One of the many unique features about high net worth home insurance is the ability to extend cover to include annual travel insurance for you and your family on a worldwide basis. However, what is meant by the term ‘worldwide’?
Most would naturally make the assumption that it means cover is provided throughout the world regardless of the country being visited. Unfortunately in reality the wording isn’t so straightforward.
Cuba, to use an example, is a fast growing holiday destination that has witnessed a tourism boom ever since lifting the law in 1997 that prohibited contact between Cubans and tourists. Us Brits meanwhile seem to have acquired a taste for the mambo and cigars to the point that we accounted for 174,343 of the island’s visitors in 2010 (the second largest number of tourists arrivals after Canada).
Since 2010 we can only assume this number has increased. However, what’s worrying is that for all its increased popularity as a tourist destination, Cuba isn’t universally considered an accepted area under the ‘worldwide’ blanket amongst travel insurers. In fact, American owned insurers will NOT provide travel insurance when visiting the island due to the U.S’s traditional market embargo which has been continuously imposed on the Castro Regime since 1960.
Similarly, as a general exclusion, insurers will not provide cover for travel to countries which the foreign and commonwealth office or the world heath organisation has advised against. Granted, countries that fall under this classification are usually in the throes of some form of social upheaval or violent transition and as such are not considered your typical holidaying hotspot, but the point remains the same – worldwide is not a literal term.
These are all examples that should be considered when booking a holiday. Rather, the term ‘worldwide’ should be treated the same as any other defined term in a policy wording in that an insurers understanding of it tends to differ slightly from that of the layman.
From our Private Client Team.