Have Insurance - death of traveling partner

[missdenise]

My DH and I had booked an Alaskan cruise/tour over a year in advance and we were traveling with another couple. All four or us have paid for travel insurance at the same time we but down the deposit on the trip. I am really asking this question on behalf of the other couple. The husband of the other couple past away unexpectedly in September. The wife is still considering going on the cruise/tour.

 

She has gotten different information for everyone she has spoken to. She was told by the TA that she would need to pay the NOW going rate for a single supplement which is about $3500 more than the one person charge. She could then file a claim after the trip with Travel Guard. The reason she had to wait until she came home was because (according to TA) you can only file one claim per policy and if she filed before the trip she would have used that policy and no longer have travel protection. One person at Travel Guard told her she could file a claim now and not have to pay the single supplement and she would still be covered.

 

With the death of her husband, she has enough to worry about beside playing these games with the TA and TG. I am proud of her wanted to still continue with the trip but things are making it difficult. It would be different if the single supplement was $500 or even $1000 but - an additional $3500 is a lot of $ out of pocket. The balance on the trip is due the end of next month.

 

Does anyone have any suggestion or advice? Has anyone, unfortunately, experience this themselves?

Thank you.

[sirwired]

She needs to get the proper information, in writing, from TravelGuard about what claim needs to be filed when, so, in the end, all she pays is her own fare, and TG covers the single supplement. E-mail is good for this. She absolutely needs to get this straightened out prior to final payment.

 

I think the answer will be: File the claim now, they'll cover the single supplement, and she'll have coverage for her own cancellation, should that be necessary in the future. I don't see why you'd be limited to filing a single claim per policy.

 

She should NOT wait to file the claim. All insurance companies require claims to be filed promptly. Waiting until after the trip will introduce unneeded complications.

 

Here's the applicable language from the TG Gold Policy for NC (other states may vary):

 

The Insurer will reimburse the Insured, up to the Trip

Cancellation and Interruption Maximum Limit shown on the

Schedule, for the additional cost incurred during the Trip as a

result of a change in the per person occupancy rate for

prepaid, non-refundable travel arrangements if a person

booked to share accommodations with the Insured has his/her

Trip cancelled or interrupted due to the Unforeseen events

shown in the Trip Cancellation/Interruption section and the

Insured does not cancel.

 

It seems pretty unambiguous, and doesn't mention any strange limitation about only being able to file a single claim per policy.

[6rugrats]

She needs a better TA. She should trust TG, not this agent. She could even read the policy herself, and she would see she's not limited to one claim. Good luck to her.

[cruiseco]

Over the years I've done many of these "occupancy adjustment" claims with many different insurers. The procedure is always the same:

 

1) Notify the insurer of the situation.

2) Pay the single supplement to the cruise line

3) After the sailing go ahead and file the claim to be reimbursed for the additional single supplement amount.

 

The reason for this is that the insurer does not want to pay the claim and later find out (or have this information withheld from them) that in fact a new roommate has been found and that the insured now has no loss. The insurer either has to act as a bill collector and try to get its money back, or if they are not notified that the roommate has been found has ended up paying a claim when there was no actual loss.

 

I guess it's possible that Travel Guard is now doing it differently (it's been years since I worked with them) but I highly doubt it. Insurers don't ever think that it's OK to pay a claim when they don't have 100% proof that there was actually a loss. The same applies as to when to file the claim -- you can't file a claim until there a provable loss so waiting until after the sailing to file a claim won't cause a problem. The actual loss occurs when the passenger boards the ship without a roommate. Before that it's just a hypothetical loss.

[cruiseco]

duplicate

[missdenise]

Thank you for your replies.. but as you can see reading the advice from sirwired and cruiseco, I am getting two entirely different ways of handling this.

@cruiseco - I had the same thought as far as TG not wanted to pay out the single supplement prior to the cruise because at this my friend has not incurred a financial loss. If TG does tell her to file the claim now for the single supplement - are you aware of any stipulation on only being able to file one claim per policy?

@sirwired - I agree 100% - whatever she ends up doing and whomever she speaks to, it should all be backed up by email.

 

To make things even more complicated.. we were dealing with a brick and mortar CuriseOne franchise. The TA we were using that made all the arrangements left this franchise, and opened her own CruiseOne. We were given another TA with the original franchise, turns out a month later she left and joined the first TA we had at the new business. Now, we were given a third TA.... it is getting extremely frustrating dealing with a new person every couple of months, especially since we had a relationship with prior trips with the first TA.

[cruiseco]

@cruiseco - I had the same thought as far as TG not wanted to pay out the single supplement prior to the cruise because at this my friend has not incurred a financial loss. If TG does tell her to file the claim now for the single supplement - are you aware of any stipulation on only being able to file one claim per policy?

 

 

I guess if Travel Guard wants the claim filed now there's no harm there but it doesn't mean they're going to pay it prior to the completion of the cruise. And if it's not paid, it could be set aside if there were a different loss. Perhaps the client gets sick a month prior to sailing and has to cancel -- the "occupancy adjustment" claim would be tossed out and the cancellation claim would be processed. So there's really never going to be two valid claims pending against the policy at any one time.

 

Only if the "occupancy adjustment" claim were to be paid prior to sailing (which I doubt will occur) and then there was a subsequent cancellation claim would there be a problem with one claim voiding another. Another reason for them not to pay "occupancy adjustment" claims prior to sailing.