In reply to NottsRich:
I am not sure the new underwriters have made a huge difference. The BMC policies are very expensive. That may be fine if they are giving cover over and above ordinary travel insurance but its unclear to me whether they are.
It seems to me the 2 main big risks that need to be covered (particularly in North America) are medical costs and search and rescue costs. Its fairly easy to cover medical costs. Dog Tag seems to be popular and you can get get medical cover for ski mountaineering in Canada from them much cheaper than the BMC.
Search and rescue is another minefield. Dog Tag states "First of all, as with any travel insurance, search and rescue is only provided in the event of a medical emergency. If you need cover for S&R in other circumstances (say, equipment failure or, well, simply getting lost) then we suggest you look at the likes of GEOS Alliance who charge very little for a fabulous membership. They also have a medivac service which will lift you to a hospital where we can take over".
Its possible to conceive of lots of reasons you might want to be rescued uninjured (ropes stuck, tent blows away etc etc).
On this subject the BMC policy states that they will pay for search and rescue if you are uninjured if you are suffering "mountain or aquatic distress". Distress isnt defined in the policy document.
Another major problem with the BMC policies is that they exclude cover if you are in a "remote and inaccessible place". This isnt defined in the policy document and has left the poor staff in the BMC office trying to work out what it means.
I have had very good feed back about the cover that comes with membership of the CAF but havent looked into this in detail yet.
