When should I buy travel insurance?

You’ve decided you need travel insurance for an upcoming trip (great choice!), but now you need to know when to buy it, right? You have some options, and we’ll go over those, but the important thing to remember is that purchasing early is the best way to protect your travel investment.

Whether it’s a down payment on a cruise or a hotel reservation, you should purchase trip cancellation coverage as soon as you make your first deposit for your trip, so your investment is covered from the start. On most Travel Guard travel insurance plans, coverage goes into effect on the date you purchase your policy and pay the required premium. The specific benefits and covered risks you get will vary by plan.

While you can purchase your travel insurance at any point before leaving on your trip, your travel investment is not protected until you have travel insurance coverage. Our plans still come with great comprehensive coverage no matter when you purchase – that won’t change! Be sure to check your specific policy documents to see what benefits you’ll qualify for, and any limitations or exclusions.

• Trip Cancellation
• Trip Interruption
• Trip Delay
• Lost Luggage
• Emergency Medical Expense

The best time to purchase your travel insurance is as soon as possible. For most of our plans, you start receiving coverage for trip cancellation the day you purchase your travel insurance.

Say you make a deposit on an all-inclusive resort and you buy your travel insurance that same day. A week later you need to cancel because a family member is sick and requires you to take care of them. Because you booked your travel insurance early, you may be covered.

As you’re deciding when to purchase your travel insurance, make sure you consider the nonrefundable trip expenses you’ve paid and would lose should you need to cancel your trip. Travel insurance doesn’t cover all circumstances, so check your policy wording to make sure you understand your coverage. You’re not travelling yet, but your Travel Guard travel insurance plan could still be hard at work for you.

Yes! You don’t have to have every detail of your trip figured out before booking your Travel Guard travel insurance plan. We know that planning travel is a process and can take months to finalize. Because of that, you can make certain changes and modifications to your policy prior to your trip departure. You’ll need to contact our call centre to make changes to your policy as soon as you add additional costs to your trip that you want covered by your insurance policy.