Travel Insurance Issues

[Rblum100]

The travel insurance policy that you purchased from your cruise line may NOT cover flight delays that cause you to miss cruise departure.  Even if the cruise line booked the flight for you.   An article (2/3/24) in the New York Times “Help! I Missed a Cruise and the Cruise Line’s Own Travel Insurance Won’t Pay”  

See:

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/01/travel/cruise-travel-insurance.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

 

Only Disney seems to cover flight cancellation.   A suggested strategy for all is to cancel the trip with the cruise line if you have a flight delay.  Most give credit for “CANCELLATIONS” right up until the time of departure.  Read the article and chose and act wisely.  

 

[deliver42]

I don't know of any insurance that pays if you just miss your cruise because of flight delays. If you book your flights through the cruise line, they will wait if it's not too long or they will get you to the next available port.

[GeezerCouple]

4 hours ago, deliver42 said:

I don't know of any insurance that pays if you just miss your cruise because of flight delays. If you book your flights through the cruise line, they will wait if it's not too long or they will get you to the next available port.

 

I need to double check this, but I've always assumed that if there were some awful blizzard or such, something clearly NOT the passenger's fault, then IF the cruise departure was missed, the insurance would want to try - or have *you* try - to get to a subsequent port.

Chances are good that would be less expensive for the insurer, especially for a long cruise, than refunding all of the cruise fare.

This assumes there are no legal restrictions on joining a cruise mid-voyage, of course.

 

In our case, we always fly at least a night in advance, and often 2 or more if it's a location we'd like to spend some time in.

 

GC

[CDNPolar]

I think that this is a very controversial topic and will vary with each cruise line and each travel insurer.

 

This is one reason why you must ask a LOT of questions when purchasing insurance.

 

This is perhaps an extreme situation, but if you were taking an Antarctica Cruise, and your flight was late and the ship departed, there is no way to get you to the next port because there is not "next port".  You are out of luck and missed the cruise in its entirety.

 

My brother recently missed the sailing of his Panama Canal cruise where the start of the cruise was a partial crossing of the canal.  The ship left without 46 people delayed on the same flight.  This was the main reason for booking this cruise was to experience the Panama lock system.

 

They got on the ship 24 hours later when the ship emerged from the canal, but they are still waiting for anyone - the airline or the cruise ship - to give any kind of compensation and they are not sure they will get anything.

 

They may be entitled to airline delay payout because the delay was mechanical, but that won't replace missing the transit of the locks.

 

With any insurance, medical, or cancel / interruption, you must read the policy in its entirety and then phone the provider and ask questions.  You must ask very specific questions and include flight delay because of mechanical, vs. weather, etc.

 

We know that our favourite cruise line, if we booked the air through them would do their best to assist, but I don't believe in the passenger contract that they have any obligation to do so.

 

To this point, I have not had to test interruption insurance for this reason.

 

 

[iamtrustworthy]

On 2/3/2024 at 8:21 AM, deliver42 said:

I don't know of any insurance that pays if you just miss your cruise because of flight delays. If you book your flights through the cruise line, they will wait if it's not too long or they will get you to the next available port.

Hi Deliver42,

 

I don't know the details of every plan out there, but the ones I know all include Trip Interruption coverage.

 

You might find this helpful. I didn't plagiarize it - I'm the author:

 

Q. How does Trip Interruption work?

 

A. Trip Interruption is similar to Trip Cancellation, but it happens on your trip. Technically, Trip Cancellation refers to a pre-departure cancellation of your trip while Trip Interruption happens after you leave home on your trip.

 

Trip Interruption coverage reimburses you the unused prepaid non-refundable value of your trip if you are forced to catchup because you missed a portion of your trip for a covered reason. Or it could reimburse you the unused prepaid non-refundable value of your trip plus pay the cost of one-way airfare home if you are forced to return home for a covered reason.

 

For example, you get hit by a cement truck while you’re walking across the street in London – did you remember that they said “Look to the right first”? If not, it’s likely you will be interrupting your trip and returning home earlier than planned.

 

There’s another scenario that could cause a trip interruption where you don’t return home: You’re on a trip and something happens to you medically. You end up being hospitalized or restricted from traveling by physician you are seeing at the time. Two days later you recover. The cost of re-joining your cruise or tour is a trip interruption.

 

Important: In the case of Bad Weather & other Natural Disasters, there usually has to be a 12 – 24 hour shutdown (depending on the plan) of Common Carrier services (ie – the airport has to be shut down for 12 – 24 consecutive hours) to have a covered Trip Interruption.

 

Steve Dasseos

Edited February 4 by iamtrustworthy
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