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Many of us have been there before. The flights are booked and accommodations secured, leaving only the packing and a few last minute details to work out before our holiday starts! Soon enough we will be skiing or snowboarding through white powder, breathing in that crisp mountain air and enjoying a well-deserved break from day to day life. Then we remember our annual travel insurance has expired and we wonder whether we really need to renew it. We start weighing the pros and cons and speculate if the cost is going to be worth the price. We must decide, so let’s first look at a scenario where annual travel insurance has been purchased, and another where it hasn’t. The Travel-Insured Skier We think about the worst that can happen on our ski trip and visions of broken legs (or worse) start to fill our thoughts. We know that these situations are highly unlikely, but still possible. We wonder about the cost of x-rays, leg or arm casts and hospital stays in the country to which we will be travelling and compare it to the cost of travel insurance. Broken nose: £21,383* Hospital visit: £3,941* Appendicitis: £21,400* *Based on a ski trip to the USA Annual travel insurance: prices from just £30.35 The costs don’t even compare, so we go ahead and decide on an annual travel insurance plan because we are hoping to get out skiing more than once this year and this one-time purchase will cover us for all our upcoming holidays. Not only are we covered for any medical emergencies, we will also be financially okay should the airlines strike or lose our luggage. Possibly even more important than this, however, is that in purchasing annual travel insurance we gain a peace of mind and assurance in knowing that should anything happen, we will be okay. The Uninsured Snowboarder In this scenario, we compare the costs as we did above but decide that we are going to risk it. I mean, what is the chance that anything really serious will actually happen on our trip? And we might be right, it is possible that all will go smoothly and we will return to our homes at the end of our stay in the same condition in which we left, and with all of our belongings intact. But what if everything doesn’t go as planned? In the back of our minds, we wonder just how big the risk is that we are taking... It’s not like the skier or snowboarder has a better chance of their holiday going more smoothly if the annual travel insurance has been renewed. But in the event that we take a fall while gliding down the side of a mountain at full speed and require medical attention, we are going to be better off if we are insured - both financially and emotionally. The last thing we want to be saddled with is a £14,000 bill, the cost of setting a broken leg in the U.S. So the decision becomes easy. It’s not only the money we will save but the peace of mind that comes with knowing, especially in the midst of an emergency situation, that everything will be taken care of. And nobody can put a price on that. Patrick Chong is the Managing Director of InsureMore, an award-winning team of specialists in global single trip and annual travel insurance policies. Besides offering great deals on travel insurance, Patrick also collects and shares the best free travel competitions to help his clients get the most out of their holidays.
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