The insurance industry generally has a bad press. Insurers and trade bodies complain that it is all so unfair and that it is that nasty media not telling us all how wonderful and generous insurance companies are.
So what do some travel insurers do when there is a serious risk of having to pay claims? You guessed it; they find ways of avoiding payment.
The public tends to ridicule insurers for only insuring things that no one really needs insurance for. This is a bit unfair, but bad publicity from a few hard-hearted companies, damages the credibility of the rest. When those insurers are owned by deep pocketed banks that make huge profits every year, all sympathy vanishes.
The latest fiasco is the refusal of some leading insurers to cover or pay for baggage lost or stolen by passengers travelling through BA’s disastrous new terminal.
I am not going to bore you with the whining and whinging of insurers and their trade association trying to justify their actions.
Some are just refusing to insure any new claims. Any sympathy you have for insurers soon goes when you start to think that many passengers using T5 will have no choice as that is either the only way to fly and/or they are already booked.
Now, this does not sound too bad until you think about it:
Do travel insurers ask which airline you are flying on ? NO
Do travel insurers ask which airport you are flying from ? NO
Do travel insurers ask which terminal you are flying from ? NO
So the first you will know of the ban is when you try to claim for baggage lost or stolen – not at all a satisfactory state of affairs.
To be fair - some insurers are treating T5 as no different from any other trip.
Sadly, for all the good guys playing fairly, the handful of high profile insurers getting a huge amount of bad press across national and local papers, radio and television, the internet and in the pub are yet again ruining any faint hopes that the public will trust insurance companies.
Insurers may try to wriggle, but legally and technically, seeking to change what cover they will or will not pay for, after a policy has been taken out – is against the basic principles of insurance, insurance law, contract law, and the FSA basic rule that insurers must treat all customers fairly.
Travel insurance: Hot Topic: April 2008
