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I want to share my great experience with the Amex Platinum travel insurance when our Argentina trip last year completely fell apart.
Our first flight from London to Madrid on Iberia was canceled at the last minute due to a mechanical issue, reportedly a bird strike. This was a positioning flight, scheduled 12 hours before our Madrid to Buenos Aires connection, but clearly, it wasn’t enough time. I know everyone always says to leave at least 24 hours!Since this was a separate booking from our long-haul Avios flights to Buenos Aires, we couldn’t make it to Madrid in time and ended up losing our entire itinerary. This included multiple onward flights, hotel reservations, a car rental, and even Avios bookings, including a companion voucher.
It was August, so there was only one flight available with available seats. While we were waiting, we called our insurance provider. They informed us that if we were to rebook the Madrid to Buenos Aires flight, we would only be entitled to a delay compensation of around £300 each. However, if we chose to abandon the trip, we would be eligible for a full refund of the non-refundable flights, hotel, and car rental.
Considering that the cost of just the four flights would be around £4,000 in economy at such short notice, we decided that abandoning the trip was the best option.
It was a long and sometimes painful claims process. The hardest part was gathering proof that we hadn’t boarded each flight. Some were with low-cost airlines that simply never replied to my requests for confirmation, but I submitted every bit of evidence I had — booking confirmations, bank statements, screenshots of messages, and all the cancelled itineraries.
In the end, though, the insurance company came through amazingly. They reimbursed all the cash expenses plus compensated for the Avios we used (including the 60,000 Avios saved via the companion voucher we lost). Altogether, they refunded almost £5,000, which was a huge relief and saved us from taking a big financial hit.
I guess this was AXA ? I believe the Platinum insurance has now changed provider to Europ Assistance
I guess this was AXA ? I believe the Platinum insurance has now changed provider to Europ Assistance
yes it was AXA
While I’m sorry to hear about your Argentina trip and I’m pleased that you are happy with the outcome, personally I would be very disappointed and I think it highlights the weakness of the Amex Plat insurance. Once one has spent time planning and looking forward to a trip I wouldn’t wish to abandon it, but would wish to get it back on track at the earliest opportunity. The fact that Amex Plat only offers you up to £300 each to do that is appalling. Other packaged policies like HSBC Premier or Nationwide offer over £5,000 per person.
The whole idea of Amex putting a gun to your head saying abandon or you’ll get peanuts defies belief!
While I’m sorry to hear about your Argentina trip and I’m pleased that you are happy with the outcome, personally I would be very disappointed and I think it highlights the weakness of the Amex Plat insurance. Once one has spent time planning and looking forward to a trip I wouldn’t wish to abandon it, but would wish to get it back on track at the earliest opportunity. The fact that Amex Plat only offers you up to £300 each to do that is appalling. Other packaged policies like HSBC Premier or Nationwide offer over £5,000 per person.
The whole idea of Amex putting a gun to your head saying abandon or you’ll get peanuts defies belief!
wow! That is really generous! I will keep it in mind for when I will need to buy a travel insurance if we drop Platinum.
The previous travel insurance we had wasn’t better. I thought was standard! Thanks for highlighting, I love this community because I can always learn new things!@JDB we have HSBC Premier.
I’ve never looked in finer detail at the cash payouts.
However, if they do pay over £5,000 for delay compensation then that is one of the more generous policies I’ve seen.
Hopefully one I never have to utilise!
HSBC Premier Travel Disruption is £7.5k I think? Barclays is £10k.
I was excited and went to check HSBC to consider for the future, and I found this:
Missed Departure – up to £1,000 if you miss
your flight to and from the UK
Travel delay – £50 if your transport is delayed
for 12 hours (or up to £7,500 if you decide to abandon your trip after 24 hours)I believe in our case it would have fallen under “missed departure.” I would have been covered for the return flight to Argentina, as that would match the cost of purchasing a new one. However, that amount wouldn’t have been enough to also cover the first internal flight, the hotel, and the car rental (lost because happening at the really beginning of the trip).
So even with HSBC, we would have had to cancel the entire trip to recover all the expenses.@Princess – it’s the ‘Travel Disruption’ section of HSBC Premier you need to look which is similar but different to the ‘Missed Departure’ section. That offers £7,500 cover.
Barclays is £10,000 for travel disruption. In fact all the packaged travel insurance policies offered by the big banks (and their cards), Virgin and Nationwide offer far superior cover for travel disruption. The £300 ‘travel inconvenience’ offered by Amex Platinum is pretty useless and not vaguely in line with the market. It’s quite a gamble for anyone to rely exclusively on the Amex Platinum travel insurance which is a very premium priced product offering cheapo cover.
@JDB we have HSBC Premier.
I’ve never looked in finer detail at the cash payouts.
However, if they do pay over £5,000 for delay compensation then that is one of the more generous policies I’ve seen.
Hopefully one I never have to utilise!
It’s not £7,500 delay “compensation”! That’s only £50! The £7,500 is to cover additional, unexpected travel and accommodation costs (but not lost costs) following some sort of disruption. That does give you quite a good prospect of covering the cost of getting your trip back on track. Amex might just cover a short bus fare.
I don’t quite understand why Platinum cardholders aren’t endlessly badgering Amex to sort out the out of date and defective policy. Of course Amex is offering a statement credit to buy a proper policy from them!
@Princess – it’s the ‘Travel Disruption’ section of HSBC Premier you need to look which is similar but different to the ‘Missed Departure’ section. That offers £7,500 cover.
Barclays is £10,000 for travel disruption. In fact all the packaged travel insurance policies offered by the big banks (and their cards), Virgin and Nationwide offer far superior cover for travel disruption. The £300 ‘travel inconvenience’ offered by Amex Platinum is pretty useless and not vaguely in line with the market. It’s quite a gamble for anyone to rely exclusively on the Amex Platinum travel insurance which is a very premium priced product offering cheapo cover.
Hi @JDB thanks for clarifying. I will now dig deeper for the future. However I’m still happy we recovered all the money from lost elements of the trip and all avios.
Do you have any recommendations for a travel insurance that cover trips longer than 90 days?
Are there any travel insurance brokers who one can sit down with and discuss one’s needs, medical history etc.
As our trips get longer, more complex and more expensive – and our bodies older (but we believe in preventative checks, which seem to cause occasional red lights!) – it gets more difficult to fill in online forms.
Should say, we are not so much worried about the trip costs, it is purely medical stuff.
But here’s another question. If one insures a house for less than it is worth, in the event of a claim your get hammered! If you have a £20k holiday but only a £10k policy limit for cancellation/abandonment, do you get just £5k?
@Colin-MacKinnon – I’m sure a broker can get you a bespoke policy, but it would likely be prohibitively expensive and might not actually be better than a good conventional one, or collection of good ones. As these policies have very different inclusions/exclusions, a combination works best. I can’t claim it’s through good planning, but to get cover during covid, my wife upgraded her Nationwide account to Flex Plus, when Tesco stopped Avios, I got HSBC Premier/WE and my wife has an Amex Plat to give the benefits to our son. The combined web of travel cover is, I think, pretty good and not costly.
Re the underinsurance question, you correctly state how it works on a home insurance policy, something many probably don’t realise and it’s quite brutal. I believe travel insurers however will pay you up to the limit, irrespective of the cost, principally because you don’t get to choose the sum insured.
Thanks JDB, food for thought.
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