Should I purchase Travel Insurance?
I'm not one to purchase travel
insurance to try to make my travel completely risk free. I'm more of a dive in
and hope for the best type of person. I can usually adopt my itinerary and plans
to most anything thrown at me...but when it comes to yacht charters, I think
it's a little different.
If there's a serious medical
emergency with a family member or yourself and you have to cancel your flight
the airlines will usually accommodate you. If their flight is cancelled, they'll
usually help you out. In most cases they will work with you(unless you cancel
for a non-emergency reason and in many cases there will just be a cancellation
fee).
With a yacht charter it's
different. You chartered the yacht and it is your responsibility to get to it.
The charter companies are not ruthless, they just can't afford to have a yacht
sitting empty at the dock when they could have chartered it out. As far as they
are concerned, although there are good reasons to cancel a charter and they may
sympathize with you, they most likely will not refund your charter
expenses.
What could cause you to miss
your charter? - You miss your flight and can't get on another
one... -Your flight is cancelled... - Your travel partner has an emergency
and cannot go... -You or your family member has an emergency and cannot
go... -A natural disaster occurs in your community and you can't leave your
house in the state it's in -Your pet gets sick or must be
hospitalized -the airline that flies you to the yacht folds....and they can't
get you on another flight for 4 days or more... -You get laid off and decide
that this is not the time to travel.. -The honeymoon cruise you've been
planning has been called off because the wedding has been cancelled -Everyone
is getting laid off around you and you decide it's not the best time to let your
company know that you're despensable(this happened to a friend who came back
from his vacation only to find out he had been laid off). -While on holiday
you have an accident and cannot continue with your plans
Anyway, some
of these are far-fetched and probably won't happen, but the point is you're
purchasing insurance to protect yourself from anything that might cause you to
cancel your trip.
What I suggest is that you use the form
below
and see what the cost of Travel Insurance would run to cover your trip. Once you
have the cost and understand what it will cover ask yourself this simple
question... "Is it worth X dollars to protect my travel?"
Look at the
total cost of the trip and compare it to the cost of the insurance... Is it worth it?
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