Earlier this month we reported that Norwich Union had conducted research which found that 51% of British holidaymakers were considering leaving travel insurance off of their list of holiday essentials this year due to the increased pressures resulting from the credit crunch(News article: ‘Scrapping travel insurance ‘isn’t worth the risk’’).

When we reported this story, we knew that we would have to bring our readers methods to cut the cost of their travel insurance, as well as reasons why it’s not wise to leave for a holiday without this cover. We thought this is especially important considering we have just entered the peak holiday season.

The Foreign Commonwealth Office (FCO) says “Don’t travel without insurance...take out adequate Travel Insurance or you could face a huge medical bill if you fall ill and need treatment”.

Norwich Union reported that in 2007, over £60m was paid out in insurance claims with the cost of the average medical claim at £1,200 and the average luggage claim at £220.

The FCO reports that it costs £35-45,000 for an air ambulance from the East coast of the USA back to the UK.

There are several ways you can cut the cost of your travel insurance and some even mean that you shouldn’t lose out on the amount of cover you receive.

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According to Sainsbury’s Finance, over 50 million domestic holidays are taken by UK residents each year.

The obvious thing that comes to mind when thinking about travel insurance is the medical cover it provides should you become ill or be injured whilst abroad.

It wouldn’t be silly to presume that Britons taking domestic holidays think they don’t need travel insurance because if they get ill or injured they think they will be treated under the National Health Service (NHS) as normal. Of course, they would be right about the NHS part, but possibly wrong about not having a need for travel insurance.

Travel insurance would not be needed by a Briton to cover their NHS treatment in another area of the UK but it could still be considered an essential because things can go wrong no matter where you are on holiday.

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When people think of travel insurance, they generally think of it as being something to protect them while they are on holiday.

However, some people forget that travel insurance is also there to protect them before they set off.

Most travel insurance will include an element of cancellation cover to cover the traveller if they need to cancel the trip because events such as illness, the death of a ‘close family member’ and redundancy.

When you go to buy your travel insurance, the insurer will not ask you when you want cover to begin and end but will instead ask you for your departure and return dates.

This can be quite confusing for those people wondering about their cancellation cover because it would appear it doesn’t start until the day of departure. Some people may think this means that if you can’t make the holiday on the day of departure then your cancellation cover will kick in regardless of when the insurance was purchased.

What some people don’t realise is that this cover will only apply if the travel insurance policy was purchased before the event causing the need to cancel occurs. If a family member becomes ill after you have booked your holiday but before you have purchased your travel insurance and they then happen to pass away before you go on holiday, your insurer may not cover you for cancelling your holiday because the death will not be totally unexpected.

Another possible scenario could be that you have booked your holiday and get ill in the time frame before you purchase your travel insurance. Your cancellation cover will therefore not be valid if you were ill at the time you purchased your travel insurance because you will have been aware of the slightest possibility that you may not make your holiday.

The key thing to learn from these possible scenarios is that buying your travel insurance as close to the time of booking your holiday is probably the most sensible thing to do.

If you compare travel insurance it won’t take you long to find the policy that’s right for your individual needs and circumstances. If you have any doubts about whether or not you can get insurance cover, it is probably best to make these queries before you book your holiday.

Click the link to compare travel insurance

Today is the last day of the Barclaycard survey which for the last month has been giving all who complete it a Thomas Cook money-off voucher worth up to £150.

The Barclaycard survey takes just a few minutes to complete and asks participants about their spending habits both on and offline.

Once you have completed the survey, you just need to enter in your address details so we can send you the voucher.

The voucher will be worth £150 to a group of 2 people booking a holiday of 14 nights or more or £100 for a group of 2 people booking a holiday for 7 nights or more or a single person booking a holiday for 14 nights or more.

What’s more, if you use your Barclaycard to pay for your holiday, you won’t have to pay the usual 2.5% credit card fee.

Click on the link to take part in the Barclaycard survey

If you are going on holiday, don't forget your Travel Insurance

In recent months our household finances have been squeezed by rising mortgage, utility, food and petrol prices.

For many, this will mean that a summer holiday this year is out of the equation because there won’t be any spare cash once all the bills are paid for.

However, as we all know, taking a break out from the stresses and strains of daily life can revitalise even the most tired soul and prepare it for another year of hard work.

So, if you have resigned yourself to the fact that you won’t be jetting off to warmer climes this summer, think again.

Here are our top tips to help you budget for a summer holiday including how to get your hands on a money-off voucher for Thomas Cook worth £150.

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If you are going on holiday in the UK, you will probably still benefit from buying travel insurance to cover you for unexpected events such as lost or damaged luggage.

Generally speaking, holidays in the UK are covered by annual multi-trip travel insurance so long as you have at least two night of accommodation pre-booked.

If you don’t have an annual multi trip travel insurance policy, it is best if you speak to travel insurance companies about what cover you will need when you go on holiday in the UK because then you will get the travel insurance that best suits your individual needs.

It is likely that the policy you buy will be for European travel insurance cover, so you will still get medical cover. Obviously, if you are a UK resident you will be covered under the NHS anyway so you probably won’t need this medical cover. Some insurers will not give you the option to remove this in place of a lower premium, but some might.

Either way, there are still risks involved when travelling in the UK so travel insurance may well be a beneficial purchase.

Click on the link to compare cheap travel insurance

If you are thinking about taking your children on holiday with you, don’t forget to get them travel insurance cover as they will only be covered if they are named on travel insurance policy documents.

If your child were to need emergency medical treatment while on holiday, and they weren't covered by a travel insurance policy, you could end up footing a medical bill for thousands of pounds.

Travel insurance cover for children varies from provider to provider. Different companies have varying ways of defining a ‘child’ in terms of its age, different rules on who the child must travel with in order to be covered by the travel insurance policy and different limits for the number of children covered per policy.

Some travel insurance providers will insure your children for free when you buy travel insurance for yourself and others will cover children for half price.

If the provider does not offer a free or half-price deal, they will generally offer cheaper ‘family travel insurance policies’ which will provide cover for you, your spouse or partner and your children. Some providers will cover your step children or foster children under a family policy or on the adult's single trip or annual multi trip travel insurance policy.

Age

The usual age range for children is 0-17, although some companies classify 0 to 2 year olds as infants and 2 to 17 year olds as children. Some providers will only classify 0 to 14 year olds as children.

Most companies will classify 19 to 23 year olds in full-time education as children for travel insurance purposes.

Who must the child travel with to be covered?

Generally speaking, you must be the parent or legal guardian of the children travelling on your travel insurance policy in order for them to be covered however some insurers will cover children travelling with Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles if the family member has at least a single trip travel insurance policy.

Others providers specify that the policy that the child is named on must belong to a parent or guardian who lives at the same address as the child.

Number of children covered

Insurance providers vary when it comes to the number of children eligible for free or reduced price travel insurance. Some offer unlimited child places and others offer a set number of children per adult insured.

If you are jetting off soon, compare travel insurance to find the best deals for you and your children
 

When buying a joint travel insurance policy, be sure to check the policy details (normally viewable online) before you finalise the purchase.

On each policy document you will find details of how much cover you will be provided with for the cost of the premium. This is normally displayed in a table illustrating a breakdown of the cover you are paying for which will include details on how much cover you get for emergency medical expenses and if your holiday is cancelled, for example.

However, in the case of a joint policy sometimes the policy wording isn’t transparent about whether the amount of cover provided is per person or per policy and therefore divisible by two.

In the policy ‘definitions’ it may state whether the cover is per person or the total amount for the two travellers.

For example, in Endsleigh’s Travel Insurance policy the section called ‘definitions’ provides an explanation into what the insurer means when they refer to “You/Your/Insured Person”. The insurer will use these terms to explain the cover provided for “each person travelling on a Trip whose name appears in the Statement of Insurance”.

This would indicate that each person named on the travel insurance policy would each be entitled to the amount of cover as set out in the wording of the policy.

However, if you aren’t sure of how much cover you are getting after reading the travel insurance policy documents, you would probably be wise to ring the insurer and find out for sure or you may end up without adequate cover.

Going on holiday? Why not compare travel insurance.

Last week, thousands of travellers were left stranded at Heathrow without their baggage when the grand opening of Terminal 5 resulted in chaos.

Thousands of holidaymakers faced flight delays and cancellations and British Airways is still trying to reunite luggage with its rightful owners, leaving holidaymakers with the realisation that good quality travel insurance is invaluable.

Aviation minister, Jim Fitzpatrick, has estimated that the total number of stranded bags stood at 28,000.

It is clear that those passengers without travel insurance will be at a loss because of the chaos.

Below are some tips to help you when it comes to choosing the right travel policy and for getting the most out of your cover when things go wrong.

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This Easter weekend we get two lovely bank holidays. What better way to use these than to go on a nice short-break holiday?

However, these weekend breaks present just as many risks as any other holiday so it is paramount that you cover yourself with a travel insurance policy.

If you think that your Easter weekend break is going to be the only holiday you will take outside of the UK this year, then you will probably just need a single-trip travel insurance policy.

If, however, you are fortunate enough to be going on more than one holiday this year you stand to save a reasonable sum if you buy annual multi-trip travel insurance.

Sometimes, it is cheaper to buy an annual multi-trip travel insurance policy in place of a single-trip policy, i.e. you buy multi-trip cover when you know you are only going on one trip.

You would need to check the terms and conditions of individual policies to be sure that the annual travel insurance policy would be valid if you only went on one trip. You would also need to be sure that the amount of cover provided by the cheaper multi-trip policy is equivalent to the cover you would get with the single-trip policy.

Some providers offer a no-claims discount if you have purchased travel insurance from them in the past and not had to make a claim. Other providers offer a discount on their travel insurance policies if you currently have another insurance product with them, e.g. car insurance or home insurance

Compare single-trip and multi-trip travel insurance and see how much you can save.