How soon is too soon to file a claim with Allianz?

[uscgmom]

My husband and I are scheduled to leave for a cruise on January 26th (2 1/2 weeks out). My father-in-law has been hospitalized and the status of his condition is precarious. My husband is not comfortable leaving on the trip. Anyone with experience on canceling a trip based on a family member's illness? He may not still be in the hospital on the day we are due to leave. Wondering on the pros/cons of filing a claim now or waiting...I think we have up to 90 days after the start of the trip to file. Thank you.

[CDNPolar]

Personally I would file immediately - if your intent is to cancel.

 

Is your intent to cancel regardless of the outcome of father-in-law's health?  Are you cancelling based on how he is now?

 

You will need doctor's letters, diagnosis, and all that jazz, but if a covered reason is your father-in-law's health and it is precarious then I would do it NOW.

 

Don't underestimate what they will require from doctors and you will have to get the docs to fill the necessary forms and possibly supply reports of diagnosis too.

 

We just recently cancelled a trip and we did so on the day that the diagnosis was made because we were cancelling regardless.

 

If you wait, and father-in-law's prognosis improves later, they may not accept the cancellation and you are now out the money.

 

I hope others chime in too!

Edited January 10 by CDNPolar

[uscgmom]

Thank you for the information. Based on his condition, we will be canceling regardless. It's unlikely he will be getting better...however, he may get out of the hospital. We've never had to use our trip insurance before so it's useful to know we may need to get forms filled out now by his doctor.  

[GeezerCouple]

7 minutes ago, uscgmom said:

Thank you for the information. Based on his condition, we will be canceling regardless. It's unlikely he will be getting better...however, he may get out of the hospital. We've never had to use our trip insurance before so it's useful to know we may need to get forms filled out now by his doctor.  

 

As CDNpolar suggested above, unless you have CFAR (Cancel For Any Reason) insurance, if you "want to cancel" because someone is sick, you may not get reimbursed.  Usually, that would require a rather dire medical situation such that a physician says something like, "Uh... sorry... but we advise that you *not* leave town now...."   It's not so much that you "just prefer not to leave..."

 

But check the terms of your policy to see if a physician's letter is required or such.

 

And you should get the forms filled out *now* if you decide to make the claim.  The insurer is likely to need contemporaneous medical information, rather than having someone think back...

(If *you* were hospitalized while you would have been traveling instead, then your own hospital record would suffice, at any time.)

 

You want to have the best chance of getting reimbursed if you don't have CFAR coverage.

We always got CFAR coverage, in part because of very elderly MIL (late 90's).  We knew if she were very seriously ill, a physician would advise that we not leave.  But if she were "just" complaining that she "didn't feel right"? (I know that is NOT your situation.)  Well, she *always* said, "You GO! Do NOT worry about me.  I'll be fine!! Go. GO!"  But at her age, IF she ever didn't say that, but only that "she didn't feel right", that would mean something likely very serious.  But the regular insurance would never cover that, so... we got always got CFAR (but also for our own purposes).

 

As it turned out, less than 2 weeks from a planned departure for a very special Med cruise + 2 weeks in Italy... MIL landed in the hospital for cardiac "tests".  So we were very glad we had CFAR.  But we still hoped she'd be "cleared" and go home, hoping the medical team would say something like, "It was nothing, but at her age, we wanted to be sure..."

But they kept having to do more tests, and then *more*.  We were getting ready to complete the CFAR paperwork (the decision needs to be "more than 2 days before departure"; I've never understood that).  With about 4 days to go, while we were starting to fill out the CFAR forms and given them to her physician, her medical team suddenly told us... "Uh... we now recommend that you NOT leave town after all..." 😞 

Bad news...!  So we had them fill out the regular insurance paperwork, and we cancelled the entire trip under the regular insurance.

Fortunately, she did recover, and a week later she was sent home.  The timing was just "off" for our trip.

It was a very special cruise itinerary, one we've been looking for ever since but never seen again.  Sigh.  But MIL came first, of course!

 

Hope things settle down for you within the next two weeks or so, and that your FIL does get better, whether you decide to take the trip or not...

 

IF you got your insurance through an agent or broker, ask them for advice about how and when to file a claim.  That should be part of their services.  We did rely in part on the advice of our travel insurance broker (Steve, at TripInsuranceStore.com).  He's always a great help, especially with anything uncertain.

 

GC

[uscgmom]

17 minutes ago, GeezerCouple said:

 

As CDNpolar suggested above, unless you have CFAR (Cancel For Any Reason) insurance, if you "want to cancel" because someone is sick, you may not get reimbursed.  Usually, that would require a rather dire medical situation such that a physician says something like, "Uh... sorry... but we advise that you *not* leave town now...."   It's not so much that you "just prefer not to leave..."

 

But check the terms of your policy to see if a physician's letter is required or such.

 

And you should get the forms filled out *now* if you decide to make the claim.  The insurer is likely to need contemporaneous medical information, rather than having someone think back...

(If *you* were hospitalized while you would have been traveling instead, then your own hospital record would suffice, at any time.)

 

You want to have the best chance of getting reimbursed if you don't have CFAR coverage.

We always got CFAR coverage, in part because of very elderly MIL (late 90's).  We knew if she were very seriously ill, a physician would advise that we not leave.  But if she were "just" complaining that she "didn't feel right"? (I know that is NOT your situation.)  Well, she *always* said, "You GO! Do NOT worry about me.  I'll be fine!! Go. GO!"  But at her age, IF she ever didn't say that, but only that "she didn't feel right", that would mean something likely very serious.  But the regular insurance would never cover that, so... we got always got CFAR (but also for our own purposes).

 

As it turned out, less than 2 weeks from a planned departure for a very special Med cruise + 2 weeks in Italy... MIL landed in the hospital for cardiac "tests".  So we were very glad we had CFAR.  But we still hoped she'd be "cleared" and go home, hoping the medical team would say something like, "It was nothing, but at her age, we wanted to be sure..."

But they kept having to do more tests, and then *more*.  We were getting ready to complete the CFAR paperwork (the decision needs to be "more than 2 days before departure"; I've never understood that).  With about 4 days to go, while we were starting to fill out the CFAR forms and given them to her physician, her medical team suddenly told us... "Uh... we now recommend that you NOT leave town after all..." 😞 

Bad news...!  So we had them fill out the regular insurance paperwork, and we cancelled the entire trip under the regular insurance.

Fortunately, she did recover, and a week later she was sent home.  The timing was just "off" for our trip.

It was a very special cruise itinerary, one we've been looking for ever since but never seen again.  Sigh.  But MIL came first, of course!

 

Hope things settle down for you within the next two weeks or so, and that your FIL does get better, whether you decide to take the trip or not...

 

IF you got your insurance through an agent or broker, ask them for advice about how and when to file a claim.  That should be part of their services.  We did rely in part on the advice of our travel insurance broker (Steve, at TripInsuranceStore.com).  He's always a great help, especially with anything uncertain.

 

GC

Very helpful, thank you. We do not have CFAR insurance...did not know that such a thing existed.