Travel and Medical Insurance

Three kinds of travel insurance are available: trip-cancellation insurance, medical insurance, and lost luggage insurance. The cost of travel insurance varies widely, depending on the cost and length of your trip, your age and health, and the type of trip you’re taking, but expect to pay between 5 and 8 percent of the vacation itself. Here is my advice on all three:

- Trip-cancellation insurance helps you get your money back if you have to back out of a trip, if you must go home early, or if your travel supplier goes bankrupt. Allowed reasons for cancellation can range from sickness to natural disasters to the State Department declaring your destination unsafe for travel. (Insurers usually won’t cover vague fears, though, as many travelers, wary of flying after September 11, 2001, discovered when they tried to cancel their trips that fall.)

A good resource is “Travel Guard Alerts,” a list of companies considered high-risk by Travel Guard International (www.travelguard. com). Protect yourself further by paying for the insurance with a credit card — by law, you can get your money back on goods and services not received if you report the loss within 60 days after the charge is listed on your credit-card statement.

Note: Many tour operators, particularly those offering trips to remote or high-risk areas, include insurance in the cost of the trip or can arrange insurance policies through a partnering provider, a convenient and often cost-effective way for the traveler to obtain insurance. Make sure the tour company is a reputable one, however. Some experts suggest you avoid buying insurance from the tour or cruise company you’re traveling with, saying you’re better off buying from a third-party insurer than you are putting all your money in one place.

- Buying medical insurance for your trip doesn’t make sense for most travelers. For travel overseas, most health plans (including Medicare and Medicaid) do not provide coverage, and the ones that do often require you to pay for services up front and reimburse you only after you return home. Even if your plan does cover overseas treatment, most out-of-country hospitals make you pay your bills up front, and send you a refund only after you’ve returned home and filed the necessary paperwork with your insurance company. As a safety net, you may want to buy travel medical insurance, particularly if you’re traveling to a remote or high-risk area where emergency evacuation is a possible scenario. If you require additional medical insurance, try MEDEX Assistance (410-453-6300; www.medexassist.com) or Travel Assistance International (800-821-2828; www.travelassistance.com; for general information on services, call the company’s Worldwide Assistance Services, Inc., at 800-777-8710).

- Lost luggage insurance is not necessary for most travelers. On domestic flights, checked baggage is covered up to $2,500 per ticketed passenger. On international flights (including U.S. portions of international trips), baggage coverage is limited to approximately $9.07 per pound, up to approximately $635 per checked bag. If you plan to check items more valuable than the standard liability, see if your valuables are covered by your homeowner’s policy, get baggage insurance as part of your comprehensive travel-insurance package, or buy Travel Guard’s BagTrak product. Don’t buy insurance at the airport — it’s usually overpriced. Be sure to take any valuables or irreplaceable items with you in your carry-on luggage; many valuables (including books, money, and electronics) aren’t covered by airline policies.

If your luggage is lost, immediately file a lost-luggage claim at the airport, detailing the luggage contents. For most airlines, you must report delayed, damaged, or lost baggage within four hours of arrival. The airlines are required to deliver luggage, once found, directly to your house or destination free of charge.

For more information, contact one of the following recommended insurers: Access America (866-807-3982; www.accessamerica. com); Travel Guard International (800-826-4919; www.travel guard.com); Travel Insured International (800-243-3174; www. travelinsured.com); and Travelex Insurance Services (888- 457-4602; www.travelex-insurance.com).

Don’t pay for more insurance than you need. For example, if you need only trip-cancellation insurance, don’t buy coverage for lost or stolen property. Trip-cancellation insurance costs about 6 to 8 percent of the total value of your vacation.