Choose the Right Travel Insurance for Your Trip to Australia
Are you planning your trip to Downunder soon? If that’s the case, you’d want the trip to go flawlessly without any hiccups. But unfortunately, our wishes don’t always get fulfilled because trips are unpredictable. You never know what can go wrong – maybe something stupid like losing your luggage.
Even when things go wrong, it’s good knowing that everything will be fine, and that can only happen if you have the right travel insurance. Having travel insurance when going to Australia is not only a smart move but also very necessary.
But choosing the right insurance for such a big country is not easy. Your travel insurance for Australia should include medical expenses, emergency medical evacuation, baggage loss, as well as trip delay, cancelation, and interruption coverages.
Let’s see more about all these insurance policies that you should have when traveling to Oz.
1. Travel medical insurance
Probably the most important insurance you can have regardless of where in the world you’re traveling is travel medical expense insurance. Without this insurance, if you get injured or sick during your trip, you will have to pay out of your own pocket for treatment. This in turn can shorten your trip since you won’t get back the money you spent.
Even though Australia is considered to be a safe country, accidents can happen, and you can injure your spine surfing or doing any other activity. Your travel medical insurance will cover the cost of an expert spine surgeon in Brisbane, medicine, imaging, and hospitalization. Of course, depending on your medical insurance policy limit.
Australia is well known for its wildlife, if you’re unlucky and have a close encounter with some of the animal species unique to Australia, your travel medical insurance might come in handy.
2. Emergency medical evacuation
Yet another thing you may need when traveling to Australia is a travel insurance plan with medical coverage for emergencies. These emergencies may include bushfires, floods, 4×4 accidents during sandstorms, and so on.
If you want to explore Australia a bit better, you may need to go to remote areas. Many remote areas in Australia are considered high-risk so being precautious is advised. When exploring these remote areas, make sure you inform someone of your plans and also make sure you equip yourself with a satellite phone or Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon.
If unfortunately, an accident occurs during your exploration of the Outback, your emergency medical evacuation insurance can save you a lot of money.
3. Luggage loss and delay insurance
This is probably one of the most frequent types of mishaps that can happen to you on almost any travel, including your trip to Oz. However, regardless of whether your luggage has been lost, damaged, or stolen, insurance can reimburse you for replacement items.
It also often happens that your luggage ends up on a separate flight from yours. This means that you may come to Australia before your luggage. In these instances, having a baggage delay travel insurance can be a lifesaver. This insurance will compensate you for items such as toiletries, a change of clothes, and other must-haves until your luggage shows up.
4. Trip cancelation insurance
Life can sometimes get in a way of your planned trip to Australia. Things such as family emergencies, death or injury, and severe weather are all viable reasons to cancel your trip. Of course, this list of acceptable cancellation reasons will vary from insurance company to insurance company, but in most cases, you’ll be reimbursed 100% for your trip costs.
You also have the option of purchasing the ‘cancel for any reason’ travel insurance. This insurance will allow you to cancel your trip for virtually any reason.
It’s good to know that you can purchase trip cancellation insurance at any point up until the day before you leave for your trip. But when it comes to ‘cancel for any reason’ travel insurance, you must purchase it within 14 to 21 days of your initial trip deposit date and you can cancel the trip at least 48 hours before your scheduled departure.
5. Trip delay and trip interruption insurance
Trip delays can happen and when they happen you may be stranded at some airport due to a severe storm or some sort of similar emergency. As you may know, being stranded at an airport for hours on end, is far from pleasant or comfortable.
Having a trip delay insurance policy can compensate you for certain expenses such as buying necessities that will make you comfortable during the delay.
Just like delays, interruptions are there to ruin our holidays and trips. Whether it’s an emergency or unexpected circumstances, interruptions are never welcome. But having trip interruption insurance can help you a bit. This insurance can cover the costs of last-minute flights, and it can also cover non-refundable, prepaid, and unused expenses for activities and entertainment you’ll miss due to trip interruption.
Whether you’re planning a trip to Australia or any other country, having some sort of travel insurance is necessary. Without travel insurance, you will lose huge amounts of money and in some cases, you’ll even have to spend more on things you’ve already paid for.
So, to avoid many stressful situations, investing some money in travel insurance can be a smart move.