Thai tourism officials are again pushing for mandatory travel insurance for inbound tourists to cut losses of about $123 million due to unpaid medical bills.
More information here
Courtesy of Travelmole
-
Edited by
Glynis HT Admin
2017-06-07 10:24:03
That would be interesting
Cuba has required all visitors to produce details of their travel and health insurance on arrival at Immigration since at least 2014. If you don't have it you have to buy a policy via them there and then. However, I'm not sure how effective they are at collecting the money either. I've needed to use their health services on a few occasions and not once have I been asked for cash up front, to produce my insurance policy or give them card number etc before receiving treatment. On the contrary, I've always received very thorough and excellent care and been given an invoice only afterwards. As the cost on each occasion was either less than or only marginally more expensive than the excess on my policy I've usually just paid cash rather than get into the hassle of claiming a negligable amount but I have often wondered what would happen if it had been much greater. Would they have refused to treat me before sorting out the fnancial arrangements first? I'm not sure they would have done because their priority has always seemed to be treatment before money.
As for visitors to the UK seeking medical assistance and charging that is a thorny topic which I don't think we want to get into debating.
Are there statistics as to how many people book with tour operators these days, very few that I know, Airlines don't have any requirements re insurance and I'm always reading in the press about someone complaining that they can't get their money back from Ryanair etc. when they have had to cancel because of illness and haven't bought insurance. Who knows what will happen after Brexit as the EHIC may be no longer valid within Europe for UK residents.
What I find most worrying,is the number of people who tell me that they have travel insurance thru their Bank - they have no idea of the number of exclusions in these types of policy!!!
Ours is through Nationwide Dave but we have seperate cover for hubby's medical conditions.
Post a Reply
Please sign in or register an account to reply to this post.
Similar Topics
-
Thousands of tourists stranded as floods hit Thailand
Posted by David in Thailand Discussion Forum
- Germany: Black Forest, free travel for tourists
-
Laos / Thailand Ã?¢ââ??¬ââ?¬Å? Interesting trip and potential insurance i
Posted by PeteB in Thailand Discussion Forum
-
Thailand travel help
Posted by trigger1 in Thailand Discussion Forum
-
Travel insurance
Posted by Howler in Help And Assistance