Current situation in ME and travel insurance.

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For all the people stranded, either on trips to ME or in transit, things must be very stressful. Just trying to find out what's going on and when/how they'll get home, let alone worries about physical risks.

But what about financially? Will their extra costs be covered by travel insurance or would this be excluded as an act of war?

My own personal experience is that insurance companies do every possible thing they can to avoid making a payout so if they can use war as an excuse they certainly will.

It is in the T and C of most insurance companies, of any kind, not just travel, will not cover acts of war.

Yes, that's what I thought, but surely that means 1000s of the people currently stranded will be in financial hardship. Most going on holiday won't have factored in the cost of an extra week or two in hotels (and I understand hotels in Dubai are using dynamic pricing), but I haven't heard anything about that.

Dubai authorities said a few days ago that they would pay all bills for people stranded there - hotels, food etc.

I'm not sure if other Emirates are doing the same.

That's good. They must be very worried about losing all the foreign money.

Oh gosh, I’ve got a friend stranded in Israel who’s worried about the costs. She’s hoping that her insurance will cover her lost wages but it looks like maybe they won’t 😕

I thought the FO advised against all travel to Israel ?
In which case , travel insurance is invalid anyway.

It nay depend when she went to Israel and what the Foreign Office advice was at that time and when she was booked to come back.

She went before the advice changed to “against all travel” to Israel. She was due to come home last Sunday.

In that case she should be able to get assistance for repatriation to UK via her flight provider. Not sure about loss of earnings though.

Im not suggesting that people shouldn’t necessarily have travelled the Middle East destinations recently, but surely people realised it was on the cards that the current situation, or something very similar was likely to happen much sooner rather than later? My daughter went to Jordan two weeks ago for Ramadan, but had the foresight to get to the airport before flights were grounded; she paid through the nose to get a flight but understood that no travel insurance would cover the break out of war. People must have understood that travelling to the region at this time carried a risk which wouldn’t be covered by insurance.

No they didn't.
Travelling is so easy and cheap today. People want to go the sun in shiny Dubai or cheap Thailand and most are not at all aware of politics in the Middle East. Most people think that insurances pay far more than they do. That's why a lot of Europeans, Americans ect are stuck now.

Most travel insurance won't cover. Afaik the government are meant to step in technically for acts of war but haven't. In the UAE the UAE are funding hotel and food for those trapped. Issue is more for people elsewhere say in se asia who are traveling with non eu airlines. Many are thousands out of pocket and having to find their own way home. Also note having been trapped before even if they do cover expenses travel insurance and airlines do not cover loss of earnings. Many people will be having to take unpaid leave for the time they're trapped.

This whole thing has taught me

Fly with an eu based airline over non eu based if possible your rights are more (this also i ckudes uk based airlines)
Book through an ABTA agent for additional protection as they cover you if travel advice from thr FCDO changes.
Book through a credit card.

I have done none of these things this time and have a flight booked through Dubai for start of April. In total limbo. I could cancel but i'd lose about £500. So waiting on emirates to hopefully increase dates on their current refund offer. Even if they give the all clear to fly tbh i'd not risk it until i know everything is completely settled in that region. It's not so much that risk of safety but more the fact it could all kick off again and i'm trapped in Asia.

I really don’t accept that most people aren’t aware of the political situation in the Middle East - our media has been full of new about Gaza for over two years and more recently the escalating situation and the very clear threat of war. Unless you live in a complete bubble you couldn’t possibly not be aware that the region has been in a very fragile state for some time and there was a very good chance of serious conflict erupting at any point. There seems little point in buying travel insurance if you don’t know what it covers, but it’s always been widely known that war is generally excluded from normal policies.

I think people have been aware of bad things happening where brown people live, but haven't considered that could impact on their holiday resorts or more widely on the whole world.

Believe me. A lot of people are not aware of what is going on in Middle East or understanding why. Most of time they do well travelling. Right know not so well.

Specialist insurance companies exist to cover extreme situations. I know a person who has worked at one, and they will even cover mercenary soldiers going into combat zones. I know this isn’t useful now to anyone who has current bookings, but it might be something to consider in future planning, with the state of the world now.