Travel insurance is the product everyone buys once without reading and hopes never to test. The trouble is that the standard annual-policy habits serve the industry, not the claimant: exclusions are written in the definition section, not the marketing page, and the claims process tests the definitions. The ten checks below are the distance between a policy and its payout. Read them before you pay, not after you need the money.
Ten checks before you pay
- The activity list, both directions: every policy excludes “hazardous activities” — moped rental above 125cc, diving beyond your last qualification, canyoning, and, in some standard tiers, skiing off-piste. Check the list against your real itinerary. The cheapest premiums exist because of this section; upgrading adventure cover prices fairly, from 3 to 8 euro per day.
- The “current condition” clause: the single densest section of every policy. It usually refers only to conditions in a set window (3 to 12 months of look-back); it covers what the policy letter defines as such and not what your GP would. Bring medical records for anything chronic, and call the insurer BEFORE departure to confirm coverage lines and recorded answers — verbal confirmations logged with a reference number are the only ones that survive claims.
- Family definition arithmetic: children covered free “travelling with an adult” often means “named on one booking”, and “free” cover frequently prices a lower sub-limit per child. For four-person families, group policies from 8 euro per day beat three-line single covers most of the time — the maths matches the family-nightly economics covered in our aparthotel analysis.
- Excess and its per-claim shape: the promotional 150-euro “excess per person per claim” converts a theft claim of 900 euro into roughly 600 euro. Policies with 0-75 euro excess price 15–25% higher premium. For any trip with expensive electronics, low-excess policies win.
- Cancellation vs curtailment split: the cover that saves trips is cancellation (before departure) at the full pre-paid value; curtailment (interrupting mid-trip) usually prices a lower cap. Confirm the cancellation cover equals the pre-paid total of flights and accommodation — the number on your booking confirmations.
- Deducted-benefit trap in medical lines: some policies reduce medical payouts when certain countries appear on the itinerary. The Caribbean, the USA, and Japan all carry regional pricing factors — confirm the destination list covers your ports of call, not just your first stop.
- Documents on the phone, offline: the claims sheet wants three lines saved offline: policy number, 24-hour assistance number saved in the phone’s contacts and on paper, and the claims email. The assistance call created at the right hour is worth more than the paper the policy prints on.
- Baggage sub-limits: the “3,000 euro baggage” line tracks a camera sub-limit at 400 and a single-item limit at 250. Anything valuable travels by carry-on, insured with the item priced on your home policy instead — the carry-on logic in our one-bag system partners this rule.
- Strike-and-airline-failure clauses: the 2020s made these real: airline insolvency and industrial-action covers exist in mid-tier policies and are absent from budget ones. Worth verifying on every trip carrying separate one-way legs — the two-bookings habit from our booking-timing guide.
- Geographic naming that outlives the marketing: “Europe” policies sometimes exclude certain ports (the Canaries and Morocco are the perennial two) and “Worldwide” often excludes the USA and Canada by default add-on. Read the geographic definition — the words that define your destinations matter at the desk, not in the brochure.
When each tier actually wins
European short trips with no rental vehicles: the basic Europewide annual policy at 35–60 euro a year beats every single-trip product. Family beach weeks: single-trip family policies with zero excess and cashless-network medical included. Long-haul or multi-country: mid-tier products with telemedicine included — 60–90 euro — and verified assistance numbers in each hub. Adventure trips: activity add-ons at quote stage, never lounge-grade bolt-ons bought at the booking engine’s last checkbox.
The claim process, run properly
- Call the assistance line DURING the event (a claim filed after discharge without this call takes triple the time).
- Collect the specific paperwork each section names: medical reports, police report numbers for theft, itemised pharmacy receipts, and boarding passes for delay claims.
- Submit within the stated window (commonly 30 days) with a dated cover letter.
The honest verdict
Insurance is priced like a lottery ticket and reads like a contract. Ten checks, 25 minutes, and one pre-departure call convert it from a lottery into the safety net it is sold as — the same 25 minutes of document reading that saves resort weeks via our resort checklist. Anyone travelling more than twice a year with children should read an annual policy’s definition page once, slowly, and then simply travel knowing which answers they gave and which ends are stuck on.