I contacted insuremytrip (a broker) for coverage of my three week trip to London next month. They prepared a quote from a company Travel Insurance International which is a subsidiary of Crum and Foster. The quote was really low so I am posting this to get a reality check from the experienced travel insurance buyers who use this forum.
As background: I am 70 years old, will be travelling to London and back, live in Washington State. Because my senior medicare supplement plan provides decent out of country coverage (eg, I pay $60 copay for emergency visits, $200/day copay for emergency hospitalization for up to five days and no co-pay after that; $150 copay for ambulance service) though outpatient services are my responsbility. I was looking for a policy that might provide up to $5,000 for medical expenses mainly to cover the co-pays. I am planning to purchase a one year membership in MedJetAssist for medical evacuation. I was not interested in other typical travel insurance coverage such as trip cancellation, lost/stolen luggage, missed connection....
The policy that was presented to me covered the following among several benefits:
Accident ad Sickness expense: max $10,000
Emergency Medical Evacuation: max $100,000
Lost/stolen luggage: max $750
Missed connection: max $300
The cost of this policy for the 19 days that I will be overseas is $27.00. That seems to awefully low. Am I missing something? There is a major restriction on this policy: it is only available to persons living in Kansas, Missouri, Virginia, and Washington. Is there something about these four states that I should know? I do know that many of the insurance companies that are promited by insuremytrip do not provide coverage for residents in Washington.
Crum and Foster does offer more coverages and larger maximums for higher premiums. I am quoting the LITE plan.
Thanks for your help. It seems for a price of dinner at a modest restaurant in London I can insure my trip if one ignores the $270 to be paid to MedJetAssist. Let me add that one has to carefully read what the "medical evacuation" covers in each travel insurance plan. Some will just transport you to the nearest hospital what can provide the services to treat your medical problem. In London this probably means an ambulance to the University of London Medical School Hospital. Other plans will allow a physician to designate transportation to a hospital in another city or another country; this is by phycian choice. Only MedJetAssist allows the patient client to designate to which city/country to be transported so long as the patient is stable and that the target city has a facility to treat the patient. I have read enough stories about $100,000+ trips from Europe and Asia back to the USA, and even a $60,000 trip from Minneapolis to Portland OR to convince me to get the special medical evacuation plan.
Geor(ge)