Cruise insurance

I have cruised a lot but have never purchased the cruise insurance. Is the Carnival insurance worth it? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciate. :)

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Most will tell you that purchasing travel insurance independently usually gets you more affordable coverage and/or more comprehensive than that offered via the cruise line. We've done both and thankfully never had to use it. The insuremytrip.com site is what a lot of people use to research independent coverage.

Worth It!

Worth what exactly?

Maybe you're phrasing the question this way because you know so little about travel insurance that you don't even know what question to ask. Been there, done that.

Here are a couple of places to get you started on your educational trip to Travel Insurance

http://halftheclothes.com/travel-tips/what-is-travel-insurance/

http://www.travelinsurancereview.net/beginners-guide/

Any travel insurance is better than none if it covers what you need it for.

All travel insurance is bad if it doesn't cover what you need.

All insurances have nuances that are important to know.

Now, is Carnival insurance "Worth it"? If it covers what your concerns are? Yes. If it doesn't cover your concerns,,, then No.

What are these nuances that you speak of?

Carnival insurance only has a small limited reimbursement for any medical costs. If you need coverage up to a larger amount,, Carnival may not be your choice.

3rd party companies base the rates they charge you for coverage by your age. Rates are much higher as you get older. Carnivals pricing does not take age into consideration.

3rd party companies charge you additional if you select a :Cancel For Any Reason" rider to the policy. Carnivals policy includes Cancel For Any Reason.

Asked many times. Did you search?

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I always buy cruise insurance, sometimes with the cruise line and sometimes independent. Depends on where I am going and how much I'm spending on the cruise.

Just peace of mind for me.

What's important to me is the medical coverage, along with the medical evacuation aspects of the insurance. My health insurance has limited coverage outside of the US, and no coverage for a medical evacuation. Insurance of any kind is only worth it if you find yourself in a situation where you need it, and there's no way of predicting that.

Roz

I use http://www.TripInsuranceStore.com to purchase travel insurance. Not only can you compare rates and plans, if you need to file a claim, they can help with that. When we had to cancel our cruise last year (3 of the 5 of us got the flu), they helped us understand what would be needed to make sure the claim was paid and even reviewed the documentation before we filed. Excellent service! Roz is correct about the medical evacuation. Not all health insurance plans cover it and if they do, they will only get you to the closest domestic city (not all the way home).

We have never gotten insurance - our medical coverage reimburses us for any treatment outside of the country, we only pay what we would have as a copay while we are home.

I also like to purchase the insurance from the independent sites. They have a box specifically for cruise insurance. We usually fly in the morning of our cruise and this insurance covers me in the event of flight delays. We have found it significantly cheaper to purchase independently rather than from the cruise line directly.

There is a difference between "trip insurance" and "travel health insurance."

Trip insurance insures the cost of your trip in case of cancellation, weather delays, etc.

Travel HEATH insurance covers medical costs while on your trip.

Some companies combine the 2 different insurance plans. Do not assume when you buy travel insurance that you are automatically getting a health insurance plan that may or may not include evacuation insurance.

I also suggest that all travelers contact their health insurance provider to understand that cover they have for medical costs outside of their home country. In the past my US based private health insurance coverage me outside of the US. I had to pay for the costs and they would reimburse me. My current US based private health insurance no longer covers me outside of the US. So, I chose to purchase travel HEALTH insurance.

I have been told that Medicare does not cover medical costs incurred outside of the US.

Also, look at some of your credit cards to understand the perks. I have a credit card that covers my "trip insurance" for any travel costs I charged to that card.

Good luck with your purchase but please understand what is included and what is not included.

When we sailed on Pride in February we purchased a comprehensive plan through www.insuremytrip.com for around $120 total. Carnival wanted to charge us $95, each. The plan through insuremytrip.com provided more robust coverage.

Independent insurance can cover you from when you leave home until you get back, trip delays and so on. You usually give them a total cost of the whole trip and they use that along with other factors and options to calculate the cost of the insurance. Options for 'cancel for any reason' etc are extra cost but can give you more peace of mind. On some policies you can increase different coverages if you like (emergency evac and so on). Insuremytrip, tripinsurancestore, squashmouth (dot com), all of them allow you to compare 3 or 4 companies/plan levels and you can do it all online, from research to reading ratings and reviews of companies to purchasing a policy, and then your policy is emailed to you. We always use the independents and always pay a lot less than the cruise lines charge.

Thank you so much everyone!!

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Great thread!

There are also travel credit cards that will include many of these coverages, on top of other travel perks. $100+ per vacation really adds up. I think it is a waste for me. It's different for everyone, especially if you are higher risk. Compare options. Know what it says and what you need. Most people recommending insurance still have no idea what their own insurance already covers and what extra insurance may or may not cover. Medical evacuation is probably the one thing that is most important. However, excessive evac coverage like over $100,000 is not necessary.

Is insurance worth it? If something goes wrong, it is invaluable. If nothing goes wrong, it is still worth it for the peace of mind. We have had to use it three times in fourteen years of cruising and were oh so thankful we had it, as we got all our money back each time.

If you are undecided, ask yourself this, can I easily afford to lose the total cost of my cruise. If you can, then it might not be worth it to you. But most of us would find the loss of a few thousand dollars rather painful.

As for the health insurance side of travel insurance, it could potentially save you hundreds of thousands if, God forbid, you or a traveling companion were seriously injured on a cruise or if you became seriously ill. We've never had to use that part, fortunately, but the small additional cost for insurance is more than worth it to me to know if the unthinkable were to happen, it wouldn't ruin me financially.

Personally, I would not even contemplate cruising without travel/health insurance.

I always buy travel insurance that includes medical, always!!..Last year my travel partner got very sick on the cruise and required some visits to the medical center. The medical center bill was thousands of dollars. While i did had to pay out of pocket using my credit card, the travel insurance reimbursement me a few weeks later after i submitted the claims with copy's of all of the bills/receipts. so thankful for the travel insurance and now i have it all for my cruises.

We buy it sometimes and other times do not. My medical insurance will cover us, but I buy it for other reasons.

I use insuremytrip.com. Their pricing is better and I get better coverage. Plus they compare multiple plans for me and give recommendations.

I have not yet had to make a claim against insurance so I cannot comment on that end.

We've always purchased through private companies and thankfully have only used it once. Last year for the first time I bought a cruise specific plan. Our cruise got completely re-routed due to the hurricane damage. Instead of Eastern Caribbean stops, we hit the Western stops. After returning, we turned in a claim for itinerary change and received $750 each. I've purchased insurance for 20 years and had never used it prior to this, but it totally paid off. We cruised with 8 other people (all bought their insurance through cruise line). The cruise line didn't give them anything for the port changes as their fine print says that they reserve the right to change at anytime.

Only you can decide if it's truly "worth it", but there is no way that I would ever not purchase it. It is pretty inexpensive (based on age) and the peace of mind is definitely worth it IMO.

Jules, which plan of travel insurance did you use?

Jules, which plan of travel insurance did you use?

Probably Nationwide.

https://www.squaremouth.com/ best place to find cruise/travel insurance.

Thank you for that, lol I wrote "squashmouth" in my comment :rolleyes::p

We have never gotten insurance - our medical coverage reimburses us for any treatment outside of the country, we only pay what we would have as a copay while we are home.

If you had to be flown home from a cruise in a medical air ambulance it can easily cost a minimum of $25-35,000. It's the main reason we buy it.

Recently we had to cancel a cruise 5 days before sailing for medical reasons. We'd paid $200 in Carnival's insurance and got $2000 back (all we paid less the cost of the insurance).

I have cruised a lot but have never purchased the cruise insurance. Is the Carnival insurance worth it? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciate. :)

 

 

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Last year for our Breeze cruise, we purchased insurance through Carnival for the first time, and were glad we did. Hurricane Harvey wrecked havoc on our travel plans (We disembarked in New Orleans a day after we were supposed to disembark in Galveston). We ended up making a claim under "Trip Interruption" and got our transportation, hotel (couldn't get a flight until the next day), and meals covered in New Orleans. Our airline changed our flight free-of-charge due to our flight out of Houston being cancelled. The cost of the insurance was less than the benefits we received, so in our circumstance it WAS worth it. Beyond the costs/benefits, during the chaos of "not knowing" what was going to happen due to the hurricane, we had a lot more peace of mind.

This year, we purchased insurance for our Dream cruise through Nationwide. We did not need it at all, so the only benefit was peace of mind, which is really the point anyway.:)