Annual travel insurance - could you save money?

by Chris Rowlands
Did you know you could be spending much more on your travel insurance policy than is really necessary? On average buying a single trip policy from a supermarket or similar for a couple with no health problems to a European destination can set you back by £34 for that one trip. Spending just a little extra time and effort searching around can help you find premiums as low as £8-9 for a single trip for 2 people. Of course you should be wary of the features a policy as cheap as this offers as you may find it lacks in some crucial areas. More often than not you will still have cover in all the basic areas you require.

An area where many constantly lose money is in the choosing of policy type. If you are aware you may travel more than once in a year, you could save money by opting for a multi-trip policy. As the name suggests, this will allow you to travel several times under the same policy which can quickly add up to a large saving when you consider the cost of a the average single trip policy. In general you may find an annual travel insurance policy (multi and annual will sometimes be branded together) the best value for money as this will allow you to travel at a higher frequency and for longer durations. The average cost of an annual policy for a couple falls at around £79 (when purchased from a supermarket or similar). As you can imagine if you'd travelled 3 times during a year, which is not that difficult these days, you would have just paid £132 on 3 single trip policies. If you utilise an internet comparison site you can quite easily find a similar policy for half of this price.

When looking at a prospective policy remember to check you are covered in all the areas you require. Cancellation and baggage cover can sometimes be optional extras so you should ensure you have these. Make a mental note to check the policy excesses in the event of a claim as these can vary considerably. Check the level of medical cover exceeds £1 million and if visiting America try to get double this amount as it is not unknown for tourists to be quite literally bankrupted by private medical bills.

When you consider that the average cheap travel insurance allows you to travel an almost unlimited amount of times (each trip not exceeding a figure of around 45 days) you could save a large amount of money by utilising this type of policy. If you spend a little time looking and maybe utilising comparison sites you will find that cheap travel insurance is not all that elusive.

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