Travel Insurance - Medical Declarations/Exclusions

[Armitage.Shanks]

I'm looking at sorting out travel insurance for myself and Mrs S and my preferred route is getting a current account that includes worldwide travel insurance, breakdown cover and mobile phone insurance for a reasonable monthly sum - £13pm.

Now whilst I'm straightforward in the fact I don't have to declare anything of interest medically, Mrs S isn't. For instance 8yrs ago she had a heart attack resulting in 3 x stents and now on medication as a result along with tablets for reducing cholesterol etc.. Other than taking the tablets no other treatment has been required.

Now insurers talk about illness/injury/disease within the last 12 months but then decide to throw in the catch all of being prescribed medication in which you then need to declare everything resulting in why you're on the meds.

If you don't declare stuff then you're not covered for it. Fair enough. However I've run the quote declaring all illnesses and the 'bolt on' 12 month 'upgrade' comes to £190. Within that the insurance then tells you what you're not covered for - being Coronary artery stent / Coronary angioplasty / Cholesterol levels.

So if you're not covered for it what's the point of declaring it and then being asked to pay £190 for the privilege? The standard wording under exemptions states 'Pre-existing medical conditions that you haven’t told us about'? You tell them, they exclude them and decide to add an additonal premium!

I've checked other insurance providers and they all say the same and all similar annual prices.

All said the £13pm deal is good not least it covers me, provides us both with breakdown cover and, not that I'm bothered, throws in mobile insurance.

[oilslick]

Try AllClear, they cover me for several things that I've declared.

[Phil.]

Insure&go and Staysure are worth a try too.

[Armitage.Shanks]

Thanks for the recommendations. I'll look to them.

The point is if the declared conditions are disclosed and then excluded why do they then seek to charge £190 for not providing any additional cover?

[TownIdiot]

Armitage.Shanks said:

Thanks for the recommendations. I'll look to them.

The point is if the declared conditions are disclosed and then excluded why do they then seek to charge £190 for not providing any additional cover?

Are you sure that the revised policy didn't have a new schedule revising/deleting the clause in the policy?

[Armitage.Shanks]

TownIdiot said:

Armitage.Shanks said:

Thanks for the recommendations. I'll look to them.

The point is if the declared conditions are disclosed and then excluded why do they then seek to charge £190 for not providing any additional cover?

Are you sure that the revised policy didn't have a new schedule revising/deleting the clause in the policy?

Not that I'm aware of as the box that came up stipulated that the three I mention above are 'not covered' in the policy 'upgrade'?

[InitialDave]

I've used a few insurance companies for travel insurance with medical declarations - Staysure, Travel Insurance 4 Medical, Cedar Tree are the ones I can recall.

However, I've yet to need to make a claim on a policy, which is obviously the real test of whether they're any good.

[TownIdiot]

Armitage.Shanks said:

Not that I'm aware of as the box that came up stipulated that the three I mention above are 'not covered' in the policy 'upgrade'?

Seems very strange and they would have hard time repudiating a claim where you have fully disclosed, they have accepted and taken your money.
Not that will be any use of you are arguing with them in a crisis.

having said that i would recommend Staysure and even then make sure you read the policy properly.

[Phil.]

Armitage.Shanks said:

Thanks for the recommendations. I'll look to them.

The point is if the declared conditions are disclosed and then excluded why do they then seek to charge £190 for not providing any additional cover?

My condition was included in the policy. They assess the risk of your condition requiring medical treatment while away and then provide cover for the price of the policy, the price being higher than if the medical issue was excluded.

Also check the difference between 12 month and short-term policy prices because it may be cheaper to take 12 months than say two separate policies in the same year.

[Armitage.Shanks]

TownIdiot said:

Armitage.Shanks said:

Not that I'm aware of as the box that came up stipulated that the three I mention above are 'not covered' in the policy 'upgrade'?

Seems very strange and they would have hard time repudiating a claim where you have fully disclosed, they have accepted and taken your money.
Not that will be any use of you are arguing with them in a crisis.

having said that i would recommend Staysure and even then make sure you read the policy properly.

They'd be taking my money on the understanding those illnesses are not covered though. It's an odd one given that I disclosed another minor ailment and that was then shown as included but not the others. This is for an annual worldwide policy given that's what Nationwide Flex Plus offers with insurance provided by Arriva. You have a facility before signing up to the account to check coverage and get an uplift price based on declared illnesses, which tells me what they will not cover despite declaring them. I tried a similar but standalone policy with Virgin and that came out the same - declared illnesses as above excluded with what was a smilalr price to the 'extra' cost to Arriva via Nationwide.

So effectively the travel insurance thorugh Nationwide is 'free' based on the £13pm account charges but declaring anything appears to end up costing the same as any customer buying insurance direct?

[TownIdiot]

Armitage.Shanks said:

They'd be taking my money on the understanding those illnesses are not covered though. It's an odd one given that I disclosed another minor ailment and that was then shown as included but not the others. This is for an annual worldwide policy given that's what Nationwide Flex Plus offers with insurance provided by Arriva. You have a facility before signing up to the account to check coverage and get an uplift price based on declared illnesses, which tells me what they will not cover despite declaring them. I tried a similar but standalone policy with Virgin and that came out the same - declared illnesses as above excluded with what was a smilalr price to the 'extra' cost to Arriva via Nationwide.

So effectively the travel insurance thorugh Nationwide is 'free' based on the £13pm account charges but declaring anything appears to end up costing the same as any customer buying insurance direct?

I think they have an error in their quotation system then.
I have checked my "free" travel policy and it has exactly the same wording for the exclusion.

It would almost certainly be considered unfair and you would win following a complaint, but that is no consolation when you are gasping for breath trying to remember the pin for credit card as your claim has been denied.

Definitely look at staysure and Saga.

[8.4L 154]

I'd imagine their assessment is that whilst they are excluding cover for the specified illness they are also pricing in the added likelihood of other medical needs not directly attributed to the excluded condition but are more likely to occur as a result of the excluded condition.

Happens all the time in insurance, take car insurance, no fault claim, your renewal goes up because you drive near people who crash into you.

Sucks, but speaking as someone who took out pre-existing medical travel insurance in the three days between discharge from hospital and getting on a flight, and which saved the need to pay a $150,000 medical bill. Make sure your covered.

[Armitage.Shanks]

Thanks for the replies. I'm going to ring them up to explain their pricing for excluding disclosed ailments.

Then I'll gave the companies mentioned abovea try. For me it's not an issue as I have nothing to relevant to declare so I'll likely take the Nationwide account deal to save on my own travel insurance and lump in the UK/EU recovery that doesn't exclude vehicles over a certian age, then buy Mrs S insurance as a stand alone.

[ScubaBiker]

I have had travel insurance from Nationwide for about 10 months. I know they have changed insurance providers for new accounts now, but when I opened the account I did have to add a couple of pre-existing conditions. My wife broke her leg and needed surgery a couple of months before we opened the account, so we did pay extra to add it to the cover. The extra payment covered anything related to the injury and surgery. If we hadn't paid the extra it wouldn't have covered any further issue relating to the injury/leg. the advisor I spoke to was pretty helpful and even advised me to wait a week or two before adding it to the cover as the price would fall 12 weeks after surgery.

As a reference point, prior to the Nationwide cover I had an annual policy with Staysure. We had to claim on this poilcy for a cancelled holiday - due to my wife's broken leg. They were pretty easy to deal with, I just filled out a couple of online forms and uploaded relevant paperwork and they paid out quite quickly. Communication during the claim was a bit lacking, but I can't fault how they processed the claim.

[Griffith4ever]

Armitage.Shanks said:

Thanks for the recommendations. I'll look to them.

The point is if the declared conditions are disclosed and then excluded why do they then seek to charge £190 for not providing any additional cover?

I wonder if they just put you in a higher risk group?

My mrs has Lupus, so we have to declare that, and all her meds, plus my BP meds and statins, but no mention of exclusions of anything Lupus related (That could literally be EVERYTHING!) nor BP/heart related. It does up teh annual policy from £180 to £340 for the pair of us.

Thinking about it, I'm now lower risk as my BP is 114/76 whereas it peaked over 200/128 when I realised I had an issue! So the meds make me a higher risk but my health is better on them than without...