While travel insurance is taken out to cover UK trips, the main
motivation is to cover trips abroad and this is the main focus of
our research in this report. In 2010, UK residents took over 55
million trips abroad. While the vast majority of these trips were
completed safely and without incident, on a small number of trips
problems arose, ranging from 'Montezuma's revenge' and upset
stomachs to more serious life-threating events. The costs of
medical care and repatriation to the UK can be extremely high and
can, on occasions, pose a serious threat to the long-term finances
of an individual or family. It is with this in mind that the issue
of being covered in the event of illness or accident abroad becomes
important.
An issue facing the travel insurance industry at present is the
economic situation in the UK. Tough economic conditions not only
reduce the number of overseas trips, but also increase the
temptation among consumers to go abroad without insurance. Consumer
attitudes and actions with regard to travel insurance in today's
environment will be a key theme of this report.
Other key issues are how attitudes to insurance impact on the
uptake of travel insurance, how consumers search for and decide on
which policy to take out, and how the growth of 'free' travel
insurance via packaged bank accounts, etc. is impacting on the
sales, distribution and buying process.
To download a table of contents for this report, click
here.