Insure and Go Travel Insurance Review

Your dependents who are under the age of 18 and in full time education or living at home.

At time of purchase:-

Single Trip Policies: no upper age limits, however, trip duration limits do apply.

Annual Multi-Trip policies: no upper age limits, however, trip duration limits do apply.

Backpacker Policies: up to age 65

Single Trip, Trip Duration is up to 365 days if you are aged 65 or under, beginning and ending in your home area. They will only cover you for up to 31 days for each trip if you are aged 66 or over. 

Annual Trip, Trip Duration allows you to travel as many times as you like during any one period of insurance, as long as no single trip lasts longer than 45 days (31 days if you are aged 66 or over). Under the Gold and Black cover option the maximum length of a single trip is increased to 90 days if you are aged under 66.

Backpacker Trip Duration is from 31 days up to 18 months.

Winter sports is available for up to 17 days during the term of your policy (or 24 days if you have arranged Gold or Black cover).   You can add Winter Sports for the entire duration of your Single Trip.

The policy covers over twenty different activities as standard including off-piste skiing or snowboarding (except in areas considered unsafe by the resort)

Individuals between one and ten people. (There are no group discounts available)

Family means A person and their husband, wife or partner and their dependent, adopted or fostered children who are aged under 18 and are either in full-time education or living with them.

EHIC mandatory, if travelling to the EU. You must enrol in Medicare if travelling to Australia and requiring treatment.

There are 90 activities covered as standard, some activities exclude cover for Personal Liability and Personal Accident are excluded.

You can add a further 50 activities by taking the Hazardous Activities option (an additional premium is required) 

It is important that you check the list of activities before purchasing your travel insurance to ensure you are covered.  If you are unsure, it’s a good tip to gain approval in writing from your insurance provider.

Insure and Go do not expect you to avoid alcohol consumption on your trips or holidays but will not cover any claims arising because you have drunk so much alcohol that your judgement is seriously affected and you need to make a claim as a result (e.g. any medical claim where in the opinion of the treating doctor, your excessive alcohol consumption has caused or actively contributed to your injury or illness, including but not exclusively having a blood alcohol reading of more than 150mg per 100ml).

Scheduled Airline Failure cover is standard on all policies. This is extended to include End Supplier Insolvency on all Gold and Black policies as standard.

Pre-Existing Medical Conditions can be considered, however you will need to complete their online screening process. Any pre-existing medical condition that has not been declared and accepted in writing by the insurer will not be covered.

Policy States “We provide cover under this policy if something unexpected happens. In particular, we provide cover under section B Medical and other expenses for injuries to the body or illness that was not expected.  We do not consider pregnancy or childbirth to be an illness or injury. To be clear, we only provide cover under sections A, B and C of this policy, for claims that come from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. Please make sure you read the definition of ‘Complications of pregnancy and childbirth’ on page 12.

Manual labour is work that is physical, including, but not limited to; construction, installation, assembly and building work. This does not include bar and restaurant staff, musicians and singers and fruit pickers (who do not use machinery).

They will provide cover for manual labour that is voluntary, for a charity registered under the Charity Commission in England and Wales, the Scottish Charity regulator or the Department for Social Development in Northern Ireland and where you will not earn any money. In these situations, you will not be covered for work that involves installing, putting together, maintaining, repairing or using heavy electrical, mechanical or hydraulic machinery. You will not be covered when you are working more than three meters above the ground, and cover for personal accident and personal liability is not included. If you injure yourself during voluntary work, the policy excess under section B Medical and other expenses will be £100 and an excess waiver will not delete this increased excess.

In the event of an injury occurring as a result of voluntary labour, the Policy Excess under the section Medical Emergency & Repatriation will be increased to £250 and application of Excess Waiver will not delete this increased excess. Cover excludes interaction with wild animals of any kind.

We would recommend that anyone planning to work obtains written permission from their Insurance Provider that it is covered under their policy.

Insurance Provider does not state that receipts are essential, however any claim for an item without a receipt may result in an additional 10% deduction on payments.

Therefore, we strongly recommend that it would be sensible to keep receipts of any new clothes/property purchased for your holiday; and additionally, any valuation for items that are of value, but you don’t have an original receipt. If in doubt as to whether you have cover for a specific item, please contact the Insurance Provider for clarification prior to taking out insurance.

The policy states "No section of this policy (apart from section B Medical and other expenses) shall apply in respect of any claim arising directly or indirectly from a natural disaster or civil unrest unless you chose and have paid the appropriate extra premium for the Travel disruption option which provides cover in this respect for Delayed departure or abandoning your trip, Missed departure and Accommodation cover".

Not covered as standard under this policy, aside from as mentioned above. Travel Disruption as a result of natural disaster or catastrophe can be included subject to payment of an additional premium.

You must have lived in the UK or Channel Islands for six of the last twelve months, prior to purchase of a policy

Cruise Travel Insurance is an option on the Silver, Gold and Black policies. The levels of cover for the Cruise option is the same on all policies. Up to £1,000 to help get you to the next port if you have missed the original port departure. Up to £100 per day (maximum £1,000) if you need to be confined to your cabin, due to illness or injury. Up to £500 for unused excursions as a result of injury or illness. Up to £500 for a change in itinerary due to bad weather or timetable changes.

Finally up to £1,000 compensation if you have to leave the ship due to injury or illness. See the policy for full details

Unlike some companies, Insure and Go include Mobile phones, Ipads, ebooks, tablets, photographic equipment, games consoles etc in their definition of valuables, so there is already some cover under the standard policy for these types of gadgets.

You do however have the option to increase this limit to £2,000 with a single article limit of £1,000. Insure and Go will make a deduction for wear and tear and reserve the right to deduct a further 10% for any item over £100 where you cannot prove ownership.

Insure and Go do market travel insurance policies on the following comparison websites, Moneysupermarket, and Comparethemarket. The policies are described as Insure and Go Light, and named Go Classic, Go Superior and Go Elite (Moneysupermarket) Economy, Economy plus and Premium (Comparethemarket).

As you would expect cover is lower than the four policies you can purchase direct on the Insure and Go Website. In some cases elements of cover are missing altogether and the voluntary excesses are much higher. We would recommend visiting InsureandGo direct.

The policies are split into three, One for the budget, one dealing with the Silver and Gold policies and one for the Black policy. They are between 33 and 39 pages long.

The policies are well laid out. Contact and Claim numbers are clearly displayed and the information regarding medical conditions is very helpful and at the front.

Each policy has a nice table of benefits and a contents section, which allows you to find specific sections of cover quickly and easily.

The policy lists under each section what you are and are not covered for. Overall a good clear policy.

As part of the MAPFRE group, InsureandGo have been around for over fifteen years and are a well established travel insurer. 

They have over twenty thousand reviews on trust pilot and have an 8.8 out of 10 rating, with 92% of reviewers rating them as good or excellent.

Reading through the reviews, the vast majority of four and five stars do only relate to administration in respect of taking out an insurance policy. All the two and one star reviews relate to poor claims service. 

There are also 465 reviews that have been left on the reviewcentre website. The overall rating is 1.4 out of 5.

It is important that you carry our your own own due diligence before making any purchase.

The Gold and Black policies do have top levels of cover and deserve their five star ratings. The website is easy to use and its quick and easy to obtain cover.

You should read the policy carefully to make sure you understand the small print and what is and isn't likely to be covered.