UKC

I have always used BMC for travel insurance. But we are going on a family trip to font and the cost seems high compared to regular insurance. Any ideas?

In reply to Blunt: Snowcard are usually worth a look.

In reply to remus: Thanks will have a look.

In reply to Blunt: I got my insurance for 6 months in Australia for here: http://www.charterflights.co.uk/travel-insurance/
It was about half the price of BMC cover at the time.

They include an option for "climbing (up to 4000 metres)", I phoned up to ask a question and the lady who answered assured me that the 4000 metres is not an absolute altitude limit, rather, whatever height you start your climb, you can climb continuously for 4000 metres before the insurance is invalid.... I wouldn't like to test that theory (mainly because I'm sure she was wrong) but as a coverall for everything from soloing to winter alpinism, it's cheap at the price.

(An btw, if you are bouldering at font just get normal insurance. Even if you smash yourself up, it's not like you are on some sort of multipitch route. Make sure there are no bouldering mats present, take off your climbing shoes and tell the paramedics you were just having an exploratory walk near these cool boulders and fell off when you overbalanced, should be covered by pretty much any holiday insurance.)

In reply to Blunt:
Are you getting insurance for medical cover, or something else?
We're heading out to Font with a baby in the next couple of weeks. In the past I've only taken out travel insurance for mountaineering/ski trips, and relied on the EHIC card for everything else, thinking that this should cover emergencies, and pretty much anything else could be sorted by heading home early.
Interested to hear the views of both yourself and others as to whether this is sensible

In reply to Sam W: I was going to get BMC (£25ish i think for a week) as i'm a worryier and i'm never sure what the EHIC actually covers, but i think for font its your stuff getting nicked thats most risky so some sort of insuerance is handy

In reply to henwardian: Cheers I think this is the route I will take. The EHIC entitles you to the same cover as is available to the French but the worry would be if you needed repatriation. Will have a look at the policy you mentioned. Cheers Pete

In reply to Sam W: I guess I am trying to work out whether if I fall off and really hurt myself whether the financial risks (hotels for whoever stays with me in the french hospital, repatriation, loss of income etc) are worth it. I am covered in a round about way for loss of income in the UK. So...

In reply to Blunt:
I had thought of those things, but decided they are no more significant in France than they are in the UK, and I don't have any insurance for climbing here i.e. If I ended up having to stay in hospital in Edinburgh for a few weeks my family would still have to pay travel, hotels etc.
Of course that isn't necessarily an argument against travel insurance, could be one in favour of getting it for the UK.
Anyway this is in danger of turning into a hijack, so I'll finish by saying that I've always used the BMC for climbing insurance in the past, the only time I ever had to claim (for some broken glasses) they paid out quickly and without hassle

In reply to Blunt:

We are also going to Font next week, and have taken out the BMC insurance which has proven to be very high in comparison to previous years. We did briefly consider going with normal insurance, but decided that our lives were worth much more, and I'd hate to be arguing with insurance companies if anything did happen whilst we were away! But for future will look at the other one suggested.

p.s. I did get a quote off another company after doing a search on google, and when that actually came out at a higher price than the whole of our holiday will cost, I went with BMC!

In reply to Blunt:

I always use www.holidayinsuranceweb.com and add the activity climbing 'without tools'.

Not had to claim for anything yet, so not sure how easy a process this is?

That being said, the cost was very reasonable compared to a lot of others.