"Military risk" travel insurance

[MechGov]

As I understand it, we are responsible for obtaining our own travel insurance that covers us for a "service risk" with respect to cancellation for holidays during leave that we are then required for forfeit due to service reasons.
Do any Ppruners know of a company that will actually cover this? Those that I have seen explicitly exclude Afghanistan or travel through it, which kind of misses the point.
Thanks in advance MG

[Stuff]

Try Travel Insurance for the Armed Forces | Forces Financial (http://www.forcesfinancial.com/military/insurance/travel-insurance.aspx)

My policy with them has no Afghanistan exclusion but I've had it for years, claimed once and got paid without issues.

[Sandy Parts]

there is a body who approve policies for forces - SIIAP SIIAP (http://siiap.org/) - lots of companies touting for business - just read the small print. Some cover 'unplanned' cancellation, some 'no-notice' etc etc. I used one once to cover cancelled holiday when called up to replace a short-notice sick-note - all they needed was a letter from my 'C.O' stating I would not have been aware of the deployment when booking the hols - simples!!

[lj101]

I have claimed twice for the refund of nugatory holiday expenses after agreed (and signed off) leave had been cancelled due ops.

First time I had no insurance in place (Kosovo), second time I had insurance (GW2) but company would not pay up.

Received a full refund on both occasions.

There is a link here to it being discussed more recently.

Holiday Cancellation [Archive] - E-Goat :: The Totally Unofficial Royal Air Force Rumour Network forums (http://www.e-goat.co.uk/forums/archive/index.php/t-30714.html)

[C130 Techie]

Virgin Travel Insurance covers this risk. Quote from their policy document:



The following are reasons we will accept for you cancelling or
cutting short your trip....

You are a member of the armed forces, police, fire, nursing
or ambulance services and you have to stay in your home
area because of an emergency or you are posted overseas
unexpectedly

[E-Spy]

Regarding cancellation of holiday due to service requirements:
LloydsTSB definitely did circa 2009 as part of their Gold/Platinum account privileges (successfully claimed).
I now use JBI insurance and they do too (not needed to claim so far).

[Whenurhappy]

Can I exercise a note of caution?

A colleague of mine recently had problems over a motor vehicle policy sold to him by the brokers Forces Financial. It was supposed to be a 'BFG compliant' policy ie for personnel serving in Europe. However when he went to claim against it, it transpired that it was a UK domestic policy and the insurers (rather than the brokers) would not initially underwrite the policy as the car was permanently based abroad (irrespective that the policy was addressed to his overseas military address); they then suggested that if he got his car to one of the 'approved repair centres' in the UK, repairs could be effected. He stood to his guns and referred the matter to the regulator. Both insurers and brokers ended up covering the repairs, an expensive German courtesy car, picked up the excess and made ex gratia payments. A wider survey found that these brokers had sold a number of 'non-compliant' policies to SP; in error, of course.

Bottom Line: check and recheck if you have been sold a 'service' oriented policy (domestic, vehicle, travel insurance). Ring the help line and from the outset explain you are SP and check their understanding (and therefore their coverage). DO NOT ASSUME that because you got the policy through a 'service' broker that you have a policy that meets our particular needs.

Moreover, even if you don't deploy, check that any life or medical insurance that you have in the UK covers service risk. I had a long fight with Lloyds TSB when their life cover excluded, amongst other things, death whilst in a service vehicle (I cited being killed in a no-blame RTA on the M4 in a Corsa as an example - LTSB would not have paid!), or death in the work-place (if MOD premises - citing as an example, being eletrocuted by a desk-top computer). Eventually LTSB accepted the policy had been sold to me in error (ie policy was mis-sold, some might say deliberately so).

There have been several instances of domestic policies not paying up because SP in SFA (married quarters in old money) are not tenants - but licencees. This has been widely publicisied in UROs (yes, I do read them) and most companies have adjusted their policies accordingly.

[melmothtw]

...explicitly exclude Afghanistan or travel through it, which kind of misses the point.



My company recently provided me with insurance for a reporting assignment to Afghanistan. As I work for a large multi-national organisation with experience of these things I assumed it was all in order, until I decided to read the policy just to be sure.

About halfway down the page it said, 'This policy does not cover loss or injury in a conflict zone' (or words to that effect).

Again, ever so slightly missing the point.