Travel Insurance

TRAVEL INSURANCE: How can this be Fair and Reasonable?

My wife and I are booked on a P & O Cruise in the Baltic for 16 nights in August/September this year. It will be our 12th cruise with P & O Cruises. We are aged 68 and 76 respectively with a fair number of pre-existing medical conditions. It is a condition of booking that we have Travel Insurance - which we have always bought but never made a claim against.

I set out to buy a Single Trip policy for us both (from a list provided by a Daily Telegraph Travel article) and expecting a hefty uplift in the premium since I have passed the age of 75. (I am wife’s official carer and wheelchair pusher-in-chief).

The first Insurer (Holidaysafe Club) I approached took a good 10 minutes to even answer the phone (despite my phone call being ’important’ to them!) but after spending a further 20 minutes honestly answering the Medical Screening questions (as listed on the Validation Certificate for our last Annual Comprehensive policy which lapsed in February this year) …. I was advised of a premium of £501 for just myself but refused insurance cover for my wife!

The next insurer I rang (Insurancewith) - having given the identical answers to the very same list of pre-existing medical conditions …. but before even quoting any premium at all, refused to provide insurance cover for me!

Panic (of the Jonesy variety!) set in at this stage as we stood to lose a lot of money (having paid P & O Cruises the full amount for the cruise) …. if we could not obtain the requisite travel insurance.

The 3rd insurer I approached is recognized and indeed promoted by P & O Cruises itself. (Called Holiday Extras). After fully answering the identical questions as I had provided to the other 2 Insurers, I was quoted a policy premium of just £205 (but with some quite reasonable and acceptable excesses) to cover both of us! (and subsequently confirmed in an e-mail within minutes).

How can this result in any way be fair and reasonable? Or is it just another Great British rip-off?

There was absolutely NO consistency in the first two insurers refusal to provide insurance cover for us!

Methinks I smell rotten fish - whole boxes of them!