You can’t afford to have your identity, personal or business information stolen. Using the internet is absolutely necessary, but being lax about the passwords you use short-sighted and dangerous.

I just discovered that Microsoft has a free Password checker. Its site says, “Your online accounts, computer files, and personal information are more secure when you use strong passwords to help protect them…”

Click here for the Password checker. And I’d appreciate any feedback if you found this tool helpful.

I didn’t know you can’t freely leave some countries with their currencies. I actually have some Indian Rupees and Russian Roubles from past trips. Thankfully I wasn’t searched on the way out of the country.

In fact, I just found out this wasn’t good from Peter Greenberg’s Free Daily Travel Tips. You can read Peter’s entire “Beware of Foreign Currency Restrictions” posting here.

PS -
Sometimes it’s a good idea to have some local currency before you arrive. Here’s where Steve recommends you get it: Get Your Travel Currency Ahead Of Time at BuyTravelMoney.com - Cash can be delivered straight to your doorstep. Rates are competitive and two-day shipping is free on orders of $750 or more.

How do I figure the value of the vacation if I am using points?

You need to do this:

Count frequent flyer tickets, award travel, vouchers, reward points & credit card miles as a $0 trip cost. The value is not equal to the money you save by using them. Your trip cost is only the taxes you pay when you exercise them.

Go here to learn more.

If you are planning a cruise, you absolutely need to go to CruiseCritic.com. Cruise Critic is loaded with Cruise reviews, cruise line reviews, cruise ship ratings, cruise deals. You’ll find 20,000+ ship reviews and active cruise forums. It’s the best Cruise information travel guide I think exists out there.

You can sign up for a Free Membership which lets you post questions and answers on any of its boards. Try out CruiseCritic.com today. And let me know what you think.

Can more travelers be added to an existing Travel Insurance policy? Jan

Hi Jan, You cannot add more travelers to a Travel Insurance policy once a policy’s set up. However, they can get a new policy. If pre-existing conditions’ or Cancel For Any Reason coverage is needed, they have to get their policy within the applicable deadline.

A similar situation is replacing a person on a policy - this can’t be done either. However, if you are still within the Free Look period you can remove someone from the policies we work with.

If so, you know how difficult it can be to try to figure out exactly what’s in the food you’re eating. Thankfully, you can often just ask the person who prepared the food to tell you what’s in it. This is pretty easy to do when they speak english or your native tongue.

But what do you do when you’re travelling? It’s much harder when the preparer doesn’t speak your language. Here’s an article you should find useful: Traveling With Food Allergies - A Lifesaving Tip.

Being in the insurance business, you would think it’s easy for me to buy any kind of insurance, right? I thought so, too, until I went to find a new Homeowner’s Insurance policy. I did the right thing and decided to compare at least 4 companies. I ended up with 6 choices. After making sure the agents each knew exactly what I was looking for I got their quotes.

And that’s where the frustration started. I thought I was insuring my home for the same amount, but each company has its own way of valuing what it costs to rebuild a home. Plus, I ran onto the “get a discount if we insure both your cars & house” pitch.

I spent part of the last 2 weeks narrowing it all down. In the end I settled on Farmers Insurance Company because their agent was the easiest to talk to. And the price was good, though not the cheapest. And they got my cars, too.

Few people trust insurance companies. For obvious reasons, this discussion’s just about travel insurance. Here’s what we say:

Buying travel insurance is a risk: You are trading a known certainty (your hard earned money) for an unknown quantity - the promise of the insurance policy doing what it says it will do. This is why we pre-screen our plans.

People manage the risk of losing money on a trip different ways: (none are right or wrong, they are just choices people make)

1. Some people stick with the same insurance company for every trip
2. Some self-insure
3. Some ignore travel / trip / cruise insurance altogether
4. Some take their agent’s advice
5. Some shop around
6. Some forget

In my opinion, getting travel insurance is a personal decision, therefore none of these choices are right or wrong, they are just a matter of personal preference.

Of course, I’d rather every US & Canadian traveler buy their trip, travel or cruise insurance from us. While we are growing, I don’t think TripInsuranceStore.com will ever be a monopoly.

I’m considering a 16 day trip to South Africa with Elderhostel. I am interested in a trip cancellation only insurance plan. I’ve read about these kinds of plans. How much will this plan cost me? Betty

This question frequently comes up, so I’m happy to address it here. Betty has probably read an article telling her that she’ll save money by getting a plan without all the extras.

In theory Betty will save money except that no travel insurance company has a trip cancellation only insurance plan. The reality is that there’s not enough, if any, profit in having a trip cancellation only travel insurance plan.

Here’s more why these plans aren’t available and what you can do if that’s what you wanted.

I’m looking for an Annual Travel Insurance Plan. Where do I start? Marilyn

As far as I know, the only Annual travel insurance plans you can buy if you are a US resident are either Flight Life Insurance (die in a plane crash) or Medical Insurance.

Neither of these choices includes trip cancellation, interruption or other common coverages.

Why is that?

Though I can’t speak for the insurance companies, here’s what I think is the reason why:

I don’t think they have come up with a way to anticipate their claims experience for trip cancellation & interruption.

It’s easier with the Annual Flight Life Insurance because as I tell people, “it only takes one event to make the policy pay”.

Also, as I mentioned, you can get annual medical / health travel insurance plans. However, these plans won’t cover any pre-existing conditions. And in most cases the Lookback Period is more restrictive.

You can see our Annual Travel Insurance Plans here

I hope this help you.

Do I get some kind of a medical insurance card I just present to the doctor or hospital I go to? And does the medical facility just collect from the travel insurance company? Thanks, Judy

The short answers are “No” & “No”, but you want to know why.

With one exception,you have to pay your medical bills yourself while on your trip. That’s because travel insurance plans are “indemnification” plans (you will be reimbursed - indemnified) after your trip by the insurance company.

Travel insurance is not a “pay on behalf of” plan. You don’t just give the medical facility a card. Instead you pay the bills, collect all the receipts and submit those receipts along with the claim paperwork you get form the travel insurance company.

In some cases, a few companies can guarantee payment to the medical facility, but it’s on a case-by-case basis. It’s determined by the financial need of the insured person.

Of course, if you get your Travel insurance from us at www.TripInsuranceStore.com, we will, of course help you with your claim. Why? Because it’s the right thing to do.

Most travelers are are mis-informed about how Primary & Secondary Medical Travel Insurance coverage works. Read this to learn the truth about what Primary or Secondary Medical coverage means and how they differ:

Primary Medical Coverage means your medical bills are paid from the first dollar. No “coordination of benefit” claim forms need to be filed.

This works best if the medical claim’s less than the coverage amount. That’s because even though you had insurance pay for part of the claim, when the Primary benefits are exhausted, your other insurance won’t consider any deductibles or co-pays to be satisfied.

For example, here’s what happens if you have a $70,000 medical claim with a travel insurance plan that has $50,000 Primary coverage:

1. You submit the $70,000 medical claim to the travel insurance. It pays $50,000 (its maximum)
2. You submit the remaining $20,000 to your medical insurance plan. Let’s say it has a $5,000 deductible with a 20% copay.
3. Of the remaining $20,000 your medical insurance plan will pay $12,000 and you will be liable for $8,000.

Secondary Medical Coverage means your medical bills are paid after any other coverage you have pays their share. This means that Secondary coverage will pay any deductibles, out-of-pocket expenses or co-pays up to its coverage limit.

Here’s a little detail that’s good to know: Secondary coverage assumes you have other coverage that’s Primary. If you don’t have other coverage Secondary becomes Primary.

I bought a policy from you last year for a trip to NZ. We’re going back in 2009 on a home / car swap with a couple there. Can a trip insurance policy cover us using their car? Thanks, Gary

Gary’s question brings up how trip / travel insurance works with personal vehicles. Related to this is when you’re driving your own vehicle to your trip’s destination.

Neither trip nor travel insurance will cover a personal vehicle in any circumstance. If your car breaks down en route, that’s not covered for travel delay nor trip interruption.

Along this line, let’s say there’s a travel delay and you have to wait a day to fly out. If you rent a car to drive to your destination, the cost of the car rental is not a covered cost.

Travel Insurance does not cover civil unrest, so if you’re considering a trip to a potentially unstable area of the world, I suggest you go here to find out about US State Department Travel Warnings.

And if you want to see what else Travel Insurance doesn’t cover, go here to see the Exclusions

I came across a great website for tracking storms and seeing weather in general. It’s called “Storm Pulse”. You get a satellite image map. You can zoom in and out, too. Here’s the link to Storm Plus.

You can even become a forecaster at Storm Pulse. You can try your hand at forecasting the paths and intensities of the deadliest storms on Earth. They keep track of your accuracy & rank your performance against other members.

We estimate our cruise’s per person cost at $4,171, but we might add a shore excursion. What trip cost should we insure? Thanks, Diane P.

Great question Diane! As you said, you don’t know exactly what your final prepaid non-refundable trip cost will be. Therefore, I suggest you round your trip cost up to the top of the range which is $4,500 each.

It’s the same cost to you as $4,171. Plus, if you choose a plan with 150% trip interruption and you needed to return home early for a covered reason you’d have a higher limit after rounding your trip cost up to the top of the range.

Another benefit to you is when you’re trying to insure pre-existing conditions or get the Cancel For Any Reason benefit. Many plans’ rules include “you must insure the entire per person prepaid non-refundable trip cost“. If you under-insure the trip cost you’ll lose these benefits.

Depending on the plan, the per person trip cost is in $500 or $1,000 increments for trips of up to $10,000 per person. You can learn more about what’s included in your Trip Cost here.

Tired of paying up to $28 a day for Rental Car Insurance? If you live in the USA or Canada AND are taking trip of at least 100 miles from home, you can save money by getting a rental car collision damage waiver on your own.

A Collision Damage Waiver is damage insurance and “Loss of Use” coverage for cars (not trucks, not SUVs, not passenger vans, not 4 wheel drive vehicles). You can get up to $35,000 coverage.

You’re covered on a per vehicle, not per person basis. This valuable plan covers repair of the rental car’s physical damage and Daily “Loss of Use” charges while the vehicle’s being repaired. A Collision Damage Waiver is not Liability coverage - it does not cover damage to property or injuries. You must get Liability coverage on your own.

Read more about Rental Car Insurance here.

Having your own water bottle to use over & over again just seems so normal and “green”. And taking it along on a trip gives you the ability to carry pure water wherever you go.

But, if your water bottle’s a Naglene, you might want to put it away for now. Worries about a hormone-mimicking chemical used in the trendy sports accessory led Vancouver-based Mountain Equipment Co-op (Canada) to remove Nalgene and other polycarbonate plastic containers from store shelves in early December.

You can read the entire article from Ben Dobbin, AP Business Writer here.

The creator & editor of SanPedro.com just alerted us to a really neat website that bills itself as “Your Guide to Airplane Seats and In-flight Amenities”.

The website’s name is www.SeatGuru.com. SeatGuru.com tells you what seats are in specific planes, which seats have power or where the good seats are. I know I’ll be going to this site before I accept any airline seat assignments.

Be sure to check out both www.SeatGuru.com. and SanPedro.com.

I understand waiting in line for security checkpoints, but the one part of the beginning of any trip I take that includes flying is waiting to board the aircraft. With the exception of traveling with babies, it’s usually a frustratingly slow process.

Rob Lovitt (Travel writer, MSNBC contributor) wrote an article on 10-30-07 called “Now boarding: new preflight procedures”. This gives me hope for my next trip.

You can read Rob’s boarding tips article here.

I don’t dread much about traveling, except having my luggage lost, damaged or stolen. It’s such a helpless feeling when it doesn’t arrive. In fact my parents had their luggage lost when they returned home from a Rhine River Cruise on 12-23-06 (it showed up late on 12-26-06). They were on Delta, but it doesn’t seem to matter which airline you use.

The most frustrating part of it was that even though they called Delta 6 times after they submitted the claim, each time they called they had to re-explain the entire story because Delta doesn’t save the information so the next customer service agent has any of that data to refer to!

Andrea Bennett, Travel and Leisure, gives 3 Good Tips to prevent lost luggage. You can read Andrea Bennett’s article here.