Travel Guard Gold Rick Steves Price

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Jane,
I had a good experience calling them and talking to an agent in person. You can ask all of the questions you want and get the exact coverage you want.

Is this the site you get redirected to? www.travelguard.com/ricksteves.
https://buy.travelguard.com/tgi2/proc/stateselector.aspx?br=agentlink&arc=000569&agentlinkasp=yes

I am glad you brought it up. I usually get the Travelguard Medevac insurance, but they removed it from the public site with a note: "only available through agents." Now I know where to find it.

Like Vandabrud, I also call and talk to them. The agents I’ve talked to thru the years have been very nice, super patient and knowledgeable. No pushiness! Last time I actually had the agent suggest a less expensive policy!

I just booked mine for next year and had no problem. Maybe Travelguard was having a problem with their system? And my cost was $10 less than the listed price (maybe a "Rick Steves" discount?) But I'm sure if you call their phone number they can help you. I've always found them easy to work with.

I have also had very good experience with the TravelGuard staff, reached by telephone. They would walk me through the different clssses of policy, to find me the right one for me, at the best price. No pressure, just helpfulness, then you can buy a policy over the phone or online with them, or later, or not at all. Over several years, as I got older and my trips tended to get longer, the insurance got more and more expensive. I realized that what I really needed and wanted was major medical and evacuation coverage, and that I could self-insure for various costs related to the trip itself. After searching, I ended up with a policy from the Berkshire Hathaway group of companies, with just the coverage I wanted for about 10 per cent of the cost. Fortunately, I have never needed to make a claim on any of these policies, and only then can you be sure of their soundness and value.

I have yearly travel insurance through another company and medevac insurance. Read what they are offering regarding medevac. Some companies will only transport you to the nearest large hospital and not home. Don't assume they will fly you home.

I got my discounted medevac insurance via AARP.

Thanks for all the good ideas. I did check just medical and medevac insurance on insuremytrip.com, and it was about $100 cheaper than the Gold policy - from the same company. Frank II, I'll check AARP before I commit. Our 15 day window ends Monday, so I need to do something this weekend.

Frank II is spot on. I’m one who looks for the details and I missed a big one a few trips ago. It looked like we might need to come home because of a medical emergency, but not severe enough to warrant hospitalization (one of us could not walk due to an injury). Well, she recovered. But, I found out the insurance would not pay to get us home unless she had been hospitalized for 7 days!

Frank II, I just checked with AARP, and their policy is higher for the two of us than the Travel Guard. I'll check some more sites this afternoon.

And Frank II and Alan, thanks for the heads-up on where they will send you; I hadn't thought of that. Sure enough, Travel Guard says "nearest adequate medical facility;" home only in case of death or if medically required.

I have a separate medical evacuation policy with Medjet Assist. I got that through AARP with a small discount. They offer "fly you home" coverage.

My regular travel insurance is with Allianz. I used to be with Travel Guard but Allianz offered a better deal.

Jane,
We have used Travel Guard for years. As others mentioned we've had excellent customer service over the phone.

We realized that on the brochure it states "Gold Plan Cost - Pricing below is not applicable to residence of CA, KS, MT, NY and WA." We live in WA and the cost is much less than the brochure quote.

Okay, by playing with dates I figured out that the higher price was because we're going to be gone longer than 30 days. I looked at about 7 or 8 different policies, and settled for Travel Guard Silver. It includes medical and evacuation, and comes in cheaper than anything else I looked at that had similar or lesser coverage. It was even a bit cheaper than just medevac.

Thanks again for all your help.

Frank II, please tell me more about your experience with Allianz. After last year's fiasco, I am not a fan of Travel Guard.
Thanks,

Jane, that's the plan we use. Glad you found what you were looking for!

I have never had to make a claim with Allianz and I hope I never do.

Last year I used Allianz for my 21 Day RS Best of Europe Tour. I actually ended up in ICU for one night while in the Netherlands. The Allianz website was very user friendly beginning with reporting my hospital stay from Europe, sending all documentation electronically once I got home, and following up to see the status of my claim. Reimbursement was mailed to me within weeks once all paperwork was in order. I am going on the RS Best of Spain Tour this year and will be using Travel Guard as they work with RS Europe. You can't go wrong with either insurance as both are very reputable in the travel industry. Do check the different options available before purchasing a travel insurance as they are so different.

when i travel internationally, i use squaremouth to get insurance quotes. it's very easy to use and you can mix and match the coverage to see how that impacts price. as long as you're not getting cancellation insurance, it shouldn't be that expensive. also, some credit cards provide some level of coverage if you used it to pay with but i would still buy additional.

note reason to buy travel insurance: when i went to peru a couple years ago, one of the girls on the trip came down with appendicitis. luckily we made it to cuzco in time but she had to have the operation there! she and her friend had to stay for a week before she was cleared to fly. think about all those medical bills plus flight change fees, additional hotel, etc.