Insurance

How ironic that I can now report back on the insurance cover that I took out.

After my little accident last week, we contacted the insurers (Direct Travel Insurance) and they have been brilliant ever since, they called me pretty much every day to make sure I was ok and didn't need any more help, in particular assistance with getting home, the fact that I was returning by train was probably a great relief to them.

They liased with the medical centre to pay for the mountain rescue and were prompt at sending through claims forms etc.

However, as yet I haven't sent through my receipts etc so I will report back again once the whole thing has been sorted, but in a nutshell, they have been great so far.

One thing I did learn from all of this was that the Carre Neige costs something like 2 euros a day and you can reclaim money back on your unsused lift pass after an accident, however having winter sports cover with DTI also covers this, along with mountain rescue so I'm not entirely sure why else you would want the CN cover?? Am I missing something?

Nelly, I don't know about other travel insurance policies, but my one with PJ Hayman has a £250 excess for search and rescue.
So my plan, should I need this, is to claim off the Carre Neige because they don't have an excess on it. Also, the Carre Neige is instantly recognized in the French ski resorts and apparently they won't ask for a 'down payment' for the search and rescue, or kidnap my skis or anything!
And the Carre Neige will also pay for medical fees and repatriation to Europe.
But unless you live in France you can't take out cancellation insurance with the Carre Neige, but my travel insurance covers this, as well as 'end supplier failure' in case a supplier of part of my holiday goes bust.

What happened when you were taken down the mountain? At what stage did they ask for some money?
I am very sorry you got hurt, but as you said, it was an ideal way of testing out the system!

I've never had to claim on my travel insurance, or the Carre Neige, so I don't know what actually happens, in practice.

I hope you're back to ski-ing fitness soon :)

Thanks for the update Nelly.
I am pleased that DT have been looking after you, I have used them for years and sort of taken on trust that they are quite good.
:)
I will be interested to hear how it all pans out, and if you had to pay anyone in France anything up front.

PS:
Hope the knees are doing ok.
:thumbup:

B'ah!..Sorry to hear about your injury Nelly. We had a minor disaster in that we missed the Eurostar home..Managed to get all our gear including tickets and passports locked in the ski lockers at ARC 1600..They close at 6.30 pm apparently!..grrr. Doubt any insurance will pay out for that one given it was largely our own fault :(

shipjack wrote:B'ah!..Sorry to hear about your injury Nelly. We had a minor disaster in that we missed the Eurostar home..Managed to get all our gear including tickets and passports locked in the ski lockers at ARC 1600..They close at 6.30 pm apparently!..grrr. Doubt any insurance will pay out for that one given it was largely our own fault :(

What a pain though! Assume you got home by some other means? It's possible that the reason I managed to get two seats to myself and stretch my leg out was down to you missing the train!

Ally, I was quite surprised by the whole thing, no one asked me for any money until I'd been seen by the doctor and xrayed, and he was the first person to ask about insurance and Carre Neige, he seemed more concerned about me getting the money back on my lift pass.

There was no mention of mountain rescue until a couple of days later when the medical centre rang me to ask if I could get my insurance company to fax over confirmation they would pay for the blood wagon, that was it. I guess every resort is different.

Knee is doing ok, still hobbling around on crutches but getting easier every day, got first physio next week so should be back up and running in no time :)

I've been doing some research into travel ins since ours failed to pay out for cancelling our holiday. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Direct Travel seem to bethe best I've seen and will be using them in future. Glad you are on the mend Nelly and got everything sorted ok.

What a pain though! Assume you got home by some other means? It's possible that the reason I managed to get two seats to myself and stretch my leg out was down to you missing the train!

Maybe!..I guess that's something. Yeah, had to fork out for a flight from Chambery..these things happen I suppose.

Just a quick report on a great response from an insurance company. I went skiing before Christmas, fell, and as a result was unable to go on my next booked ski holiday in January. I finally got together all the doctor's notes, receipts, hospital certificates etc and sent them off to my insurer on Monday this week. I received a letter yesterday (Friday, the same week) telling me they had paid the claim, and on checking my bank account I can see that my refund is already in there. So I'm happy (although I'd rather have gone skiing!)

The insurer? Tescos (via Ageas).