Travel Insurance: What It Should Actually Cover

Travel insurance is the purchase people spend the least time on and understand the least well. The gap between what a policy appears to cover and what it actually covers is where the trouble happens.

Medical cover — the non-negotiable part

This is the reason insurance exists. Everything else is a bonus.

• Check the limit, not just that medical is "included". Serious treatment abroad can be very expensive.
• Emergency evacuation and repatriation should be explicitly covered, ideally with a high limit.
• Pre-existing conditions are usually excluded unless declared and accepted. Declare them — an undeclared condition can void a whole claim, not just the related part.
• Check whether the insurer pays the hospital directly or expects you to pay and reclaim. That difference matters enormously in a crisis.

Cancellation and delays

Understand precisely what triggers a payout: illness, bereavement, severe weather, airline insolvency. "Change of plans" is never covered, and neither is a foreseeable event you booked around.

Gear and belongings

Per-item limits are usually far lower than the total baggage limit — a camera or laptop is frequently worth more than the single-item cap. If you travel with valuable equipment, either add a specified-items rider or insure it separately.

Most policies also require belongings to be with you or in a locked room, and reject claims for items left unattended.

Adventure activities — the biggest gap

Standard policies routinely exclude:

• Riding or being a passenger on a motorbike or scooter, or cover it only with a valid licence and helmet.
• Scuba diving below a certain depth or without certification.
• Trekking above a stated altitude.
• Skiing, climbing, and anything organised informally.

Before you buy, and before you fly

1. Read the exclusions section first. It is shorter and more informative than the cover section.
2. Check the policy is valid for your whole trip length and every country on your route.
3. Save the policy number and the 24-hour emergency line offline in your phone.
4. Tell a travelling companion or someone at home where the policy details are.