Travel Insurance Reviews

DO NOT TRUST THIS COMPANY! THEY MAKE EXCUSES TO NOT PAY GENUINE CLAIMS! THEY DONT RESPONSE TO CLAIMS UNTIL MONTHS LATER! You will know if an Insurer is good during claims time and it is no point buying any insurance at low cost when they dont actually pay you when you need to make a claim. This is an extremely hard lesson I learnt googling for "best insurance companies in Australia or cheapest", CHEAP IS BAD and this is BUDGET DIRECT, their name itself is a reflection. They spent a lot of advertising money and mostly appears at the top of search engines and many Comparison sites like Canstar, Find, Comparethemarket, etc, to ENTICE ignorant consumer like me to buy their policies but when it comes to claims time, they do not response at all until months later and make all sorts of excuses to NOT PAY GENUINE CLAIMS! So please DO NOT GET SCAMMED, read each and every fine print in their policy! They used this to argue themselves out of paying claims. I am taking my case to the AFCA, also read the reviews of other policy holders before you buy! I am a frequent business traveller, been buying travel insurance since 30yrs ago with different companies and last year, it was UNFORTUNATE I came across Budget Direct whilst googling. I bought a comprehensive multi-trip travel insurance in 2019 for my trip to Egypt and Jordan during Xmas holidays. Halfway through my trip, my Mum passed away overseas, and I had to break my trip and fly back for Mum's funeral. Hence, I had to rebook my Business Class Air Tickets and cancel half my trip, and rebook all hotels overseas attending mums funeral for a week. To rub salt into the wound, when I tried to make a claim, I received no response for almost 2 months, sent them multiple emails, they of course made excuses using COVID-19, asked for mum's death cert and all documents to proof my flights, travels, hotels cost etc. They then come back to inform that MY CLAIMS HAVE BEEN REJECTED! Below is their response:-

"The claimant has lodged the above claim under Section A-Cancellation and Amendment fees. As the claimant has already departed Australia she will not be covered under this section. We further considered this claim under Section C1- Cutting Your Trip Short & Section C2-Additional expenses. However, as the incident did not occur in Australia the claim does not fall within the scope of the policy and is therefor denied at this time."

I wondered why the Hell would anyone purchase travel insurance for overseas travel if not for unfortunate events like what happened to me! My mum passed away when I was travelling, and this is NOT A GOOD ENOUGH REASON for Budget Direct to pay my claims! So BEWARE all of you, think 100x before you think of engaging this company's services as CHEAP/BUDGET doesnt mean quality and this is often TRUE each and everytime. I am really keen to hear what the OMBUDSMAN AFRA had to say about this when I lodge a FORMAL COMPLAINT about Budget Direct tricking ignorant, unbeknownst consumers hundreds of million of dollars purchasing their policies hoping NO ONE MAKES A CLAIM and if one does, Budget Direct goes "see, read our 10,000 lines of fine prints in our terms of policies document when you purchase, you are not covered!!!" So unless you are a lawyer, and you have read through each and every word in the terms of their policy document, you are in for the SHOCK OF YOUR LIFE, when most of us would have thought we are covered by travel insurance if a family member passed away during your travels!!!

When applying to be covered for travel, customer service is so helpful and polite!!

When applied for a claim, customer service was so considerate and understanding! They explained to me exactly what I needed to do without judging me or makeing me feel stupid!!

Just amazing service!!!

Please. Save your money and do not follow through with this insurance company. They are not responsive, and do not cover you for anything. I filed a claim with the company in March, and still have yet to hear anything from them. Two months of waiting, and this insurance company just won't respond to me. I also had multiple claims to file, but only one was technically "approved". So much for feeling comfortable and safe while traveling.

What a joke of a company. I paid for top cover travel insurance policy back in October 19 before covid and only wanted to change my travel dates to when it’s safe to travel. The whole process of trying to get help or a helpful answer has been absolutely ridiculous. I was asked to originally lodge a claim And then after doing so was told I could get a partial credit back. I thought partial credit would be at least 70% back. I paid $150 for my policy and they are offering $29 credit to use at a later date. WHAT A JOKE, do they really think $29 is acceptable and do they think I’m going to use that $29 and give them another $120 to take up travel insurance at a later date??? That’s $150 less a year this company will not be getting from me and by the looks of things on this feedback page lots of other people won’t be using them either.

Tried to contact for months during the pandemic. Dreadful company who have disappeared but cover nothing and ultimately have kept the premium and provided zero service

Paid for ski holiday insurance with this company. Holiday was cancelled due to covid19. Holiday company agreed to re-book at no extra charge for same time next year. Same with equipment hire company. Insurance company refused to follow this pragmatic approach and would not reply to subsequent correspondence. DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY THEY ARE CROOKS!!!!!

Flights to UK cancelled resulting from the pandemic, but we thought we were one of the lucky ones that wouldn't suffer loss because our travel insurance stated we were covered for a pandmic and we took it out in Dec 2019 - pre-COVID.

Unfortunately, because we have been offered a voucher by the travel agent, we are advised we are ineligible for a refund. This, despite that fact said travel voucher must be booked by end 2020, rendering it useless, in light of international travel restrictions

Budget Direct are hiding behind 'travel credits' as grounds for refund avoidance. The travel credits offered will almost certainly be useless within the time frame we have to use them.

We have been traveling for two decades, have taken out travel insurance dozens of times, and made a claim on two previous occasions, both of which was satisfactorily rseolved. This was our first time insuring with Budget Direct. Take heed BD. When this is all said and done, people will remember and you will get your just desserts.

I purchased trip insurance in late Feb 2020 for a trip to Italy scheduled for early June. When the Covid crisis hit, i cancelled all of my travel and attempted to cancel the trip policy since I wasn't traveling. All of the other companies I dealt with were efficient: AA, Airbnb, etc. However, I spent over 2 months writing 20+ emails, filling out numerous web forms and leaving 10+ voice mails trying to cancel my policy with zero response.

I protested the charge via my credit card and received a response within 24 hours.

Coverage may be good, and they may have a good reputation in this space, but when customer service was at its most important, they completely blew it. I makes more sense to self-cover or go with a different company if you want trip coverage.

I spend each week trying to get hold of their customer services only to be promised a call back or email response. Having brought their comprehensive travel insurance I was told they would honour any cancellation claims however, I have found out that their requirements are designed to make any claim almost impossible. The travel agents and accommodation places are not responding to emails and according o Tick I need them to provide a cancellation certificate. GotoGate and MyTrips have even disconnected their hot line. I also had a boat trip in Colombia booked and they are not responding. Airlines such as Copa and Interjet will not provide any information saying I need to go travel agents I booked through. It's a vicious circle where travel agents do not respond and Tick Insurance (after getting a response) refuse to pay out on any claim unless they have a formal cancellation certificate. There is no compassion or understanding of the impacts of COVID and being able to get cancellation certificates. I have provided my credit card and bank statements sowing payment, airfare tickets and accommodation bookings all clearly labelled non refundable.

Think twice before purchasing Tick Insurance You may think you are covered however, this assumes you are able to get all the information required under their policy which may not be attainable in extreme events such as the COVID pandemic.

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Since writing the above, TICK Insurance have completely and utterly attempted to frustrate things further with the same requests. The most recent is to get a cancellation notice from the US Department of Immigration to say my Visa application is cancelled. Similar to hotels with a non refundable non cancellation policy, the US Dept of Immigration are not going to cancel nor provide a cancellation notice yet TICK are refusing to cover the costs.

I would add TICK customer service could not be this poor. They have made a decision to frustrate claims in the hope their customers give up and go away. Very poor given the circumstances. All I want to be reimbursed for out of travel expenses which are covered under my comprehensive travel policy. How can this be unreasonable?

Please re-consider TICK if you are looking at travel insurance. It's a Policy thwart with exceptions and terms which make it impossible claim.

I contacted insureandGO last week. I took out an annual policy just prior to Covad 19 and clearly can't travel. The generic response received twice refers to non annual policy. I contacted them again saying I don't have a single policy, I received the same response. Needless to say, I won't be renewing my policy next year. There are insurers out there giving 6 monthly rebates due to Corona 19. Not these shonkies.

These guys do everything they can to not pay you when you need them the most.
I’ve been through the hardest time of my life recently having to deal with getting back to Australia during covid 19 and after another life catastrophe.

I will never use this company for anything ever again.

I had taken out a Gold International policy, in June 2019, for travel to Canada and Alaska in May 2020. As we all know, COVID -19 put an end to all travel. I approached I &G to try to move the cover to the same rescheduled tour in May, 2021. They have point blank refused. I have reported this to AFCA, as have 100's more. I hope this company meets its demise, due to the abhorrent treatment of its customers.