We hear our fair share of travel insurance horror stories. Yet sometimes the worst examples aren’t from happy-go-lucky holidaymakers who ignore the importance of travel insurance, but from those who thought they had adequate cover only to be caught out when they tried to claim. If you have a travel insurance deal bolted onto a banking package, there’s a chance you could be next.

Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen…

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Yesterday, 4^th January 2011, VAT went up from 17.5% to 20%. It means that everything, from petrol to pyjamas, will become just that little bit more expensive. The same goes for Insurance Premium Tax, in case you hadn’t heard. Like VAT it has gone up from 17.5% to 20% for holiday and travel insurance premiums, which will be a blow to people hoping for a little low cost sunshine or snow this spring.

But not for World First Travel Insurance customers. World First have announced that they are waiving the increase and passing the savings back to you until the end of January. So that means you’ll get the same great value cover at last year’s prices but without having to compromise your trip away by travelling with inadequte or no travel insurance cover.

 Of course if you’ve yet to plan your trip away you can still benefit by taking the opportunity to buy cheap annual travel insurance that will cover you fro the next 12 months. If you take more than one trip abroad this year it could end up saving you a small fortune. And let’s not forget about the savings you could make if you suffer from a medical condition and require medical travel insurance. World First cover thousands of conditions and offer screening online for people up to the age of 100.

 So why wait? Beat the Taxman with World First.

If there’s one thing that the recent bad weather and Spanish air traffic strikes have proven, it’s that you can never be absolutely sure that you’ll get there – or back again – when you think you will. And let’s not forget the volcanic ash problems earlier this year. The fact is that if you are travelling with a medical condition, you might need a little more than a toothbrush and spare undies to take to the airport. 

If you are travelling with a medical condition and have purchased medical travel insurance then World First recommend that travelling with the medication you plan to use and some extra in case of delays and disasters. Whilst it may not be your fault if you were delayed it is still your responsibility to make sure you have plenty of supplies so you don’t end up creating a medical emergency through a lack of medication. In some instances, especially if you face long delays or are worried about losing your luggage, it could be worth taking twice as much as your normally need and splitting in between your hand luggage and suitcase.  (more…)

Diving for novices and people with medical conditions

Taking off for a winter sun holiday? No doubt you’ll want to make the most of every opportunity that comes along. And what is a beach holiday without getting in the water? Exactly. If you’re the type of person who can’t lie on a sun bed all day then scuba diving must be the ultimate sea going thrill. It’s not something you’d ever consider in the UK ( for obvious reasons) but on a winter sun holiday, when the air temperature is 28 degrees and the sea temperature is 20 degrees or more, who could resist?

Of course diving can be dangerous so there are going to be a few hoops to jump through before you can swim with the fishes. Firstly – and most important – is your travel insurance. Will yours cover you for diving? Some policies will have exclusions, others will limit the depths to which you can go and some will specify that you always dive with a reputable operator (and why wouldn’t you?). World First Travel Insurance policies will cover you for diving up to 30 metres, providing you dive with an approved and qualified operator.

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The airwaves seem to be full of annoying but admittedly brilliant advertising campaigns for cheap insurance generally involving meerkats. This is all very good for meerkats because a large proportion of the population had probably never heard of them before, but not so good for the insurance industry generally as it gives the impression that all policies are similar and the only important differentiator is price.

Price is obviously important but there are other considerations to take into account when assessing the real value for money that your travel insurance policy gives you. (more…)

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office today released their annual British Behaviour Abroad report saying rather wearily that we’re “still” getting into trouble abroad like some kind of exasperated parent. And what’s more, all that trouble is avoidable. Top of the list of reasons why people get into scrapes is the high numbers of drink and drug related arrests. Embassies also helped many people stranded by the problems with volcanic ash. But there are far more quite mundane reasons. Here’s a list of them. (more…)

What with volcanic ash and airline strikes, holiday cancellation insurance has been in the news quite a lot recently, and not always in a positive light. Well, we can’t actually guarantee to pay out every time but maybe we have the next best thing.

World First has just launched two new cancellation policies that will cover you in almost any scenario you could imagine. (more…)

Actuaries are a conservative bunch. It’s said that they’re the ones that found accounting and insurance a little too exciting. They spend their days among tables and charts that they use to calculate the risk of you and me falling under a bus before giving us life insurance. They spend their lives calculating whether that risk is worth taking. They’re the ones, like the man in the Treasury that holds the purse strings, that have to say “no”. They must have (more…)

Sounds great doesn’t it? I just renewed my home insurance with Direct Line (yes, I will name them, hello Google, I’m here!). The house insurance (more Google attracting) deal is quite good. It includes buildings and contents as you’d expect with a reasonable level of cover, I added accidental damage because I can never be sure what stupid things I’ll do at home. I haven’t yet put by foot through the ceiling as it says in the documents but I wouldn’t be surprised if I did. I did put it through a ceramic cooker top a few years ago.

Then there’s legal support like most policies these days, they cover personal possessions outside the home and they’ll pay my salary while I’m on jury service. But what really caught my eye was the travel insurance. All for 250 quid a year. I know a little about travel insurance, I thought, I’ll have a look at that. (more…)

I have a confession to make. I was chatting to Martin Rothwell this morning and I told him that I have a (well, two in fact) pre-existing medical conditions.

Well that’s a surprise

To be honest, I didn’t even realise the fact – I’ve been taking blood pressure pills for more than 20 years and they are just part of my life. (more…)