When thinking of buying holiday travel insurance when you go on your next holiday abroad, my advice to all is do not insure with INSUREANDGO unless you are prepared to read and understand every piece of information listed in their terms and conditions section.
Based on personal knowledge, INSUREANDGO refused payment for a claim made for what seemed to be an incident that could happen to any traveler on holiday, citing that the situation was not covered within the policy wording and that it is up to the policy holder “to read the terms and conditions of the policy”.
ATLAS INSURANCE recommended by Which? Magazine on the other hand paid out promptly for the same claim made by other members of the family for the same set of circumstances for the same amount of expenses to the ones refused by NSUREANDGO.
The incident that caused reasons for a claim on holiday travel insurance happened on 24th April 2007. After enjoying a five day holiday in Paris I was taken ill with some kind of stomach bug early on the morning of our intended return from Orly Airport to Coventry via Thomsonfly, together with my wife and 21 year old son.
When the taxi that had taken us from our Hotel arrived at the Airport at 7.45am I was feeling quite ill with severe pain, sickness and diarrhea.
Our flight due to take off from Orly at 9.50am was showing on the information screen as “delayed expected landing from Coventry at 12.39pm”. By now I was in terrible pain and discomfort so my wife called for the Airport Medics to give me some treatment. They said that there must be a virus going around as they had seen quite a few similar cases recently and that it would be best if I went to hospital for treatment. My wife went to the Thomsonfly desk informed them what was happening and was told that we had plenty of time as they had not yet been informed when the incoming plane was due to land.
I was taken along with my wife by ambulance to hospital, had tests taken, treated and arrived back at the Airport at 10.10am. My wife then went to the Thomsonfly desk and asked if they knew of any developments for a new take-off time as the information screen was still showing the same “flight Delayed” message as before. She was told that the check in desk had closed at 10am and that we would not be able to travel on the return flight to Coventry!
For the next 2 hours we pleaded with Thomsonfly desk for help in getting back to England. They refused us any help what so ever. They would not let us on to the plane home even though it had not yet landed! They could not arrange another fight that day. They could not even guarantee seats on a flight for the next day, saying come back in the morning and see if any seats are available. We had been abandoned by the flight company.
The only chance of getting home was under our own initiative, so we took the only option available and traveled 20 miles across Paris to Gare de Nord and caught Eurostar back to London. Then underground to Euston then train to Coventry then taxi to the Airport arriving at Coventry Airport at 8.40pm instead of the original time 1.45pm by plane.
After writing to Thomsonfly and explaining what had happened at Orly Airport they replied with an apology together with an extra £50 for goodwill, adding that staff would be re trained in Paris so that an incident such as this would never happen again.
My wife and I had both taken out holiday insurance with ATLAS INSURANCE and were paid promptly and in full for the expenses incurred returning to Coventry.
My son who had taken out a 12 month insurance with INSUREANDGO to cover several trips he would be making abroad this year mainly through Birmingham University where he is a student, had his claim for return costs incurred REFUSED by INSUREANDGO saying this event was not covered in their small print.
I will leave you to decide which Insurance Company to trust with your next holiday insurance cover in case something goes wrong and you need to make a claim.