America's Benefit Specialist March 2023

TRAVEL INSURANCE IN THE PRE- AND POST-COVID WORLDS

By Bradley Niederman TME Travel Insurance brad.neiderman@tmetravelinsurance.com

Prior to 2019, travel insurance, particularly policies with med ical coverage, may have seemed a luxury. Today, the demand for trip insurance is skyrocketing. Comprehensive travel policies, which also cover such possibilities as a death in the family, injury or illness, offer the peace of mind of not losing the cost of a trip when the unexpected strikes and we have to cancel travel plans. EVEN WITH ADVANCED PLANNING, THERE ARE MANY WAYS THAT TRAVEL PLANS CAN BE DISRUPTED ON YOUR WAY TO YOUR FINAL DESTINATION.

If you’re like me, you often convinced yourself it wouldn’t happen to you. Then COVID hit. I have a friend who had to cancel two major trips in the early months of COVID and he spent many months trying to untangle the mess of reservations, flights and expenses. Had he purchased a travel insurance policy, his worries and costs could have been negligible. Even before the pandemic, travel insurance has historically been one of the least considered insurance coverages for most consumers yet is really one of the most needed in today’s environment. But as vaccines, boosters and treatments have progressed and the world has reopened, travel insurance has boomed. Prior to the pandemic, U.S. flight travelers numbered between 2 million and 2.5 million per month. Those totals, of course, dropped dramatically during the worst of COVID, with 2020 showing a dip well below 500,000 monthly airline travelers. But, according to TSA.gov data, “As of March 2022, U.S. travel was only roughly five percent below 2019 levels.”

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