When you’re planning to go on holiday there are many things to consider and as such, remembering to buy travel insurance can sometimes seem like an afterthought. However, no matter where you’re going or how long you’re going for, it is an essential and you should always make sure you have the right travel insurance for your trip. It’s surprising how many people get caught out and fail to purchase the necessary cover only to discover the hard way that it would have been really useful to have after all.
I’m a careful person so why is travel insurance so important? Put simply, if anything goes wrong, your insurance will make sure you have the tools you need to fix it. For example, imagine that you went on holiday, didn’t bother taking out a travel insurance policy and your travel operator suddenly went bust while you were away, leaving you stranded.
While there are repatriation schemes in place to make sure you get home eventually, you’d have to cover your costs while you waited. By contrast, if you had holiday insurance, you could call your insurance provider, explain the situation and chances are that they’d be able to help you or even get you home sooner than you’d otherwise be able to.
This means that one of the main reasons to purchase holiday insurance is so you’re covered for unanticipated events. A prime example of this was the chaos caused when the Icelandic volcano erupted last year, leaving people stranded all over the world. This is exactly the sort of situation your travel insurance can be useful for, making sure that you can pay for accommodation until you can get home.
Holiday insurance also covers essentials such as your baggage and money, so if it goes missing while you’re away, you shouldn’t lose out. It also covers health issues, although with some exceptions if you have a pre-existing condition that isn’t covered. This is important as most other countries don’t have an NHS as we do in the UK; this means that without insurance, you could end up with an unfortunately large bill for your care. However, with insurance, all you’d have to pay is the excess.
Something else travel insurance covers you for is extreme sports and other activities that are considered to be high risk; there are special types of insurance available to make sure you’re covered if you’re going to be taking part in any high risk activities. This is vital as you never know what might happen and, even though most people will never make a claim on their holiday insurance, it certainly helps to give you peace of mind when you’re away.