Travel insurance is one of those things to which most of us give little or any thought.
A former colleague flew to America without travel insurance and contracted gastro-enteritis. He didn't seek medical assistance because it is so expensive in America and it really spoiled his holiday. Compared to some he was lucky. A heart attack in the USA could set you back tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in treatment costs. If you're too young to think about heart attacks, how about a car accident?
If you go on a package they'll insist you have insurance and you can just take their standard package. This is adequate for most people, but it's not a cheap option. I'm taking a self drive trip to Germany for 5 days shortly and the package operators standard package was over £50. By selecting the right levels of cover with Direct-Travel, the premium was under £10, a saving of over 80%. I have yet to find anybody providing similar cover cheaper.
So, if I'm saving so much, am I getting a second rate policy?
My answer to that is no. First the policy is underwritten by Axa, a very reputable insurer and one of the largest insurance groups in Europe.
Secondly, I will admit that I don't have theft cover. I pay for all risks cover on my household policy and I chose not to pay for it again. You may think that even if you have all risks cover you can avoid a claim on your household policy by paying the extra premium. Unfortunately it is common practice in the insurance, where a risk is covered twice, for the insurer that receives the claim to pass some of the claim on. If you claim from your travel insurance, you will probably still find a claim on the record for your household policy.
Finally, I have checked the level of cover. I believe the cover provided will meet most eventualities and I'm not undertaking any excluded activities. I am happy that my 80% saving is not a false economy.
I have to make the one caveat that I have never claimed on one of their policies, so I can't comment on the claims service.
For those of you who wish to take out a fuller level of cover, you will probably still get a better deal from Direct-Travel than your tour operator. All tour operators get a very substantial commission from sales of travel insurance. I seem to recall hearing that 80% of the cost of one tour operators insurance was commission!
Even if you choose to stick with your tour operator's insurance, do keep a very careful eye on the exclusions. Activities deemed to be dangerous, such as scuba diving and skiing may well be excluded.
The process of choosing and buying cover, is really very simple. There are links to policy types, FAQs, etc from the front of the web page. If you click on "Instant Quote" it lists the policy types available with "how do I decide?". From the "how do I decide?" link you can compare levels of cover and read the policy wording. If you decide to get a quote and/or buy then go back to the "Instant quote" page, select the policy type, click on the "proceed" button and follow the process through.
P.S. They also do reasonably priced continental breakdown cover with the service provided by Mondial. I haven't really shopped around, so I can't say how the prices compare.
PPS. I've rated them excellent on APR, so that it's the same as the other ratings. It should be N/A, but that's not an option I'm allowed.
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Jul 19th, 2003
(Jan 17th, 2004)
very helpful by (82%):
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