Travel Insurance

If you live in Hong Kong or some other place with government subsidized healthcare, travel insurance becomes really important.

The primary purpose of travel insurance is that it pays for a variety of emergency medical expenses if you get injured or fall ill while out of your home territory. When you’re sick, injured or need emergency medical attention while traveling in a foreign country (ie. the United States), things can be expensive and you might not know where to find the best medical treatment. In these cases, travel insurance kicks in to make sure your medical expenses are paid for.

Yes it is. Even though nobody likes to think about it, accidents happen – especially when you’re on vacation. You might eat something at the hotel or street food stall that makes you sick or your children might get overexcited and hurt themselves playing at Disney Land.

In a foreign country, unexpected medical expenses can be huge. Rather than worry about ruining your vacation and coming home with giant medical bills, you should consider purchasing travel insurance whenever you or your family are going out of your home jurisdiction for work or a family vacation.

Ideally, if you’re getting travel insurance to cover a single trip, you should purchase travel insurance in advance of your departure date. Once you leave your jurisdiction, you might not be eligible for coverage. Just like how you don’t want to forget your socks when packing your bags, you don’t want to forget to contact a Trusted Union broker to get your travel insurance before you go.

The main coverage provided by your travel insurance policy is coverage for emergency medical expenses. If you get injured or fall ill during your travels and need to see the doctor, go to the hospital, or have to undergo some kind of treatment or taking some kind of medication, the travel insurance company will cover those expenses.

It’s important to note that only “emergency” medical expenses are covered. So if you are regularly taking medications, refills on that medication would not be covered. Similarly, if you have a scheduled medical procedure, pre-existing conditions or pregnancy-related issue close to your expected due date, those might not be covered and would normally be covered under your health insurance plan.

There can also be restrictions on the types of activities undertaken, length of trip and locations visited. Most insurance companies will not offer travel insurance coverage for injuries sustained while participating in professional sports or dangerous activities (this is part of the reason why Jackie Chan has such a hard time getting insurance). Most insurance companies will also limit the length of each trip to no more than 180 days but this number varies. Insurers will also not cover you if you’re visiting a destination deemed dangerous. Most insurers in Hong Kong will follow the Hong Kong Security Bureau’s Outbound Travel Alert (OTA), a similar system from a competent jurisdiction or their own proprietary list.

As a bonus, many policies will also throw in extra coverages like payments for legal advice, flying out family members to see you while you’re recovering at the hospital, medically necessary return flights home, trip cancellation coverage, and other convenient coverages most travelers could use from time to time.

Yes you can – and it happens a lot. For most people, travel insurance is one of those last minute things they rush out to get right as they’re packing their socks. Personally, we’ve had clients call us from the airline check-in counter at the airport to arrange travel insurance for themselves and their family.

The only restriction is that you still have to be in your home territory when the policy is issued. You can not normally buy travel insurance if you’ve already left Hong Kong.

There are many different types of travel insurance and – like health or dental insurance – many companies might even offer tiers of coverage. But generally speaking, there are individual and family policies and single trip or annual policies. These can be mixed and matched to form a total of 4 different combinations. For example, you can have a family policy that only insures a single trip, or an individual policy that insures all trips taken within the policy term.

The difference between an individual and family travel insurance policy is pretty straight forward. By bundling your entire family together under one policy, you’ll be able to save money when compared to purchasing individual travel insurance for each family member. This is a great option for those yearly family vacations.

For the frequent flyers or business travelers, an annual policy would be the best fit. An annual policy covers all trips taken during the policy term (typically one year) without the need to call and arrange insurance for each individual trip.

If you’re unsure about which travel insurance policy is the best for you, contact a Trusted Union insurance broker to go over your needs.

The simple answer is yes. If you were injured by bad weather (ie. a windstorm caused a roof tile to break loose and strike you on the head) then you would definitely be covered as it would be considered an emergency medical expense.

Generally speaking, your travel insurance company would cover trip cancellations due to an airline having to cancel their flights because of inclement weather, but you would need to check the terms and conditions for what coverage applies.

You claim for travel insurance in much the same way you would claim under a health insurance policy. Depending on the healthcare provider or hospital you’re being treated at, they could either bill the insurance company directly or you would need to keep receipts and request reimbursement from your travel insurance company after the fact.

Regardless of which method is used, if you need help with any step in the process, contact us and we’ll be happy to assist.

Yes it does but only doctor’s visits stemming from unexpected medical emergencies. Any pre-arranged doctor’s visits or medical emergencies are not covered by your travel insurance policy. And neither are doctor’s visits dealing with pre-existing conditions or pregnancy-related issues close to the expected due date.

On top of this, travel insurance policies cover a variety of other emergency medical expenses like ambulance, specialist visits, different medical procedures, evacuation, and much more.

Yes you can. While certain activities like professional sports or skydiving may not be covered, there is no such restriction on method of travel. The travel insurance company will cover travel using all forms of transport – including road trips, travel by rail, or even hitchhiking.