InsureMyTrip Blog

The news is stunning: Fifty-five passengers, according to preliminary reports, robbed at gunpoint while enjoying a sponsored excursion from their cruise in St. Lucia.  Witnesses tell of masked gunmen, money and jewelry taken, and a possible injury to one passenger who may have fallen and broken her leg in the course of the events.  The cruise line has reported no injuries, but has confirmed the robberies and the rest of the witness accounts.

Even in the midst of the most diligent preparations for “unforeseen events” during your vacation, chances are, you’d never envision falling victim to a crime such as this one.  Shore excursions, particularly the type these passengers were engaged in — sightseeing at the botanical gardens! — are generally regarded as safe, convenient ways to maximize the enjoyment of a cruise.  Yes, everyone knows that the advice is to be aware of your surroundings while on shore, and to take safety precautions to avoid getting lost, being pickpocketed, or becoming injured in a needless accident.  But “watch out for masked men robbing your entire tour group at gunpoint in St. Lucia” isn’t usually on the list of warnings for travelers.

Fortunately, for those victimized passengers who had the benefit of travel insurance, there is some assistance that can be offered to them by their insurance providers.  There are a few key areas of help and recovery that can be addressed by travel insurance:

1. Reimbursement for stolen items.  Most travel insurance policies include some coverage for loss or damage to your property while traveling.  Victims of theft who have this type of coverage can file a claim with their insurance company to help offset the costs of replacing stolen items.  Before filing a claim, however, it’s important to check the coverage limits on your travel insurance policy, as well as the benefits offered by your homeowner’s insurance policy.   Often, homeowner’s insurance will offer coverage for big-ticket items like jewelry that may exceed the limits of a travel insurance policy, while travel insurance can take care of the reimbursement for additional smaller items that a homeowner’s policy will not cover.  Make sure that in any case, you are able to provide a police report verifying the incident, as well as any proof you may have that documents what items you were traveling with at the time the crime occurred.  The more documentation you are able to provide, the easier it is for an insurance company to process your claim.
2. Replacement of stolen documents.  If any personal documents or identification are involved in the theft, an immediate call to the 24/7 assistance hotline offered through your travel insurance provider can help in starting the process of replacing them.  Often, the assistance will include acting as a liaison on your behalf to handle many of the stressful details of reporting the theft and submitting the necessary paperwork to get replacements.  Additionally, if your credit cards were among the items stolen, your travel insurance provider may be able to help you in contacting the companies to cancel them and get the cards re-issued.  Before calling the assistance line, be sure to check the terms of your specific plan to see which of these assistance services are included in the benefits available to you.
3. Identity theft mitigation. Adding insult to injury, being robbed while on vacation can leave you more vulnerable to identity theft.  In addition to helping with the process of cancelling stolen credit cards and replacing stolen documents, some travel insurance providers offer specialized benefits to help minimize the damage of possible identity theft.  Identity theft coverage typically includes services such as credit monitoring, assistance in reporting to all the necessary authorities, and continued attention to the resolution of any problems and the restoration of your reputation for a defined period of time after the theft occurs.

Our thoughts are with the victims of this dreadful crime, and we are relieved to know that there were no serious injuries or fatalities.  We hope that there is a swift resolution for each of them in recovering or replacing their stolen belongings and in controlling the damage of these horrible events.

Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons, public domain

Last night, the ill-fated Carnival Triumph finally docked in Mobile, Alabama after passengers had endured four days of discomfort following a fire that knocked out much of the ship’s power and left it bobbing listlessly in the water, requiring the vessel to be towed to port by tugboats in order to get passengers evacuated.  The deteriorating conditions aboard the ship have dominated travel headlines, and its ultimately safe (if odorous) arrival at port was greeted with a collective sigh of relief from most of the general public — to say nothing, of course, of the travelers aboard the Triumph and their loved ones at home.

By now, it’s been widely reported that Carnival Cruise Lines has made efforts to patch things up with the understandably shaken passengers of the Triumph.  The cruise line’s arrangements to charter buses and planes, book blocks of hotel rooms, and secure ways for all of the Triumph’s travelers to get home safely and quickly have been the subject of much scrutiny.  As is the case with almost any travel nightmare of this magnitude and visibility, no matter what the cruise line ultimately does or does not do for its passengers will invite opinions on all sides.  Debate is certain to rage — and is already, in fact, smoldering — as to whether or not cruise vouchers and refunds and passage home is really “enough.”

The trouble is, as consumer advocate Clark Howard aptly pointed out this morning, Carnival is not actually obligated to do anything to assist these unfortunate passengers.  Contracts of carriage aboard cruise ships don’t usually include any kind of language that barely hints at the cruise line bearing responsibility for passengers’ happiness, comfort, or transportation needs should something on board go awry.  To question, therefore, whether Carnival’s efforts in this case are “enough” for passengers is interesting, but it’s only an academic exercise.  By offering the assistance they have, the cruise line has already gone well beyond what it’s contractually obligated to do.  (Moral and ethical obligation may be another story, but that will ultimately be tried in the court of public opinion.)

Like it or not, if Carnival had chosen not to extend these offers of assistance, there wouldn’t be any legal need for them to do so — though there would, presumably, have been a resulting public relations snafu the likes of which no company aiming to stay in business would ever want to experience.  In the event that the cruise line had not taken care of its passengers’ immediate needs, what recourse would they have had?

Travel insurance may have provided solutions for many of the Triumph’s passengers in that circumstance.  A comprehensive travel insurance plan — one purchased from a third party, not from the cruise line — would very likely have covered most, if not all, of the difficulties experienced aboard the ship.  Among the possibilities:

• Damaged belongings.  If conditions aboard the ship — whether fire or flood — led to property damage, the baggage coverage included in a travel insurance package policy could have helped with replacing the affected items.
• Medical care.  If a passenger fell ill or was injured on board, the medical coverage on their travel insurance policy might have helped to cover the costs of their treatment, if those costs were not already covered by their primary health insurance carrier.
• Rebooking.  The Triumph’s passengers all ended up having to get home through alternate arrangements, not using the means they had originally planned.  A reputable travel insurance company would not only have assistance available to make the necessary arrangements for transportation and, if necessary, lodgings, but would also potentially reimburse those costs.
• Reimbursement for pre-paid expenses.  If any passengers had made arrangements for further travel beyond the scheduled return of their cruise, and had lost the opportunity to fulfill those plans, travel insurance could help them to recover any pre-paid, nonrefundable expenses.

It’s easy to assume that a cruise line, or any other travel supplier for that matter, will always do the right thing for its passengers.  We’d like to believe that they will.  However, situations like the one aboard the Carnival Triumph certainly give us a moment of pause as we consider what might have happened.  The only way to be sure you’re protected in whatever way possible against the financial toll of a travel disaster is to equip yourself with an appropriate travel insurance policy from the moment you book your trip.

As people book cruise travel, often they’re confronted with a series of options to “add on” products and services to their bookings.  Airfare deal sites, hotel sites, and cruise lines themselves may offer travelers the chance to quickly purchase a travel insurance policy along with their bookings — usually, this involves not much more effort than checking a box to accept the insurance and paying the additional fee, which is generally quite low.  It seems like a quick and easy way to purchase your insurance, without the hassle of doing research on various policies or having to shop around for coverage.

Of course, as with most things in life, if it seems too easy, it probably is.  Buying travel insurance isn’t meant to be a frustrating, convoluted process; but it IS supposed to be a process that involves a little bit of thought and self-evaluation.  No one insurance policy is guaranteed to offer the perfect amount of coverage, the right mix of benefits, and the best value for every single passenger on a cruise ship — but that’s what the “add-on” insurance is supposed to do.  You’re supposed to believe, when you check that box, that the cruise line or other supplier offering the insurance has somehow evaluated your needs and is going to give you the right kind of travel insurance coverage for your trip.  In reality, you’re going to get exactly the same policy every other person who checks that box is going to get — and it may not be right for you at all.

When travel suppliers offer insurance policies as an “add-on,” they usually have one standard type of insurance that is offered to everyone, regardless of specific individual needs.  These policies are generally crafted to offer a minimum baseline of coverage at a very low price, which makes them seem appealing to the average traveler who just wants to get his booking completed.  They also tend to favor the cruise line or travel supplier by not offering any coverage against financial default, and sometimes having a more narrowly defined set of criteria as to what constitutes a legitimate claim.

“Add-on” policies offered by travel suppliers are also nearly certain to be devoid of some of the more desirable, time-sensitive benefits many travelers look for in an insurance policy; things like Cancel for Any Reason coverage or Pre-Existing Conditions Waivers are rarely going to be included in the “one-size-fits-all” approach to travel insurance.  To get those specialized benefits, you would likely have to buy ANOTHER travel insurance policy on top of the standard-issue cruise line policy — one which would certainly offer all the benefits the cruise line is giving you, along with many other potential coverage options that could be very valuable to you.  Of course, the only way you’d be able to figure out which types of coverage you might want or need would be to look at all of the choices available — and checking the box doesn’t give you any choices.  Only by going to a third-party insurance provider, preferably an unbiased comparison company offering plans from a wide range of providers (like, ahem, maybe InsureMyTrip?), can you see what’s really available to you.

Might the cruise line’s insurance policy be just fine for some travelers?  It might.  Is there any way to know for sure whether or not you’re one of those travelers?  Only if you do your homework.  The bottom line is, you need to compare the options that are available out there and know what you want and need before you make any insurance purchase.  If you need help, our Customer Care Center is open 365 days a year to offer guidance and answer questions.  They’ll even help evaluate a travel insurance policy you purchased from someone else, to see if it’s the best fit for you.