Why Should You Have Pre Existing Medical Conditions Coverage?

by Steve Dasseos, The Trip Insurance Guru on May 9, 2013

Hi Steve, I guess we’re still not clear on pre-existing conditions and just how that relates to a trip and why we need it. Please explain and sorry if you already have, we just need clarification. We have pretty darn good insurance that always reimburses us for anything that happens overseas. Linda

Hi Linda,

Thanks for writing. I have a page that explains Pre-Existing Medical Conditions in greater detail (http://www.tripinsurancestore.com/how-travel-insurance-pre-existing-medical-conditions-coverage-works/), but I’m happy to explain the basic concepts for you here.

Pre-Existing Medical Conditions could affect you 3 ways:

  • You are forced to cancel your trip
  • You need medical coverage on your trip
  • You need to return home early

Pre-Existing Medical Conditions coverage is important is because you may not want to lose the money you paid for the trip if that condition worsens and forces you to cancel or interrupt your trip. Or if you needed medical treatment on your trip from that Pre-Existing Medical Condition.

A Pre-Existing Medical Condition is any medical condition (no matter how minor), which manifested itself, became acute or exhibited symptoms which would have caused one to seek diagnosis, care or treatment; or which medical advice, diagnosis, care or treatment was recommended or received; or required taking prescribed drugs or medicine, unless the condition for which the prescribed drug or medicine is taken remains controlled without any change in the required prescription; or required medical treatment or treatment was recommended by a Legally Qualified Physician during the 60, 90, 180 or 365 day Lookback Period prior to the day you buy a travel insurance policy.

Pre-Existing Medical Conditions coverage also applies to a non-traveling family member, or a traveling companion, or a traveling companion’s non-traveling family member.

If there are no concerns about a potential Pre-Existing Medical Condition causing a trip cancellation or trip interruption, then there’s no reason to insure for it. The cost is the same with or without the pre-ex coverage.

I hope this makes sense. If you want the right travel insurance advice, call us at 1-888-407-3854 and we’ll help you figure it all out.

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Follow The Rules or We Won’t Help You Get Travel Insurance

by Steve Dasseos, The Trip Insurance Guru on April 24, 2013

Last Friday I had to send the following email:

Janet, After I heard your phone call with Tara, we cannot help you get travel insurance.

What would prompt me telling someone who wanted to buy a $1,054 cruise travel insurance policy this: “After I heard your phone call with Tara, we cannot help you get travel insurance”?

She broke one of my TripInsuranceStore.com rules: “We only work with nice people, so if you’re not nice, kind & happy, there are lots of other travel insurance sellers who will gladly take your money.”

Since I’m such a nice guy, I didn’t give her one of my competitors’ phone numbers to call (though the thought briefly flickered in my mind).

Here are the rules to work with TripInsuranceStore.com:

It’s too bad that Janet has made it to her forties with being able to get her way and being completely rude because “I am spending a lot of money with you … “. I doubt she clicked http://eepurl.com/wCXYr to subscribe to my Blog, so she won’t get the benefit of this statement: “$1,054 isn’t that much money!”

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Please Change Your Passwords

by Steve Dasseos, The Trip Insurance Guru on April 15, 2013

On August 8, 2012 I wrote a post called “Change Your Passwords” which I hope helped you. Unfortunately, many computer users have weak passwords and overall low security. Even if you have great passwords you still suffer the consequences of the people with weak ones. Here’s one example:

Starting last week, tens of thousands of WordPress and Joomla websites (roughly 20% of websites use WordPress and Joomla) have been under a “Brute Force Attack” from an illegal botnet. A botnet is a collection of internet-connected programs communicating with other similar programs in order to perform tasks. There are illegal botnets which are a group of computers that have been infected with malware to perform tasks for a 3rd party.

A brute-force attack is a systematic checking of all possible passwords (or just popular ones) until the correct password is found. A botnet is not required, but can help in the process as multiple computers can be used to check different combinations and avoid triggering multiple attempt limits.

The top five user names being attacked are admin, test, administrator, Admin, and root. The top five passwords being used are admin, 123456, 666666, 111111, and 12345678.

Why does this matter to you if you don’t have a website or blog using WordPress or Joomla?

  • You probably know someone who has a website or blog with these programs. Here’s a chance to help them. Wouldn’t they be surprised if you gave them some technical advice?
  • You use passwords and you need stronger ones

I use 12 – 17 digit long passwords. That may sound paranoid, but it’s worth it for the peaceful sleep I have every night. Not everyone who does anything online sleeps peacefully.

I hope this makes sense.

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Don’t Wait 4 Months to go to The Doctor

by Steve Dasseos, The Trip Insurance Guru on April 4, 2013

I haven’t written on my Blog for 4 months because (although I didn’t know it at the time) I have been battling bronchitis. I thought I just had a cold that came and went. I chalked up being tired all the time, being in a daze and having the overall run-down feeling to working too much and sleeping too little (I don’t deny I work too much).

After 4 months of getting better and worse I decided to go to the doctor. She said I should have come in 3 – 1/2 months earlier! It turned out I had bronchitis with a severe bacterial infection in my lungs. I ended up with a few rounds of antibiotics: first Amoxicillin and then Levofloxacin. The Levofloxacin packs quite a punch. Plus, I have a steroid inhaler I am still using. Mucinex helps a lot, too.

That was really stupid to ignore it. Especially because I have since found out that there are a lot of infections that are not curable.

About the only good thing that came from being so sick for so long is that I got a chance to do some soul-searching. I have made and stuck with a few major personal changes. TripInsuranceStore.com is also getting some improvements to even be more useful to our wonderful clients. I’ll be announcing those over the next six months as they become available.

In the meantime, you can look forward to more detailed blog posts to help you navigate through the complicated trip cancellation travel insurance plan world.

Sincerely,

Steve Dasseos

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Should You Buy Trip Cancellation Insurance For Just Airfare?

by Steve Dasseos, The Trip Insurance Guru on December 5, 2012

If you have read TripInsuranceStore.com including this blog, you will see that we usually have no problem telling you when you should not get travel insurance. There are just some trips that you should not waste your money trying to insure (like when you have no prepaid trip costs).

This time I am telling you: If you have an airline ticket with absolutely no other prepaid and non-refundable trip costs we do not recommend buying a trip cancellation travel insurance plan.

Why did I just shout this to you? The short answer is that it’s likely your Airline Ticket’s Contract of Carriage includes wording like “changes or cancellations to an itinerary may be made prior to departure” and “a Future Travel Credit will be issued …”. So, there’s no need for a trip cancellation travel insurance plan.

Here’s the longer answer:

Someone recently bought a trip cancellation travel insurance from us and is now forced to postpone her trip. They are flying Spirit Airlines, but it could have been any airline. As it turns out, she didn’t want to use Spirit Airlines for the postponed trip, so she bought new tickets with Jet Blue. Plus, she hasn’t cancelled her Spirit Airlines trip.

Now she wants a 100% reimbursement of her Spirit Airlines tickets. But, Spirit Airlines’ Contract of Carriage, doesn’t allow her to cancel her trip – she can only postpone her trip to a future date.

Just in case you didn’t slap your head and say, “Of course, I see why a trip cancellation claim will not be paid”, I’ll enlighten you:

“Alternate requested date(s) or flight(s) …” and “A Future Travel Credit will be issued …” . Both “Alternate requested date(s) or flight(s)” or “A Future Travel Credit” means you cannot cancel your airline ticket. Technically, you will never cancel your airline ticket because you are postponing it to use on a different trip.

If you cannot cancel your airline ticket, there’s no legal basis for a trip cancellation claim to be paid because you do not cancel your airline ticket. If you could cancel your airline ticket and get fully reimbursed from an insurance company, why would an airline give you a Future Travel Credit? They wouldn’t because that means you would fly for free.

The next thing you are probably thinking is “what should she do with her unusable policy?” I solved that yesterday by telling her we would cancel it in the Free Look period so she gets a refund.

In addition, I did something I probably shouldn’t have done: I offered to pay her, out of my own pocket, the Spirit Airlines change fees if she can furnish us proof she paid the change fees. There’s nearly $500 she would not have gotten anywhere else. In fact, I probably just bought nearly $500 of negative publicity: “I will make sure to tell people about my experience so the same thing doesn’t happen to them.”

I can tell you from now on we will never advise anyone to buy a trip cancellation travel insurance policy if they only are buying it for just trip cancellation purposes and for none of the other benefits.

Phew!

PS – Don’t blame the trip cancellation travel insurance providers. They legally cannot pay a trip cancellation claim when you get a “A Future Travel Credit”.

As you are planning your trip you will realize how much you still have to learn about trip insurance. You are learning useful travel insurance information at TripInsuranceStore.com and are wondering when it will all click. Don’t worry, everything will make sense. Call us at 1-888-407-3854 and we’ll help you, too.


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Travel Insurance Claims Need Written Proof of Loss

November 27, 2012

Subscribe This is one of those blog posts I never thought I would have to write. I have a few more written which are currently in “draft status”. I discussed these with a friend last week and she said: “I am constantly amazed by the number of people who will not follow simple directions, can’t [...]

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You Cannot Get a Refund on Non Prepaid Trip Costs

September 26, 2012

Subscribe Hi Steve, I want trip cancellation insurance to cover my hotel costs in case I have to cancel my trip for one of the normally covered reasons. I have reserved 3 nights in Paris which are guaranteed with my credit card. My credit card will be charged $788 if I cancel my trip less [...]

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I’m Sorry About Mary’s Brother

August 31, 2012

Subscribe Steve, Help! Here is my dilemma… I am scheduled to leave in 5 weeks for a 3 week trip. I paid my Initial Deposit on April 10, 2012 and my trip is paid in full. My brother was just diagnosed with brain cancer. What are my options since I may have to cancel my [...]

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Goodbye Buddy

August 16, 2012

We said goodbye to our precious 9 year old Bichon-Poodle “Buddy Fred Dasseos” just a few hours ago. 10 days ago Buddy was just fine. And, without any warning he developed a renal infection and went downhill from there. We got to have him at home for a few days and nights, too. We loved [...]

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Change Your Passwords

August 8, 2012

Subscribe I’m sure you are well aware of all the data breaches that have taken place over the past years. In fact, on July 31, 2012, the GAO reported “Data breaches up 19%”. Two simple steps to protect yourself: Change Your Passwords. We use complicated passwords both for TripInsuranceStore.com and for our own personal use. [...]

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An Exciting 7 Weeks

August 2, 2012

Subscribe I haven’t written here for a while because it’s been an exciting 7 weeks. It started with someone telling me they won’t be able to complete their project on time because of their bad internet connection. Why did they have a bad internet connection? It was because their son watched Netflix at the same [...]

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It’s Good Erin Didn’t Take The Other Advice

June 20, 2012

Subscribe I called 1-888-407-3584 and talked to Deanna about travel insurance and she was very helpful and friendly. That phone call saved me several hours searching for the right insurance! Thank you for a great service and friendly employees, which is hard to find these days. The reason I did not get insurance is because [...]

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Is Penny Still Covered While Taking Refundable Flights?

June 7, 2012

Subscribe I have a question about coverage during the time of an uninsured refundable flight. We have 3 different flights, one is refundable, the others not. I was thinking that we only have to cover the 2 nonrefundable flights in our total trip cost, but what if a problem, such as lost baggage or trip [...]

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Carla Needs The Cancel For Any Reason Coverage

May 18, 2012

Subscribe Hi Steve, Have a pretty specific situation I am hoping you can give advice on. I was advised by my physician handling invitro fertilization to get trip insurance for a trip I am planning in September, in the event that I have complications when completing an IVF cycle 1-2 wks prior to trip departure. [...]

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I Have Great News

May 3, 2012

Subscribe Before I tell you the good news, if you don’t like hearing about anything supernatural or religious, I suggest you don’t read any further. I am not telling you what to believe because you have the right to make up your own mind. It’s out of respect I am telling you this first. Last [...]

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Don’t Waste $429 on Un-Needed Trip Cancellation Insurance

April 18, 2012

Subscribe My name is Kathy. I am interested in low cost trip cancellation insurance to cover the costs shown below in case we need to cancel our trip and also to have our mileage reinstated in that event. Ages 72 & 66, our per person cost is $3500 for hotels, car and plane tickets: We [...]

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I’m sorry to hear about Tony’s Grandma

April 13, 2012

Subscribe Steve, On April 6th we (family of 3, and grandma who is 88) booked and paid in full for a cruise for June. On Saturday April 7th, grandma was hospitalized with neural seizures, and she’s not doing well. Came home yesterday, with home care required. Based on all this, we’ll probably not be going [...]

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