How Travel Insurance Can Save You Thousands Of Dollars

(lighthearted music) – How travel insurance cansave you thousands of dollars.

I'm just going to getstraight to the point here.

Why would you ever jeopardizeyour family assets, your wealth accumulation just for that– – Doh!- Moment? (lighthearted music) Welcome back to “Your Travel with Olivia”.

I'm Olivia and this is the channel where you are going to come to for advice and insight intoanything to do with travel.

I am not going to get intoall of that again today about travel insurance, I have done numerousvideos on that before, because today we are joined by Carl.

And Carl is actually going toshare with us today his story of how travel insurance savedhim thousands of dollars.

Carl, thank you so much forbeing with us here today.

This is awesome! And you're going to be tellingus your story of what happened.

– Yeah, thank you forallowing me to share my story.

Having worked in the insurance world, I know something about the risks of health and so the old-fashioned wayis that you had group insurance and you understood that itwas going to take care of you.

As the world has changedand as we get a little older and we start doing the travel, two stories that I have, Iwas wound up in a hospital coming back from aconvention in New Orleans and we're in Branson, Missouri, July the 4th.

A beautiful day and Iwake up in the morning with a kidney stone.

– Oh, excruciating! – Yes.

– To say the least, right? – But I was happy thatI had travel insurance.

The bill for that particular event was somewhere around $3, 500 US for being in the hospitalfor about an hour and a half.

– No way! Really? – The hospitals, thisis the American system, one minute I get a billsaying you owe me this money.

I called my insurance company and says, “Well no, don't worry about it.

“We're part of a syndicateand we'll take care of it.

” and of course they kept callingand said where's my money? I said, “No, no, you have to deal “with my insurance company.

” Oh! And eventually I realized, being someone that understands something about insurance claims, I spoke to a claim adjuster on it.

He says, “Oh yeah, it takes some time “in the Americans area.

” They think that theCanadians are a little stupid that they'll pay right upfront and then not worried about it.

And I said, “Okay, well, thank you.

” I was a little disappointed, to say the– – So did you pay upfront? – No, I did not pay.

– You did not, okay.

– No, 'cause we hadthe coverage and they– – You had the coverage.

Now, you presented that at the place?- Yes, it presented, and they were all fine with it.

As a poor Canadian traveling, do not step in The US.

I would not even step onBuffalo just to go for a drink without having coverage because I just know enough about– – That's right, and howmuch they come back to you– – Absolutely! – Even though you presented it to them.

And have you already calledthe insurance company– – Oh, absolutely!- Just to let them know– – Oh yeah!- That you were having this issue, just toopen your claim basically.

– Absolutely, absolutely.

As soon as we walked into the hospital– – That was all taken care ofand that's really important– – Absolutely.

– That people do that right off the bat, right?- Yes.

I don't worry about it anymore because I know that I willnot step outside of Ontario without having coverage.

– And you said Ontarioyou would not step out of.

That means even provincial, right? – Absolutely.

– 'Cause you know fromprovince to province that you are not covered, right? – Absolutely.

And I have so manypeople make that mistake of not understanding that there's a war between province to province.

We can always say that the thefederal government legislates that we should havewonderful care in Canada.

It's not there.

In the province they don't and I– – Each provinces run differently.

– Absolutely.

– They're according to their provincial laws, it's that– – Ontario doesn't like BCand BC doesn't like Ontario.

So if you get sick in BC and try to get the OntarioGovernment to look after you, please don't do it.

– All I know is we can't get BC wine.

(both laughing) You've mentioned thatthere were two stories.

– Well, the story is— The other one, we was in January of 2017, right? – 2017, or no, 2018.

– 2018, all right.

– Yeah, we're now in '19.

We've started our regulargoing South with some friends and we go to Cape Canaveral.

We rent a condo in the winter.

Two weeks into it, all of a sudden, I got a cough and acouple of my buddies said, “You might have pneumonia.

“This thing isn't going away.

” so you kind of cough for five days, I went to the pharmacist and he said, “If you've got a cough for five days “and it's a little dry, ” he says, “I think you should go tothe emergency right now.

” You called your insurance company.

I'm here.

They gave me information, the insurance companytakes over from there, they're talking to their admin people.

I'm in a room, I had no waiting period, I'm there at 10 o'clock in themorning, no waiting period, absolutely the perfect healthcare.

They said, oh, you've got pneumonia and you're not going home.

– Oh, so now you're admitted? – Yeah, I am admitted.

She said, “We just needto find a room for you.

” They found a room and they started the IVs of different medications.

– And how long were youin the hospital for? – Three days.

– Okay, total.

– Two nights and three days.

– Total, okay.

– So when I got the bill, you do get a summary of thebill from the insurance company.

The insurance companypaid $25, 000 Canadian.

– Ouch! – It's not going tobankrupt most families but– – But it goes back to what I was saying, do we actually want to depleteour wealth accumulation by that amount forsomething that only cost you for your insurance? – Yeah.

– Versus paying out 25, 000.

So when you do it that way, when we do the scales, it just makes sense.

– Oh.

Why I have such a wonderfulrelationship with Olivia is because she understands the market.

I ask a lot of questionsbecause of my background and having that comfort thatshe goes and looks for them, the policy that best fits my needs for the type of traveling that we're doing outside of the province or in The US.

In fact, I look at thisand I say, oh my gosh, for the days I'm away, $10a day for my insurance.

For $10! – It's a no-brainer.

– It's two drinks! If there was a way thatI can help our societies is please do not travelwithout having insurance.

Please buy it from a good supplier.

It's not even a peace of mind.

It's just knowing that your family doesn't have to worry aboutwhile you're recovering.

– Yes, yeah! I had my own story too so the same thing.

I was in Spain when I got sick and you're there by yourself and you don't speak the languageand that add on top of that that I had to worry about finances, that would have been awful, but I didn't because Ihad travel insurance.

Just taking that financial worry off of your overall stress level already just because you are sick, because you are in the hospital, and because you don't knowwhat's going to come out, the outcome's going to be.

So it is really important thatyou got that travel insurance and you're a huge advocatefor it, a huge believer, and that's why I reallywanted to talk to Carl.

I wanted him to share hisstory with you here today because he was the one whoapproached me and talked to me and said there's no way he would ever travel without insurance.

So he's going away andhe wants to make sure that all of his insurance is covered and that he's protected, him and his wife.

– If I can save one or twofamilies from having a tragedy, what an honor to have hadthis opportunity to share.

– I am so pleased that you did this and that you've actuallyspoken to everybody out there.

I think that it's important when you do hear somebody's actual story and what they've been through, not once but twice with Carl, just in his short space of time that he does travel down to The States.

He doesn't want to stopgoing to the states and thoroughly enjoys it so if he can get his peace ofmind just by buying insurance and still continue to enjoy his trip and feel like he's being taken care of if anything should happen, then I think that's all worth it, and I think that's what we're all about when we all love traveling.

But hey, you know what? If you guys have your ownstories that you want to share, this is a great placeand a great community to share that here today by putting that in thecomment section down below, let others know what you've been through, pass that message on to other people so that they too canlearn from this experience as we have learned from Carl here today.

If this is your first timevisiting with this channel, please consider subscribing by hitting the subscribe button down below as well as the bell that will notify you that I've just uploaded a new video 'cause I am here every single week bringing you differentinsight into travel.

Anyways, if this is your week to travel, I want to wish you a safe trip there as well as a safe return home.

Ciao, adios! And thank you so much, Carl.

That was great.

– Appreciate it.

(lighthearted music).