We are four friends taking a cruise together. We don’t think it’s fair that the first two passengers listed on the invoice have to pay more for their cruise insurance just because they randomly have a higher per person trip cost than the 3rd and 4th passengers. To get around that, we split the costs of the suite 4 ways and add our individual airfare costs. And, we always quote insurance at the equal per person trip costs. We do need the pre-existing conditions coverage.
I know this is an acceptable way to price the cruise insurance because other websites allow us to average our costs. However, I read some things on TripInsuranceStore.com that suggest otherwise. Will you clarify this?
Thanks for your detailed explanation and question. Insuring the correct per person trip cost is important for three reasons:
- The pre-existing medical conditions coverage requires this. Go here for a more detailed explanation.
- The Cancel For Any Reason coverage requires this. Go here for a more detailed explanation.
- You want to be sure each person gets back the actual amount they paid as shown on the invoice.
I cannot tell you why other places tell you to average the trip cost between everyone, but that’s the wrong way to assign the per person trip costs. I also explain it here:
http://tripinsurancestore.com/blog/how-to-correctly-quote-a-travel-insurance-plan
As I noted above, both the Pre-existing Medical Conditions and the Cancel For Any Reason coverage require you to insure 100% of your trip’s full prepaid non-refundable trip costs. This is the amount of money you will forfeit if you were forced to cancel your trip at the last minute before you left home.
In case you are wondering if you can self-insure part of your trip cost and insure the balance with the travel insurance, you cannot do this and also have the Pre-existing Medical Conditions coverage and / or the Cancel For Any Reason coverage. The simple reason is that the insurance company may write its policy’s provisions any way it wants to. No one is forcing you to buy their policy, so if you do not like the requirement requiring you to insure 100% of your trip’s full prepaid non-refundable trip costs, you are free to refuse to buy it.
The 3rd reason “You want to be sure each person gets back the actual amount they paid as shown on the invoice” means if you have four people with the following prepaid trip costs: Traveler #1 $2,200, Traveler #2 $2,200, Traveler #3 $800 and Traveler #4 $800, you have $6,000 total. $6,000 divided by 4 equals $1500 each. If you insured each person at $1500 each and then had to cancel your trip for a covered reason, you will not be paid $1500 each. Traveler #1 and Traveler #2 will each receive $1,500 because that is what they were insured for. Traveler #3 and Traveler #4 will each receive $800 because that is what the invoice states is their per person trip cost. This adds up to $4,600 and you all will lose $1,400 total.
I hope this made sense. If you have any questions about travel insurance, call us Toll-Free at 1-888-407-3854 or email Steve (me), The Travel Insurance Guru, here or using steve [at] tripinsurancestore dot com.
I hope this makes sense. If you want the right travel insurance advice, call us at 1-888-407-3854 and we'll help you figure it all out.
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