uk tourists in the hospital at the same time (cardiology) this was not an uncommon tactic. Internet forums reveal the same: The insurance companies do not want to pay out:,
The insurance company delayed, in my opinion to such an extent I was convinced so they didn’t have to pay medical repatriation costs. we were lucky we could pay. If we couldn’t have paid, I may have reluctantly considered a go fund me as a last option.
I am also 100% sure that this is correct as they ended up settling out of court in the uk to reimburse the costs.

Because not all insurance is £25? My friend’s parents in their 80s are going overseas next month, few health issues as expected at that ripe old age…over £1k insurance for them..

The T&C are usually very clear. Everyone can look at their GP records via the NHS app and the policy usually only requires 3 to 5 years history. My insurance company always does a telephone interview and they are very clear about what does or does not need to be declared. You need to take as much time and effort organising travel insurance as you do planning the holiday. I was ill on holiday recently and the treatment costs were £6K. I wouldn't have been able to afford that.

What when the holiday is £600 and insurance £2400. That doesn't add up. Not everyone can get cheap insurance. I'm definitely one of them. Yet I have nothing pre existing wrong that could possibly need urgent treatment

Yeah I was quoted £2400 on a trip because I'd had cervical cancer that was removed 2 years previously. Only other problem I'd had was appendicitis and that can reoccur as appendix was removed

It should be mandated that you need to prove you're insured to enter the country - similar to a visa.

Maybe they should do an accident cover. So anything linked to a pre existing condition is not covered, but accidents and new ailments are.

It doesn't matter how "clear" the ts and cs are (and they often aren't), insurers will often find a spurious reason to not pay out.

If people sre stupid enough to go abroad without insurance, on their head be it. I wouldn’t donate to any begging site because of stupidity. 🤷‍♀️

I don't think everything is on that app so I wouldn't rely on that, mine has got hardly anything on it.

100% ^

Agree with this too! ^

We would also fully cover any cost if he became unwell.

Any cost? Are you sure?

It's not just risks of his known illness you need to cover. The OP's example was a car accident. He could be walking down the street totally blameless and BAM, hit by a badly driven car and suddenly you are looking at hundreds of thousands of pounds for surgery, care, accomodation, specialist travel...can you cover that for him?

Unless you can bail out any eventuality, ultimately you are taking a risk and gambling it will be ok.

And to be fair, really bad things like this don't usually happen. Usually it's ok. But with millions going overseas every year, every year the worst does happen to some people.

So if he is unlucky enough to be one of them and he has no insurance what would happen? Cling to a bed until the hospital chucks him out and then beg on the streets? Try and get the government to pay to get him home?

(We are in the same position as your family member BTW)

The OP "just" wants people travelling to make sure they will not be dumped without support in a foreign country should the worst happen. Seems fair enough to me.

You could buy a cheap £20 policy that wouldn't actually cover you in reality if that was an issue. You'd have paperwork to get in. Bit like buying a refundable ,( or fake) flight to show at check in to be allowed to board. In Kuala Lumpur flying to Thailand and airline wouldn't let me check in as had no flight out of Thailand within 30 days. I just booked one on the BA site, showed them the details, got checked in and cancelled the flight ( 24 hour free cancellation) when landed in Bangkok.

Ways and means round most things

Yes I tried to get them to not cover me for cancer related stuff. That got the quote down to just over 2k.

Ridiculous as I Don't have any cancer and if it did reoccur it's not an emergency