beware of celebrity cruise and trip insurance

my wife and I usually spend one or two days pre cruise or post cruise at say the embarkation city such as Venice--Sydney and Vancouver.A few years agoI called Celeb and spoke to insurance people in Long Island NY and was informed then that I was covered for medical emergency for a week on both sides of the cruise--Big change--now the policy is administered by AON and their reps state that celeb ins is only for the cruise--coverage starts the day of the cruise and ends the last day of the cruise--I told them that I had planned to spend a day before and after the cruise in Dublin--I was told that I would not be covered for a medical emergency on those days and that I should buy third party insurance--Rather than chance an uninsured slip and fall I will look for other medical insurance

Suggest you talk to the tripinsurancestore.com. They have polices that will work for you and they are great listeners. After they listen they ask a lot of questions to find the right policy for your needs

If you make multiple trips a year you may want to look into a Annual Travel Insurance policy. After years of buying a policy for every cruise we heard about annual policies. It has been less expensive that buying insurance for each trip.

This is a change in policy if true. We had Celebrity insurance for a cruise in 2012. We spent 2 days in the embarkation city when my DH got sick and ended up in the emergency room in the early morning hours of disembarkation day. He was admitted to the hospital and we missed the cruise. We were fully reimbursed for the cost of the cruise, part of our change fees for air fare, his co pay and some of my additional hotel & meal costs. I'm pretty sure the policy was administered by AON.

Following this thread as it was explained a little differently to us ... but we booked and paid for the insurance several months ago for our upcoming cruise. We usually fly straight home but were told the insurance would cover us until the flight took us home provided we book the air on ChoiceAir, which we have done. We also need to fly in a day early as we live across the country. I am hoping we are covered as we were originally told. Maybe others can chime in.

IMHO, for most, the celebrity insurance is woefully inadequate if you have a medical problem.....their medical limits and their evacuation limits are so low, they assure that the celebrity doctor will get paid and that you will get transported from the ship....but then you've almost run out of insurance funds to handle the medical issues and get you home.

Don't get drawn in to an inadequate policy by the cancellation benefits because if you do have a true emergency when you really need the insurance, you may/will find that you have too little insurance to cover the costs. Almost all, if not all, travel policies have the pre-existing condition waiver if you buy within a short time after you make your reservation....and in reality, many folks who worry about pre-existing conditions actually don't have pre-existing conditions at all per the terms of the policy. This is covered in the insurance forum here on CC.

I strongly advise anyone who will be buying trip insurance (and that should be everyone reading this post) that you look at insurance offerings at insuremytrip, squaremouth, etc. and understand the difference between the policies before you buy.

:):):)

IMHO, for most, the celebrity insurance is woefully inadequate if you have a medical problem.....their medical limits and their evacuation limits are so low, they assure that the celebrity doctor will get paid and that you will get transported from the ship....but then you've almost run out of insurance funds to handle the medical issues and get you home.

 

Don't get drawn in to an inadequate policy by the cancellation benefits because if you do have a true emergency when you really need the insurance, you may/will find that you have too little insurance to cover the costs. Almost all, if not all, travel policies have the pre-existing condition waiver if you buy within a short time after you make your reservation....and in reality, many folks who worry about pre-existing conditions actually don't have pre-existing conditions at all per the terms of the policy. This is covered in the insurance forum here on CC.

 

I strongly advise anyone who will be buying trip insurance (and that should be everyone reading this post) that you look at insurance offerings at insuremytrip, squaremouth, etc. and understand the difference between the policies before you buy.

Completely agree. IMHO, insurance minimums should include primary medical, $0 deductible, $100,000.00 medical, $1,000,000.00 evacuation.

:D:)

:):):)

 

Completely agree. IMHO, insurance minimums should include primary medical, $0 deductible, $100,000.00 medical, $1,000,000.00 evacuation.

:D:)

You don’t need $1m evacuation, you need 50-100k PLUS MedJet Assist. The first gets you to some local hospital that can stabilize you and then medjet gets you home or to the hospital of your choice. You need both! For those outside the us with a chance of winding up in a US hospital without any other insurance, I would suggest 250k medical minimum....and don’t forget, something can happen at your departure/arrival port...eg your cruise leaves from Miami.

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This is a change in policy if true. We had Celebrity insurance for a cruise in 2012. We spent 2 days in the embarkation city when my DH got sick and ended up in the emergency room in the early morning hours of disembarkation day. He was admitted to the hospital and we missed the cruise. We were fully reimbursed for the cost of the cruise, part of our change fees for air fare, his co pay and some of my additional hotel & meal costs. I'm pretty sure the policy was administered by AON.

Did the insurance cover any of the medical bills? That is the gap mentioned by the op. The items you listed were all coverages related to being to ill to cruise, no matter where on is when they fall ill.

There is an entire CC forum devoted to trip insurance. It seems to me that’s where this discussion belongs.

Did the insurance cover any of the medical bills? That is the gap mentioned by the op. The items you listed were all coverages related to being to ill to cruise, no matter where on is when they fall ill.

We had health insurance through my employer. The cruise insurance covered the deductible and any other medical expenses not paid by my health insurance.

There is an entire CC forum devoted to trip insurance. It seems to me that’s where this discussion belongs.

Although some (including me) have veered from the original post....the issue here is the travel insurance offered by Celebrity and it's adequacy or not. I suspect that many don't even think about insurance...they just take it automatically....and in some cases that's OK. However, the specific policy offered by Celebrity is not OK in my, and others, judgement.....so this discussion is specific to Celebrity.

My apologies for veering....but it's important for folks on this board to know that all travel insurance is not the same...and specifically that the Celebrity Policy may leave you in the lurch, so to speak.

When I booked through Celebrity, they didn't ask me if I wanted insurance or not...they assumed I did and added it to the total booking. I found out only because I asked about the insurance option and they said that they automatically added it. The agent SHOULD have asked. Since I never travel without it, I asked about the coverage and the agent said it was only for the cruise portion...NOT adequate. When you travel, it should cover your entire trip from beginning to end. So I cancelled theirs and purchased a better plan with Allianz. This was two months ago. I assume the TA was knowledgeable....:confused:.

Here's a vote FOR Celebrity insurance. Two years ago, DW was diagnosed with a detached retina on the 3rd day of a 14 day cruise. We disembarked in Athens, saw a Greek doc arranged by the Celebrity MD who confirmed diagnosis, and chose to fly back to US for treatment. Celebrity insurance covered all costs including unused cruise days as well as the ridiculous same day walk-up airfare from Athens to NYC.

Yes our overseas medical treatment and costs were minimized since we had the time to get home, but travel costs were significant.

So don't discount Celebrity insurance ........ it worked for us.

:):):)

 

Completely agree. IMHO, insurance minimums should include primary medical, $0 deductible, $100,000.00 medical, $1,000,000.00 evacuation.

:D:)

Every situation is different. We always want secondary because we have primary medical at home, and if the travel insurance is used for a medical incident abroad it would count toward our policy’s annual deductible. What I do recommend is insurance that covers pre-existing conditions even if you don’t think you have any. We have never been asked to supply medical records.

Cruise line insurance works best for canceling for any reason.

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Here's a vote FOR Celebrity insurance. Two years ago, DW was diagnosed with a detached retina on the 3rd day of a 14 day cruise. We disembarked in Athens, saw a Greek doc arranged by the Celebrity MD who confirmed diagnosis, and chose to fly back to US for treatment. Celebrity insurance covered all costs including unused cruise days as well as the ridiculous same day walk-up airfare from Athens to NYC.

 

Yes our overseas medical treatment and costs were minimized since we had the time to get home, but travel costs were significant.

 

So don't discount Celebrity insurance ........ it worked for us.

One issue is that most policy’s only cover trip interruption at 100 or 150%. So if the cruise fare was $4,000 ($2,000 each), the interruption/amount to travel may max out at $4,000 - $6,000, which may not be enough in some places in the world to cover a last minute one way flight home.

People need to understand exactly how much is covered.

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First, we give our personal kudos to the OP for being aware of the policy provisions. Second, we do often contribute to the Cruise Critic trip insurance forum we we have often cautioned about booking any trip insurance sold by a cruise line. Our issue is the inadequateness of the medical coverage that is inherient in most cruise line policies. These days, $100,000 should be considered as minimum medical coverage....and yet many will book cruise line policies that only cover $10,000. That amount of insurance will not even cover 1 day of a major medical emergency in many hospitals around the world.

But many cruisers have no or little concern with medical and focus on trip cancellation or interruption...where their personal liability is limited to the cost of a cruise (and transportation). But consider that your medical liability is virtually unlimited! If we lose the cost of a cruise due to a medical problem causing us to cancel....we will survive (the money would have been spent if we had taken the cruise). But if we incur a $150,000 medical bill plus $50,000 in medical evacuation costs...because we got sick on a cruise and were dropped in a foreign land......what would we do? Consider if all we had was $10,000 of medical coverage from a cruise line policy.

Just fruit for thought. When buying insurance one should consider the big picture....and not focus on insuring a relatively small loss.

As to the OP's situation we would suggest contacting the Tripinsurancestore (Steve gets lots of positive reviews here on CC) or using insuremytrip.com or squaremouth.com to review non-cruise line issues policies....both medical and cancellation.

Hank

Here's a vote FOR Celebrity insurance. Two years ago, DW was diagnosed with a detached retina on the 3rd day of a 14 day cruise. We disembarked in Athens, saw a Greek doc arranged by the Celebrity MD who confirmed diagnosis, and chose to fly back to US for treatment. Celebrity insurance covered all costs including unused cruise days as well as the ridiculous same day walk-up airfare from Athens to NYC.

Yes our overseas medical treatment and costs were minimized since we had the time to get home, but travel costs were significant.

So don't discount Celebrity insurance ........ it worked for us.

It is great that it worked for you because you were smart enough to have a problem that was covered. It won't be so great for someone else if they are stupid enough to have a problem that is not covered. Like a problem on the way to getting to the ship. Or a problem with a pre or post cruise land extension. All of which can be handled far better with appropriate 3rd party insurance.

There is a caveat that if you are 70 of age & older your cruise/trip insurance because of age can easily run you 10 to 12 % of your total trip cost . Cruise line insurance does not ask ages , This is a definite factor in deciding ones insurance needs

In our case we have unlimited medical any where in the world per our domestic Medicare Advantage insurance :D

There is a caveat that if you are 70 of age & older your cruise/trip insurance because of age can easily run you 10 to 12 % of your total trip cost . Cruise line insurance does not ask ages , This is a definite factor in deciding ones insurance needs

 

In our case we have unlimited medical any where in the world per our domestic Medicare Advantage insurance :D

Agree that once one gets older, cost becomes a factor. Medjet also raises their annual rate if you are over 75. Every situation is different....some have medigap policies that cover up to $50K of medical expenses outside the US, some have medicare advantage plans (most are HMO's not PPO's in the US....which limits your choice of doctors, but that's fine for some). Some have company or other insurance through a credit card, club, etc.

The key is to know what insurance you already have....and to understand what you are buying. Don't just assume that the cruise line/TA is looking for the best policy for you....or it must be OK because they sell it.

Cruise lines do not have to ask for your ages as they already have all the needed information from the original booking. Other insurance depends on your input!

Hal

Sorry that my post started a discussion about insurance--I just wanted to inform the reader that I was told that the celeb ins. would not cover me for the medical bills incurred if an emergency occurred on the day before or after the cruise. I had been previously told that it would

We have previously used independent travel insurance companies. This year we bought the Celebrity insurance. It seem most of the folks above who complained about the inadequacies of the policy or misrepresentations didn't read the policy. I did. The insurer is required by law to pay every thing listed on the policy. If something is not adequate, cancel the policy and buy a backup. You don't have the right to complain if you don't.

Glenn:cool:

Suggest you talk to the tripinsurancestore.com. They have polices that will work for you and they are great listeners. After they listen they ask a lot of questions to find the right policy for your needs

That was just what I was going to suggest. We did a river cruise last June and bought the cruise line insurance. We booked a precruise privately and were able to secure insurance for that very easily through that company. In fact, it was so close to time to depart that the very reasonable price covered the whole trip.