There’s a good chance that your credit card already gives you some kind of travel insurance coverage
Published 2:51 p.m. UTC July 6, 2015
Would you like to receive our email newsletter? Will you come to our poetry slam? Do you want travel insurance? For some questions, the only answer you’re ever going to give is “no.” Although travel insurance typically costs anywhere between 5% and 12% of the price of a trip, most of us decline to take the coverage or the additional cost. But if you read the fine print on your rewards credit card, there’s a chance that you’re already covered, for everything from travel accidents to lost or delayed luggage. In a recent report, CardHub reviewed 52 different credit cards from the 10 largest issuers and discovered that almost 90% of them offered travel and vacation-related accident insurance and more than 60% covered your suitcases and gear as well.
The study evaluated the cards in three categories – Accident Insurance, Luggage Insurance and Eligibility Cost & Extra Coverage – which included the cost of activating the benefits (if applicable, whether travel insurance was available if the trip was purchased with rewards, and the card’s annual fee. After adding all of the numbers, the site determined that the three best cards for travel insurance were Chase Sapphire Preferred, Discover It and a tie between Wells Fargo Propel 365 and Citi Prestige. On the other end of the spectrum, Chase Slate, Citi Simplicity and US Bank Platinum were amongst the handful that didn’t offer any kind of travel insurance coverage.
Almost a quarter (23%) of the cards that were reviewed provided travel accident coverage of more than $300,000 and almost three-quarters (73%) covered lost luggage. So before you book your next trip, it’s probably worth checking the coverage on the card that you’ll be paying with, whether that means reading some small print or calling a customer service representative. That way, instead of saying “No,” when you’re asked about coverage, you can say “I’m already taken care of, thank you.” That poetry slam, though, still sounds terrible.