{"id":367382,"date":"2026-03-27T04:03:21","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T04:03:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/367382\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T04:03:21","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T04:03:21","slug":"travel-insurance-offers-anything-but-peace-of-mind-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/367382\/","title":{"rendered":"Travel insurance offers anything but peace of mind \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Summer might not yet be here but many families are already well advanced in planning their summer holiday travel. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">While the focus is naturally on the adventure and the opportunity to relax away from the world of work, holidays abroad are inevitably a significant financial outlay, no matter how many early bird discounts you secure.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Travel insurance, we are assured, offers peace of mind, allowing you to look forward to your trip in the knowledge that if anything goes wrong, you are covered. Or maybe not.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The report of the Financial Services and Pensions Ombudsman, published on Wednesday, tells the story of one couple who took out a travel insurance policy ahead of a trip abroad. On the day of their flight, they received a message from their airline while on the way to the airport to say the flight had been cancelled due to an IT issue. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">They submitted a claim to their insurance company for half the cost of their accommodation and the cost of pre-booking a rental car \u2013 a not inconsequential total of close to \u20ac700.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The insurance company rejected their claim on the same day. It said that because they had selected \u201cOther\u201d on its website as their reason for cancelling their trip, \u201cthe system automatically declined\u201d their claim as this reason was not listed in the policy terms and conditions. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-it-article-body__interstitial-link\">[\u00a0<a aria-label=\"Open related story\" class=\"c-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/your-money\/2026\/03\/25\/record-number-of-complaints-made-to-financial-services-and-pensions-ombudsman\/\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Record number of complaints made to Financial Services and Pensions OmbudsmanOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">When the couple complained, the insurer reopened the claim only to reject it again.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The reason on this occasion: the definition of \u201cdelay and abandonment\u201d in the terms and conditions of their policy only covered a mechanical fault with the aircraft itself, rather than the airline\u2019s IT systems. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Also, as they had left their home before the flight was cancelled, they could not claim under \u201ccancellation\u201d in the policy, as this only offered cover for issues that arise before the trip began, the insurer said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">However, after the ombudsman sent a summary of complaint, the insurer said it had \u201cadded more definitions in relation to transportation and mechanical faults\u201d, which meant it could now accept the claim.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">As someone who has had more than their fair share of dealing with the insurance sector, insurers adding definitions to accommodate rather than limit claims is behaviour that certainly raises a sceptical eyebrow.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">For intending holidaymakers, for real peace of mind, be sure to read the small print of your travel insurance policy to the end \u2013 and be prepared to challenge the sort of fatuous rejections that arose in this case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Summer might not yet be here but many families are already well advanced in planning their summer holiday&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":367383,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,6572,165428,61,60,115260],"class_list":["post-367382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-cantillon","tag-financial-services-and-pensions-ombudsman-fspo","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-travel-insurance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367382","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367382"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367382\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367383"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367382"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367382"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367382"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}