After Aloha Airlines filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection 2 weeks ago, many travelers were left in the lurch. When the final flight left Sacramento at 11:25am Monday, they knew they weren’t coming back.

That means many travelers were left stranded, scrambling to find a flight home.

In a gesture of good travel karma, Travel Guard has announced that it will provide their emergency travel assistance services to all travelers affected by Aloha Airlines’ announcement that it has ceased operations.

Travel Guard has offered to help stranded travelers rebook flights on other air carriers, arrange for extended hotel stays for those currently stranded at their destinations, and even help with other emergency travel needs.

Travelers wishing to take advantage of these complimentary emergency travel assistance services can call AIG Travel Guard’s 24-hour emergency hotline at 1-888-637-1739, or visit www.TravelGuard.com

Traveling students often think they are invincible as they encounter some of the first and most significant travel experiences of their lives. However, as parents and friends know, travel carries some risk even for the young and seemingly invulnerable among us. Emergencies do happen, especially in unfamiliar surroundings.

Travel insurance for students can make sure such emergencies are covered

Although some student discount cards or credit cards do come with insurance, it’s generally quite minimal, so it’s a good idea to obtain additional coverage. For a student who is carrying all of their important items in a backpack while traveling by train or plane between countries, even luggage loss could cause major problems.

If a student is spending a semester or a year at a foreign college or university, any routine illness may be complicated by the unfamiliar surroundings, susceptibility to different varieties of virus or bacteria, or by the obstacles of communicating in a foreign language.

Long-term coverage is available for students who spend months abroad at a time

Costs of insurance may vary depending on the risks associated with the country where the student will be spending his or her time.

Although students are often some of the youngest and healthiest travelers, there is still an undeniable risk of illness or medical emergency when traveling to another state or country. Different weather or climate conditions or different diet can cause people to be more likely to catch whatever germs are going around. Travel insurance for students means that the student can rest easy knowing that he or she is covered in case they do get sick, and parents can worry less about their traveling son or daughter.

If the job keeps you on the road, business travel insurance might be a safe bet

There are meetings to make, clients to visit and seminars to attend. Because of this busy schedule it can be helpful to have travel insurance, especially if your schedule includes foreign destinations. Even domestically, the hectic nature of business travel can make it painful to cancel a trip (and sometimes, especially given recent airline delays, the trip is canceled without warning whether you like it or not.) This is where trip cancellation coverage can be very convenient, removing some of the trouble associated with rescheduling. Another appealing aspect of travel insurance for business travel is its coverage of lost luggage or travel documents. Both of these types of coverage can make business travel a lot less stressful.

Trip cancellation coverage is almost essential in today’s business climate

When meetings can be canceled mere hours before you head on a plane it’s nice to know that you won’t be penalized for the cancellation. It’s also helpful since often times you have to cancel plans from your end of a business meeting. Perhaps a key team member has become ill, or a presentation isn’t quite ready. When dealing with so many variables it’s convenient to have travel insurance to maximize convenience for you and your company.

Don’t forget the bags

Also, keeping track of your baggage may not be your first priority, especially if you are sprinting to catch a flight at the other end of O’Hare or Logan. When you have coverage for lost luggage, your missing suitcase is merely a small bump in the road instead of a trip-stopping disaster. Traveling in unfamiliar areas with deadlines and meetings weighing on your mind can mean that a piece of luggage or important travel documents get left behind. Be sure you have coverage for losing expensive items such as laptop computers or PDA’s.

Insurance coverage isn’t an instant fix, but it certainly helps. When you have travel insurance you can stay focused on the deadlines at hand and skip sweating the small stuff.

Many travelers want to know, “Who has the best deals for travel insurance?”

There is no easy answer to this question. It is hard to single out 1 travel insurance company as having the best deals. Each company, and more importantly, each policy, has different coverage and levels of coverage. Therefore, they have different prices.

Cheap is not always the best way to go

The important thing its to get the coverage you need. It will do you no good to buy the cheapest trip insurance plan, but not have coverage for that lost suitcase or missed flight.

Decide what coverage is most important to you, and how much. Every plan varies. If you are going abroad, and want to make sure you have medical coverage, you will want to pay special attention to the travel medical policies. If you are concerned with a last minute cancellation due to the illness of a sick family member, you will focus on trip cancellation insurance, or “cancel for any reason” coverage.

Here are the steps to finding the best deals for travel insurance:

1. Decide what coverage is most important to you and your trip
2. Compare travel insurance using a comparison site (see How to Compare Quotes with a Travel Insurance Comparison Site)
3. Find the policies with the coverage you are comfortable with, then look for a price that works for you

It’s that simple.

To give you an idea of how the different the premiums can be, here is a comparison chart of the rates from various companies and plans. This is a quote for a 30 day trip, trip cost of $10,000, medical coverage of $10,000, for 2 32 year-old travelers:

Company	Plan	Cost
Travel Guard	Essential	$600
CSA Travel Protection	Freestyle	$617
Travel Guard	My Travel Guard	$627
Travel Guard	Essential Expanded	$682
American Express	Global Travel Shield Classic	$722
Travel Insured	Worldwide Trip Protector	$756
Travel Guard	Protect Assist	$790
Travelex	TravelLite	$802
CSA Travel Protection	Freestyle Luxe	$823
Seven Corners	RoundTrip	$823
Travelsafe	Vacation Insurance	$838
American Express	Global Travel Shield Deluxe	$842
M.H. Ross	Enhanced	$849
Global Alert!	Preferred	$859
Seven Corners	RoundTrip Choice	$859
Access America  (now Allianz Travel Insurance)	Classic	$870
HTH Worldwide	Trip Protector	$918
M.H. Ross	Enhanced Extra!	$1,041
Global Alert!	Preferred Plus	$1,051
HTH Worldwide	Trip Protector Preferred	$1,114
Travel Insured	Worldwide Trip Protector Gold	$1,137
RBC Travel Protection	Standard	$1,146
Travel Guard	Cruise, Tour & Travel	$1,226
Travelex	Travel Plus	$1,242
RBC Travel Protection	Deluxe	$1,259
Access America	Deluxe	$1,472

As you can see, there is a big gap between the cheapest and the most expensive plan. You can bet there is more coverage for the Deluxe plan from Access America, and less coverage in the Essential plan.

When looking for a low cost travel health insurance policy, start by determining your needs

As you might know, there are 2 general types of travel insurance. Insurance, in simple terms, is a form of financial protection. You pay a little money (the premium), in exchange for the promise to pay the larger expense if something happens.

The first step in finding the right trip insurance policy for your vacation or business trip is asking yourself what exactly you need to cover?

Here are the 2 general types of travel insurance:

1. Travel Health Insurance- Also known as travel medical insurance, this is meant to replace the medical coverage you have at home. While visiting a foreign country, your insurance from home (i.e. Blue Cross, Harvard Pilgrim, etc.) may not cover your expenses. Medicare is definitely not effective abroad. This type of insurance covers accidents, illness, hospital care, and usually medical transportation.
2. Trip Cancellation Insurance- This type of insurance is meant to cover your financial investment in the trip. When you organize a vacation, you commit to spending a large amount of money on hotel rooms, airfare, rental cars, special tours, etc. If you need to cancel the trip, you are still responsible for many of these expenses, and you would lose that money. A trip cancellation policy provides financial protection against canceled vacations, reimbursing you for non-refundable, covered expenses.

How to find a low cost travel health insurance policy

If you decide that you want a travel health insurance policy, it’s time to get a quote. Use a comparison site to see instant quotes from several companies (see How to Compare Quotes with a Travel Insurance Comparison Site). Make sure you are looking at the “Travel Medical” policies, and not the “Trip Cancellation” policies.

You may notice that there is a price difference between some of the different products. That is because each company offers various coverages and coverage amounts. This is where you should read through the different policies and make sure you are comfortable with the benefits.

Also be sure to read through the “Exclusions” section of the policy. You can find this in the “Certificate”, which is usually a download-ready document that spells out the specifics of each policy. The “Exclusions” section lists risks that are NOT Covered under the policy. For example: most companies will not cover injuries sustained while intoxicated, such as a drunken fall down a set of stairs.

Click and buy

Once you have found a policy you like, you can click and buy, right online. The policy will be mailed to you, and most travel insurance companies will email a confirmation as well, with all the policy details. Again, a great way to compare different policies from various carriers is with a comparison site (see How to Compare Quotes with a Travel Insurance Comparison Site)

The financial benefits of travel insurance for your next trip

Consider the following scenarios:

You’re at the beach somewhere warm, sunny, and exotic. You’re just there for a few short days—one of those special last-minute internet deals. You go out a little farther from the shore. Suddenly, you hear a menacing sound, some sort of low-pitched stringed instrument going “Da-dum…da-dum…[faster] da-dum da-dum da-dum—” No, it’s not Jaws, just your imagination. But in your sudden panic, you flail a little going back into shore, and your foot comes down into the sand hard. You feel a sharp pain. You stepped on a fishhook and it looks like a deep puncture wound. At first, you think that you can just limp back to your hotel, clean out your wound, and resume your activities in tropical paradise. But then you remember you haven’t had a tetanus shot in years. Since you were only going to be away for a few days, you didn’t get any travel insurance. Several hours and several hundred dollars later (assuming there’s even a hospital in your island paradise), you’re back on the beach, just in time to leave.

Or, you’re traveling from Portland, Oregon to New York with a connection in Chicago. Your connection time is long enough that you’re confident you’ll make it. It’s a business trip, and your suit is in your checked luggage. But your plane is delayed leaving Portland. Upon arriving in Chicago, you sprint to make your connection, because your meeting starts a couple of hours after you get to New York and you can’t be late. You make it, but your luggage doesn’t. The airline delivers it to your hotel…after you’ve flown back to Portland. Later, the hotel claims they don’t have it. Somewhere, someone is enjoying your favorite suit.

Or, you’re getting married in a few weeks, and you book a 3-week honeymoon in Tahiti. You both wanted the best of everything for this once-in-a-lifetime romantic getaway. You booked a resort that offers daily massage, snorkeling and scuba diving. Your honeymoon costs more than your wedding, and you can’t wait. Sadly, on the night of the wedding, your father has a heart attack and winds up in critical condition at the hospital. At first, the doctors aren’t sure if he’ll make it or not. He does recover and is able to go home after bypass surgery, but you’ve stayed by his side the whole time, and your honeymoon will have to be postponed.

In any of these situations, travel insurance would have saved you anywhere from several hundred to several thousand dollars. Whether you need medical care, luggage replacement, or trip cancellation insurance, travel insurance is typically only a few dollars per day of your trip (with additional fees for especially risky activities). Some trip cancellation insurance allows only specific reasons for cancellation, so check ahead of time—it might be a good idea to get the kind that allows you to cancel for any reason. It’s a smart financial decision to pay a few dollars up front rather than risk losing a serious chunk of your savings in addition to your honeymoon, your favorite suit, or your precious time on the beach.

Seeking cheap family travel insurance for your next trip?

Family vacations are a great way to show your kids parts of the country or world they haven’t seen before. Although fun and even educational, they can also come with headaches since family travel requires a lot of planning and preparation. That’s where cheap family travel insurance can be convenient.

It covers some of the unexpected things that can happen during a family trip so that the only worries a family has is whether to pull over for ice cream or not. Travel insurance for families can cover things like lost luggage, or liability and damages to a rental car.

Baggage coverage provides well-deserved peace of mind

Traveling by air with very young children can require a lot of extra paraphernalia—strollers, carseats, extra diapers, etc. With luggage coverage you don’t have to worry about where the bags are or how they are being handled every minute of your trip—or how expensive it might be to replace them. Instead you can relax, and know that whatever happens is covered by your insurance. It is important to remember however, especially with cheap family travel insurance, that there can be policy exclusions. Be sure to check the “fine print” for the “exclusions” section. Read it thoroughly before taking off.

Travel insurance for families helps remove some of the stress that comes naturally with travel. Losing that important piece of luggage, like clothes packed for the week or other valuables, can throw a wrench in the trip in a hurry, but insurance coverage can make it easy to replace items without damage to your wallet.

Last minute illnesses can cost you plenty if you need to cancel

If you get trip interruption insurance, and your trip is cut short by an accident, illness, or other reason, you won’t be liable for nonrefundable costs like hotel reservations.

Similarly there can be a lot of stress involved with driving a rental car, especially with kids in the back asking “Are we there yet?” If collision coverage is included in your travel insurance, you can remove the stress of driving a rental car before you even hold the keys, at a cost that will likely be less than what the rental company would charge for similar coverage.

Be thorough when reading the “fine print”

Read all policies carefully in order to make the best decision. Since driving an unfamiliar car in a different state or country can increase your risk of accidents, this kind of coverage is helpful and lets the you focus on getting where you want to go instead of worrying about how you are getting there.