Piste break didn’t send Brooke broke
To borrow the words of the late actor-turned-credit card spruiker Karl Malden: don’t leave home without it.
We are not talking here about an Amex card but good travel insurance to get you back home if something goes seriously wrong.
With many of us trying to survive the new working year by planning our next holiday, now is the time to think about policies that suit your plans and your situation.
Some credit cards can offer solid travel insurance if they are used to book holidays but consumer advocacy group Choice warns there is a good chance these policies will not automatically cover pre-existing health conditions and can have far higher excesses.
There are many highly rated insurance policies readily available on the internet or even through retailer Woolworths, which has two policies among the 12 given a five-star rating by financial services research group Canstar.
While the policies may take a couple of hundreds dollars off your holiday drinks and day-tours budget, they can save your family a small fortune and unimaginable anxiety if something goes wrong.
Ocean Reef engineering student Brooke Shaw has tens of thousands of reasons to be thankful her parents Helen and George insisted she sign up for comprehensive insurance cover just four days before she flew out for a two-week holiday to Japan and Hong Kong.
Three days into her holiday at Club Med in Sahoro, Brooke ruptured her left anterior cruciate ligament while skiing. Japanese doctors who had MRIs and X-rays taken wrote reports in their language recommending Brooke be flown home business class with her leg raised.
Mr and Mrs Shaw contacted Travel Insurance Direct, which had the reports translated and had a doctor assess the MRIs to confirm the injury. “From that point on, it was all about getting this girl home,” Mrs Shaw told
She has an email trail showing that through the night, TID made arrangements for Mr Shaw to fly to Hokkaido to meet Brooke so he could escort her home to Perth, via Hong Kong. They flew business class with Cathay Pacific.
She is now recovering at home after a knee reconstruction.
Fortunately for the Shaws, Brooke’s policy covered skiing, both on the groomed slopes and off-piste. In its travel insurance guide, Choice says it is important that people know the leisure activities included in, or excluded from, a policy.
Some policies cover skiing for an extra premium, but Choice says not many cover off-piste skiing. This makes it necessary to get the right cover for their likely skiing adventures, including any forays away from the groomed runs.
Another hitch with travel insurance is precisely what losses a policy does and does not cover, and the need to provide detailed proof of a loss.
