What Is The Most Secure Travel Insurance Plan To Protect Yourself From Coronavirus Related Cancellations?

It’s common knowledge that travel insurance is never a bad idea.

Considering how many things could go wrong that is. The question remains, considering the current crisis, what kind of insurance is sufficient to protect yourself from corona related cancellations?

Even without such a unique set of circumstances such as a global pandemic travel insurance is something you should always try to get for security and peace of mind. However recently it’s become a much more pressing issue as a litany of would be holiday makers have not only had their travels cancelled, but are being delayed or outright refused a refund.

That being said we can expect the general public to learn from their mistake and grab some solid travel insurance to cover them in future travels.

I’m sure many of you are wondering, what kind of insurance will be sufficient in the event of a similar pandemic related cancellation?

Experts have gone on record in speaking with the Express.co.uk to give us their take.

“Since the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, we’ve seen governments around the world impose travel restrictions to stem the tide of infections, and it is now estimated that over a third of the global population is living under some form of lockdown,” said Aman Johal, Lawyer and Director of Your Lawyers.

“As such, we know huge numbers of consumers are worried about if their summer holiday plans will go ahead and if they’ll be able to claim or get their money back from their insurer where refunds are refused from travel companies, hoteliers and airlines.”

CoverForYou.com had their founder Niel Wright share a few words with the news site also stating:

"The short answer is, that it is currently impossible to include any type of cover for Coronavirus cancellations because once it was declared a pandemic (March 11 2020), it became a ‘known event’, and could no longer be covered by travel insurance,”.

“That said, it’s not completely cut and dry, there are various scenarios, for our existing policyholders, where they may be entitled to seek some type of cancellation cover.”

If you’re one of those who did pay for travel insurance then be sure to read the policy carefully to see if their insurance was taken out before the FCO placing travel bans actually insures them for FCO restrictions and scenarios such as the current lockdown.

Niel also went on to say: “Anyone who purchased a travel insurance policy with Travel Disruption Cover with us before 13.00 hrs on 13 March 2020 will be covered for cancellation of a trip due to FCO advice, providing that the FCO advice was not in place at the time of booking.

“They will also be covered for Coronavirus as per the terms of the policy."

“All our products will also continue to cover any medical claims because of Coronavirus if people are travelling to a region where no Foreign Commonwealth Office (FCO) advice exists.”

His company CoverForYou does not cover cancellations in regards to coronavirus cancellations if purchased after March 13th.

Travellers need to inspect their policy under the title of “cancellation/curtailment cover” in their insurance.

We also recommend checking for Scheduled Airline Failure Insurance (SAFI).

This helps protect you from any flights that are cancelled due to the airline going into administration.

If you’re still unsure and have any concerns, check the “flight cancellation cover” in your insurance policy or “scheduled airline failure” to see if either of those are included.

If you’ve booked a package holiday however, you should be covered by ATOL.