Travel Insurance 101: Do You Need It?
Many of our guests have asked us over and over again, “Travel insurance. Do I really need it?”
AdventureWomen values you as a client and wants to do everything possible to make your chosen adventure travel trip with us (and all your trips!) enjoyable and worry free. Because the unforeseen and unexpected can occur however – before you leave or when you’re away from home – we strongly encourage you to purchase travel insurance to protect your vacation investment.
What Is Travel Insurance?
Travel Insurance is insurance that is intended to cover medical expenses, trip cancellation, financial default of travel suppliers, and other losses incurred either before your vacation or while traveling, either domestically or internationally. Travel insurance is different from car or home insurance in that you buy a policy to cover a specific vacation and do not pay a monthly premium.
Why do we recommend travel insurance for our guests?
Well first, in the grand scheme of things, travel insurance is fairly inexpensive. And, of course, there are different levels of plans to choose from covering any and everything, flights only, or medical only. Regardless of your choice of plan, however, the cost of your travel insurance premium is insignificant relative to what you would spend in case of an emergency or for any of the reasons listed below.
What Does Travel Insurance Typically Cover?
1. Trip Cancellation
In case you need to cancel your trip prior to departure, it will reimburse the pre-paid, non-refundable portion of your trip cost for a number of reasons such as sickness while traveling (you, family member or person you are traveling with), injury while traveling (you, family member or person you are traveling with), bankruptcy, terrorism, etc. You may also chose to purchase a plan that will cover you for cancelling for any reason.
2. Medical Care
Medical providers outside your insurance plan and especially outside the United States often ask for up-front payments for medical services that can be very costly if you get sick or injured while abroad. Your health insurance may not cover you outside of the US, or may have limited coverage. Travel insurance covers these payments. Travel insurance also covers medical evacuation if you needed to be emergency transported to a nearby medical facility, or transported home.
3. Lost or Delayed Baggage and Personal Effects
Most policies will reimburse you for items lost, stolen or damaged in transit, and cover expenses incurred if luggage is delayed. You can also chose coverage for lost credit cards and passports.
4. Missed Connection/Flight Delays or Flight Cancellation
You can be reimbursed for expenses incurred in case of a missed connection, flight delay or flight cancellation.
5. Trip Interruption
In case you need to return home from your trip early due to covered reasons, it will help you pay for additional expenses to make arrangements to return home early.
6. Travel Assistance Services
Travel Insurance also comes with assistance services such as medical or legal assistance, evacuation assistance, lost baggage retrieval and concierge services.
How Do I Purchase Travel Insurance for my trip with AdventureWomen?
TravelGuard comes highly recommended by our guests
Safe travels!
