sl1ppy

battleface would provide medical cover (including covid related) but has exclusions for covid related cancellations/quarantine. This includes countries on where the FCO has advised against travel.
https://www.battleface.com/en/travel-insurance/

Card

Yes - god know when that will be though. It is frustrating because I feel like the system could easily set up an obvious warning that the coverage you have requested to start 2 days from now is likely to be void as other sites have done. I fear people may purchase it thinking that they would be coverage only to be easily bankrupted by US medical bills.

Card

Thanks for the Battleface suggestion! Though triple what I normally spend I feel much better - would have questioned it more it was the usual price. It will cover COVID medical bills but not cancellations/quarantining due to COVID which is completely understandable. Having lived in the US in the past, I would never step foot on the soil their without medical coverage.

teebs

Is this insurance no longer being offered? I've tried to buy it on a couple of devices and been told there's an error each time.

Card

The BA insurance or Battleface? I am able to access both. The BA Insurance does require you to close the banner at the top before you can processed to a quote.

Delboy65

Not sure this is the most appropriate place, so Admin please feel free to move if required...

Just had my renewal quote from Virgin Money (policy with MAPFRE ASISTENCIA) and though the policy price for a couple (WW, inc USA) has increased by 33%, they have also updated the policy to exclude "any claims caused by or relating to C-19, any mutation or variation, or any fear of threat concerning these viruses", as well as now excluding Scheduled Airline Failure Insurance

As BAH have now cancelled my hol to MRU, and the refund is under process, I will not be renewing this policy - but wanted to highlight to the panel to be sure when planning ahead not to expect your insurer to automatically renew your policy on same terms as pre-COVID (do carefully check the renewal paperwork)

teebs

I meant the BA insurance. I'm not keen on going anywhere outside FCO advice! It let me proceed right through the quote, entering my details etc. but then said there was a payment error whenever I tried to go past the entering my details stage.

teebs

Actually I've worked it out, the unlabelled date boxes in the details section were for my birthday rather than the policy start date. I kept trying to tell it I was a newborn baby. Bought it now

We won the world cup

We have Nationwide Flex annual cover which comes free with a bank account. It not only covers covid 19 related medical conditions but includes cover for travel to countries where fco advise " against all but essential travel" which is everywhere except the near battlezone countries. Got emailed confirmation of cover for purposes of trip to Israel.

Ancient Observer

Beware any policies from the Post Office. We had a "high" quality WW policy with the UK PO.
We had 2 holidays cancelled - one via BA and one via SQ.
In a pre-claim query, - Post office pointed to sub clause 5.2000.33.???/Whatever. The policy did not cover any issues caused by the act of Government.

And any country had to be FCO blessed.

Amex delivered. The Post office did not.

wrinklymel

My dilemma is that I want to book NOW for travel next May to a country currently on the FCO “don’t travel” list but gambling that the FCO advice will have changed in the next 8 months. However, all of the insurance policies that I’ve looked at explicitly say they won’t cover for cancellation or medical expenses if the FCO advice is in place when you BOOK which would be useless.

The BA Allianz policy says “You will not be covered if you travel to or choose to remain in a country or region where the Foreign and Commonwealth Office has advised against all travel or all but essential travel or where you have travelled against the advice of the local authority at your journey destination”.

It also says claims won’t be allowed for “You not following any advice or recommendation made by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, World Health Organization or any government or other official authority.”

So my interpretation of this is that we WOULD be covered if the FCO advice is no longer in place when we travel. Does this sound right?

Delboy65

Personal opinion is no, you would not be covered, as at the time of booking the FCO restrictions were in place so you were NOT following their advice

Caerbannog

We are booked to go on BA Hols to Crete late September and right now it's not looking good. Greece is spiking and the UK is not OK so one or other government could pull the plug.

We can self-isolate quite easily on return (stock up on UHT milk etc before we go) so if BA is still flying we want to be on board. Battleface looked like the answer for insurance but on reading the policy, it doesn't cover over-60s for CV19 medical expenses. I think that's OK because of the Greek government's offer to pay hospital bills but it wouldn't be good elsewhere.

We can cope with being detained on arrival in Crete for a few days. A positive test at the airport is unlikely and we'll suck up the cost and inconvenience if it happens, hoping that BA will find us a seat home.

What if Greece decides to treat the UK similar to NL and require a pre-departure negative test? It looks like the only available private tests here are about £200pp. It was suggested in another thread that I should develop a cough and lose my sense of smell and do a government test but would they give me a certificate acceptable to the Greeks with my passport number etc??

Any other ideas?

chance88088

If you google high risk travel insurance you should find some options. If you are a US citizen, I would suggest you try Diplomat America which is quite reasonable if you accept a high deductable. (Saddly, if you are a US citizen most high risk travel cover will not cover you when travelling to the US.)