This is a long one so see the TL:DR – Went on international trip, got stranded due to conflict in middle east. Had to book alternative flights home to circumvent. Travel insurance denied due to war clause in PDS.
I recently went on an international trip. My credit card allows for free travel insurance when you spend $500 or more towards the pre-paid travel costs using that card.
I ended up spending around $15,000 through that card on flights + accommodation + car rental + booked tickets to things at destination etc. So I met the eligibility requirements no doubt.
We left Australia on the 16th Feb and were due to leave where we were (South Africa) on the 3rd of March. Before continuing on to Japan. About 3-4 days before we were due to leave this conflict in the middle east broke out between Iran, Israel and the US. The issue for us was our flights to Japan were booked through JAL but they used Qatar airways as their partner out of South Africa to Qatar then operated a JAL flight to Japan from Qatar.
They just flat out cancelled the flight without offering as an alternative route or partner airline to get us either to Japan or even home.
At this point being stuck in another country and our accommodation running out (we were only able to extend one day). We had to get out of there so I booked a direct flight home to Sydney using Qantas. This was the only flight getting us either home or to Japan within 7 days. The new flights ended up being $13k. We did get a refund of $3.5k from JAL but still out of pocket more than $9k plus loses on accommodation etc.
I submitted a claim with my travel insurance who have denied the claim due to a clause that acts of war are not covered.
Now here's the thing. I wasn't in an active war zone, I didn't sustain loss directly due to war but a cancelled flight due to closed airspace which wasn't even passing through a warzone. We didn't set off before the conflict started and became stuck after it did. And lastly I am not sure what was happening in the first few days even counts as war as nothing had been declared yet.
So given these circumstances what are my chances on an appeal?
Posted by Stumbows
1 Comment
Close to zero. Travel insurance is kinda the wild west and not nearly as regulated as most other lines of personal insurance.
Besides, what EXACTLY does the policy say about losses due to war/armed conflict? The specific language matters, not what you or I think makes sense. While we may think of a war exclusion applying only to losses directly and immediately caused by a war-like conflict (like finding yourself in the shooting zone), if that understanding doesn’t align with the actual policy language, then the policy language trumps.
So open up your policy and read the war exclusion.