Travel Insurance

[Berkfamily]

Hi! We have finally booked our villa for Christmas and will be spending a week at Orchid Villa. I'm now considering travel insurance and am a little confused about how it works when travelling with a family. When my kids travel alone I get the quote based on what I've paid for the trip for them. With 5 of us, how do I allocate the costs? Do I allocate it to one of us and have that person file the claim for, say the total amount of the villa, if something happens? As you can imagine, we are now in final payment stage for the Villa since its the holidays, so it's all paid....now and I want to make sure the total paid is covered. Thanks for sharing any advice and experience.

[David- n Hampton, VA]

During the times I have gotten insurance here is how it worked for us (if I understood it correctly...as I have never had to use it so I am merely explaining what was explained to me.)

As for the villa, if you still use it you pay for it.

As for the plane fares - everyone that can't go due to a covered reason gets their money back....if everyone can't go then you get every covered item back in full (up to the covered amount).

So for example, I paid 4800 for a villa, then spent 600 for each plane ticket (for 4 so 2400 total). then I arranged for food in the fridge and catering 400.

Now if my daughter can't go because she is sick, I get her plane fare back…..if her husband lost his job and then both of them can't go, then I get their plane fares back but still owe for the villa. (I do not know if I could have gotten a portion back if the villa had a reduced rate for less people staying but I doubt it.)

If there was a hurricane and none of us could go, then I would have gotten it all back. If we had to leave early because of a storm it would have reimbursed us a prorated amount.

Hope I explained this well. I have found in every case the insurance agents explained it very well, and were very helpful. (Of course that may be because I was buying instead of reporting a claim!)