Do You Know How to Buy Good Travel Insurance for Parents?

Is Buying Travel Insurance for Parents Worth It?

Regardless of their age or gender, solo travel among seniors is trending as they free themselves of family and financial responsibilities. However, as they boldly step into this new world, reality can often be different from what they expected.

With age, the chances of our parents falling sick or getting injured increase too. In such a case, their medical care can rack up a greater bill than you can anticipate. What’s worse, if they’re travelling alone, then the need for a reliable backup plan becomes paramount. To deal with these financial and emotional risks, most people prefer to buy travel insurance for parents.

From much-needed travel assistance to any sudden health or travel-related emergencies, make sure to pick the travel insurance for your parents.

What Should I look for when Buying Insurance for Parents?

Now that you’re convinced about buying insurance for your parents, the next step is to learn about important factors to consider before buying trip insurance:

1. Consider Location

   Firstly, you must pick a senior citizen travel insurance depending upon their destination. Many travel insurance companies in India automatically provide custom plans for different countries and continents in the world.

   For example, if they’re going to the US or any European country, the plan is likely to be costly. Countries with expensive healthcare and high cost of living need appropriate coverage.

2. Opt for High Sum Insured

   It's a good idea to buy senior travel health insurance with a high sum insured, as long as it's in your budget. Depending upon your parent's overall health, you can always decide on a reasonable sum insured so that they don't need to bear costly medical bills needlessly.

   A plan with USD 50,000 or more is often considered sufficient as a higher amount will cost you a lot more premium.

3. Plans with Medical Tests

   Always go for travel insurance plans that require medical tests as these tests will always offer your parents improved coverage and reduce the chances of claim rejection.

   Especially if you're travelling for a long duration, you're better off undergoing medical tests to avoid claim disputes later. On the other hand, this will also be a great way to get your parents checked as they usually avoid it until necessary.

4. Check for any PED

   You will always find hundreds of ads promising instant trip insurance plans without checkups. While these are great, there’s a small catch- your parents may not be aware of any recent or not-so-obvious health disorders which may become a basis for claim rejection later.

   These issues are termed pre-existing diseases and are usually not covered by insurers. Knowing about your parent’s PED will let you find foreign trip insurance plans that cover pre-existing health conditions.

   In fact, there are optional covers that protect a person from any pre-existing issues. All you need to do is to be aware of your parent’s underlying health conditions and buy a plan that covers them.

5. Watch out for Deductibles

   Often while looking for an affordable plan, people end up buying the one that’s least expensive. The issue with many such plans is that they come with deductibles; a mandatory expense that can really cost you much more than you thought.

   To put it simply, deductibles are necessary expenses that an insured person must pay before their insurer will. Buying a plan with high deductibles means that in case of an issue, you will have to pay up first.

6. Avoid Buying Plans that Restrict

   Insurers know that old people have additional risks. For this reason, they end up charging more premiums before issuing them a policy. However, you should always buy any plan only after making sure it has no unfair restrictions or limits.

   For example, if your father has both high blood pressure and diabetes, then don't settle for a plan that only covers one of these issues. Similarly, if you have purchased a USD 75,000 sum insured plan with USD 15K per illness restriction then be careful of such plans.

7. Compare Premium

   Once you’ve finalised two-three different travel insurance for your parents, don’t forget to compare their final costs. Using a travel insurance premium calculator, you can easily get an idea about the travel insurance quote and how much it will cost you in the end, including all the optionals and taxes.

8. Confirm the CSR

   Claim settlement ratio or CSR is a very important factor to consider before buying any policy. This will let you judge an insurer’s credibility and help get an idea about their claim settlement tendency.

   If the CSR is above 90%, it’s considered good and in case you raise a claim, the chances of it getting accepted are pretty decent. Similarly, check out public forums for honest customer reviews so that you can know their first-hand experiences.

What is the Good Travel Insurance for Senior Citizens?

Since there are so many travel insurance companies in India, it is hard to decide which one is better or worse. In fact, this is completely subjective as what may work for someone may not appeal to another person. For example, buying an expensive senior citizen travel insurance with pre-existing coverage is useless for a healthy couple who has no underlying conditions.

Over to You,

Most parents past their 50s or 60s are considered a risk by travel insurance companies. The insurers are taking on greater risk knowing that aged people are more likely to raise a claim. In such a scenario, it is your responsibility to scan policy wordings carefully and make the most of the costly premium that would cost your parents. After all, it is finally their turn to take a back seat and explore the world too!