Red Pennant Insurance
For the benefit of members with bookings for Europe in April or May (including myself), I have just spoken to Red Pennant regarding what options are available should the current travel situation carry on. I have single trip Red Pennant policy from 2nd May to 15th June.
I was told that it is possible to 'shuffle' the dates along (to cover new travel dates later this year), and, if my ferry and sites bookings were refunded (rather than a voucher from ferry operator), I could choose to obtain a refund on the Red Pennant policy also.
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Cancel the policy. You are not going to be travelling yet a while.
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Yes I could cancel the policy, and get the premium refunded, however I would still suffer detrimental losses this policy is supposed to cover.
It's not just about cancelling the policy, with the state all countries are in with Coronavirus, plus the Foreign Office advice to avoid all but essential travel globally, the logical course of action is to cancel the holiday completely. That results in loss of site cancellation charges plus ferry fares. These can readily exceed the premium of the policy which would obviously be retained in the case of a cancellation claim.
The real point here is that the actual Insurer (Astrenska Insurance Limited) and in turn the club as intermediaries are not honouring contracts people purchased before this all kicked off in Europe. There is nothing in the policy information or terms supplied that excludes honouring claims caused by Coronavirus or the actions of various governments, such as closing border and advising against travel, is response to the virus.
I worked in the insurance industry for over 25 years and throughout that period the bottom line was that the contract of insurance was the contract and could not be changed retrospectively unless by agreement of both parties, at which point it became a new contract anyway.
Personally I have requested the underwriters rationale for turning down any claims on existing contracts to fully understand how they think they can justify this action
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Yes, I take your point - but you are not going to court over it are you? I would cancel the policy, and cancel as many other things as you can.
The ferry company will give you something back - maybe as a voucher for future travel - and you can try that for your campsites too. Some will hold your deposit for a visit at another time. For some items you may even get a refund for things you paid for with a credit card.
Recover what you can. Be thankful for small mercies. Your losses will be small. My son owns businesses overseas and has lost about £100,000 so far and has had to make half his staff redundant.
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There is nothing in the policy information or terms supplied that excludes honouring claims caused by Coronavirus or the actions of various governments
In my 2019 RP policy document it states in the 2.1 section:
You are not covered:
b. prohibitive regulations by the govern-ment of any country.
I assume border restrictions come into that.
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I have just had a Live Chat conversation with the Club and had it confirmed that Red Pennant will not honour any cancellation due to the clause on p28 saying “prohibitive regulations by the government of any country”. Nor can you cancel RP (which is now useless) as that can only be done within 14 days.
The only way to get a refund is to be ill in the 14days before you travel such that you cannot go – then RP will pay up.
Very poor attitude by RP and makes you wonder what service they think they are providing when they renege on a technicality I doubt any of us knew existed.
To be fair the Club do say they will attempt to recover Eurotunnel and site fees but I very much doubt they will be successful
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wow, somebody on this forum in another thread says they cannot do that,
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I applied common sense in that if an insurance was to change such a term after the issue of a certificate then it would be easily challenged.
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I believe what you have been told, i have cxld my policy and will negotiate with the ferry company direct re delaying my sailings etc maybe until next year
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wow, somebody on this forum in another thread says they cannot do that,
They cannot refuse a claim based on the coronavirus itself. If there was a clause saying that actions of governments in closing borders or preventing travel is excluded then they will be able to exclude that aspect. A separate case and I believe that there was such a clause
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In the current situation, it would have been helpful if the club had posted definitive guidance on the website, for the many members who will be in the same situation of having booked ferries, sites, and Red Pennant insurance, giving illustrative examples of what options are available to us.
Or better still, sent out emails with our options.
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