We have used Allianz annual plans for several years and fortunately have never had a reason to make a claim. We are heading to Spain in September and used a travel agent to arrange some tours and hotels.
He has suggested Travel Guard as his preferred option over Allianz. He is an authorized agent for both, but he said 2 of his customers had had bad experiences with getting claims honored by Allianz and so he doesn’t really bother with them anymore.
He runs a small ‘high-end’ service. We know of him through a new neighbor who has used him for years, so I’m not doubting his knowledge, but I’m not sure it’s enough to make me want to change.
I originally came to Allianz based on Jeff’s (OrmontUS) book and travel dialogues.
Before I renew our plan, I thought I would seek opinions here.
Thanks.
As an aside, pricing of annual plans is often as cheap as single trip coverage (depending on the level of coverage). Even a second trip in a year makes it worthwhile.
What is your coverage? And do credit cards cover some of that (several cards have various trip coverages if you use their card to buy the tickets, for example).
We have a MedJet plan. Basically, medical evacuation back to the US. Doesn’t cover trip cancellation, and we didn’t get the terrorist plan (i.e. their premium plan). But if we have to go to a hospital, MedJet will provide medical transport to the hospital of our choice in the US, so long as we are more than 100 miles from home.
1poorguy
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Going to have to settle on one plan. We already have MedJet for medical evacuation. Most other plans seem to offer that, too, so I guess we’ll have double coverage in that area.
I’ve been looking at Allianz and Nomad. I notice that Nomad seems to charge per trip, or per month. Seems like if you don’t travel in a given month, you don’t pay. But if you travel frequently, it will add up. Allianz is yearly coverage. I’m leaning towards Allianz. My primary interest is medical coverage overseas (or even out of state). The trip cancellation stuff is just a bonus.
Did Neuromancer still with Allianz?
I am no longer with Allianz.
We’ve changed our patterns a bit resulting in fewer but more expensive trips.
As with most insurance, it’s all wasted money until you need it. And likely you get what you pay for.
We also have credit cards with trip coverage including delays and lost baggage.
Again, we have never actually had any travel insurance claims, so I don’t know how well that works either.
Sorry if this is not particularly helpful.
FWIW, our insurance coverage is mostly driven by Neurospouse. I am more inclined to self-insure and take my chances. Something along the lines of ‘if I can afford this trip, I can afford emergency travel too’. And remember, medical events don’t cost as much when you’re outside the US.
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That is true (cheaper medical). We have evacuation coverage suggested by Ormont (Jeff) through MedJet. I’m generally OK with just accepting the coverage offered by credit cards for trip cancellation and such. Most plans don’t offer any more than the credit cards do. Medical is really the bigger concern. What if there is hospitalization in France? I believe Medicare will reimburse for that, but we are not on Medicare yet. Our insurance should reimburse for emergency medical, but I’m not so sure about a hospital stay. Unlikely to happen, but the best laid plans of mice and men…
We use our Costco Citi card to pay for most stuff travel-related (the rebate check from Costco is very nice!).
So you’ve opted to “self-insure”, so to speak. That’s what we’ve been doing for a while now. I thought it was better to have coverage, but maybe not.
Squaremouth.com is where I buy my insurance. They list all available plans for all the companies.
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Yes, I checked those. I think you recommended them before. They seemed to be on a per-trip basis. So if I’m traveling in May, the coverage ends a couple of weeks into June. Which is OK, I guess. If we do enough trips, it would be better to get an annual plan. If we were doing just one trip, this might be OK. I noted that some of the per-trip plans cost nearly as much as an Allianz yearly plan.
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Thanks, I didn’t know that.
I have travelled several times a year.
Do you use a plan to charges every trip? Or just one annual fee? I put in the dates of our next travel, and it was quoting prices that covered that range of dates, and a few “extended” the coverage by two weeks. Squaremouth serves up several companies, but I was wondering which one you went with. We have three trips planned this year. We just did one in January, another in May, and another in October. And there is always spur-of-the-moment ideas that can add to that.