What travel insurance really means • Hacker News Board

Re: What travel insurance really means

#181

Post by caymanjim » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 2:58 PM UTC

idontpost wrote: post #87

caymanjim wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Singapore, with first-rate hospitals, and the highest cost of living in the world? That's not even a little surprising.

> the highest cost of living in the world Singapore is not THAT expensive. Yes, it's first-rate, but not even close to highest COL[1] [1] https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...

Cost of living is complicated and lifestyle-dependent, and living in the city core vs. the suburbs makes a huge difference in most places. According to Forbes and The Economist, Singapore is #1. San Francisco may have laughably-high rents, but the cost of consumer goods, food, and many other things is far cheaper in San Francisco than in Singapore, for example, and it heavily skews the results.

Singapore is a "top 10" city by any metric and that was the main point.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2018/03/19/the-ci... https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2017/03/21/measurin... https://www.thrillist.com/news/nation/most-expensive-cities-...

Re: What travel insurance really means

#182

Post by DoreenMichele » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 3:08 PM UTC

zaarn wrote: post #172

DoreenMichele wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked in insurance for a company with a reputation for being unusually ethical, etc. While working in insurance, I heard that it was quite common for other insurance companies to train their claims processors to look for a reason to deny, not a reason to pay. I was trained to look for a reason to pay, not a reason to deny and still sometimes found the bureaucratic process stomach-turning. I generally am sympatheti…

The problem there is profit orientation and it's true for all insurances. Even car insurances do this even if you think they don't. They'll look for a reason to not pay you a dime even if it's on legally uneven feet. When an insurance is profit motivated, then maximizing profits is the first instincts. Maximizing profits happens by maximizing the deny:payout ratio. My car insurance did this by denying me reimbursemen…

Even car insurances do this even if you think they don't. They'll look for a reason to not pay you a dime even if it's on legally uneven feet.

No, I don't think car insurance is better about being willing to pay. I just think that it actually helps encourage driver responsibility on the road and it's less of an issue if you can't afford a car than if you can't afford medical care. I don't think the ACA actually insisting that all Americans have health insurance encourages anyone to eat right, exercise etc.

Re: What travel insurance really means

#183

Post by rsbadger » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 3:16 PM UTC

trocadero wrote: post #179

rsbadger wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I didn't, that email was 7 days after the surgery, I had already left Singapore and was back in Bali by then. (My "not fit to fly" letter stated I was not fit 'before' having the surgery, once the plate was in and the swelling had resided I was OK)

Well, I'm sure your doctor will see your blog post and write up a new letter for you. Of course in the off chance that this method is ineffective you could, y'know, call or e-mail the doctor's office and ask them to write the letter your insurance company wants. Honestly, I don't see what the insurance company is doing wrong at this point. They've told you exactly what you need in order get your surgery covered yet y…

Because they said "No further medical input needed." which is a fairly clear "we don't require any more input from anybody, we've made our decision."

If after they "review" my case they ask again, I will reach out to the DR who treated me and waste more of his time, but I'm confident the insurance company would have still found a way to weasel out of it, even if the DR had been more explicit. I imagine it wasn't his first time writing a "not fit to fly" note, after all...

Re: What travel insurance really means

#184

Post by rsbadger » Wed, Jul 18, 2018, 3:22 PM UTC

trocadero wrote: post #178

rsbadger wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to clarify your comment on "What they offered was exactly what travel insurance is there for." They didn't offer me anything. Not one piece of my cover was offered. They 'offered' me a flight home as a goodwill gesture. They stressed that they didn't have to. It was a really shitty tactic. If you complain to a company and accept "their goodwill gesture" you are agreeing that no further action will be taken. If I…

Your booklet says: We will not cover the following: 2. Any treatment or surgery which we think you do not need immediately and can wait until you return home. Our decision is final. That's what travel insurance is. It's there to pay for care until you can fly home. Accepting their flight home isn't voiding your insurance. It's getting the coverage you paid for.

It would have been if they said "we will fly you home, as per your cover" but they didn't, the flight home was a goodwill gesture. If they weren't going to pay for my 2nd operation, I would have ditched the "reasonable attitude" and claimed for the 1st operation. They knew that, so by offering me the goodwill flight home they were literally trying to make me void my own cover.

Furthermore, the policy says clearly, until I CAN fly home. My DR had explicitly told me I could not. I wasn't going to risk my health for the sake of my arsehole insurance company and their bullshit attempts to wriggle out of paying.

Ask yourself, would YOU have ignored the advice of your DR, who knew your case personally, in favour of the "opinion" of a private company whose sole motivation is financial?

Re: What travel insurance really means

#185

Post by 76 » Thu, Jul 19, 2018, 10:42 AM UTC

dalore wrote: post #3

I always wonder when I buy insurance, if I need it will they actually pay out. You should be able to get insurance for your insurance. So when you need insurance and it doesn't pay out. Then that insurance company can go after the first one without having to resort to twitter or medium to shame them.

What happens when the "insurance for your insurance" (level 2 insurance?) refuses to pay? You get level 3 insurance for this case? What if they are all equally corrupt? Which they probably should be, since it's in their interest not to pay up?

Re: What travel insurance really means

#186

Post by mendez » Fri, Jul 20, 2018, 8:51 AM UTC

3pt14159 wrote: post #70

trocadero wrote: post #37

I'm somewhat sympathetic to the insurance company here. Travel insurance is there to take care of emergency medical care. It's not for long term care. The guy clearly didn't want to travel because he preferred to be cared in Singapore. From his e-mail: >I intend to stay in Asia for some time yet. I did consider travelling home to have surgery in the UK, but the medical Service here is excellent and I'm already schedu…

Warning bells starting chiming as soon as I read how much the insurance cost. He might not have known better, but £273.70 for 18 months of insurance is at least 10x too low. My trick is simple: Get an Amex Platinum if you need insurance for under 2 weeks [1] and buy insurance from your bank for anything longer. Banks compete on trust, so they don't randomly fuck you over. I actually used my bank's health insurance wh…

I thought it sounded really expensive. My annual AMEX travel insurance is £31 a year, however it does have a max trip length of 90 days so wouldn't be suitable for "Digital Nomading".