Best Travel Insurance Policies 2025 (UK) - Tips to find the best cover

I'm going to tell you exactly what to look for in a travel insurance policy in terms of features and coverage and also tell you some of the must-haves. I'll also give you some scenarios from world travelers or family holidayers and suggest some insurance companies you might want to consider in each given scenario. I'm also going to give you some tips that could save you a lot of money and you might even find that you have free travel insurance already but didn't even know it. Plus I'm going to dispel the odd myth along the way. So let's start off with what is travel insurance. Well it's a financial safety net that protects you against unexpected costs that could arise during your trip. So you've got to think medical emergencies, flight cancellations, lost luggage and even things like natural disasters. Now there are different types of travel insurance out there. You have single trip insurance which is designed for one-off holidays. That's pretty straightforward. You've got annual multi-trip. That's perfect for people who travel regularly, have multiple trips in a year and it's often more cost-effective in the long run. You also have specialized insurance so you've got to think things like winter sports, even backpacking. Now the first thing people ask is do I really need travel insurance? Well the short answer is yes and that's because you've got to think about things like medical emergencies. So getting sick or injured while abroad can be a financial nightmare. You've got to think about the costs especially in places like America which can be astronomical. You've also got to think about repatriations. So that means that if you need to be flown home for medical reasons then your travel insurance policy can cover the costs because that can run into thousands. Obviously you've got things like trip cancellations. So if your trip gets cancelled you don't have travel insurance then you don't really have any recall. So if the worst happens you may be reimbursed and get the non-refundable items like flights, hotels and other expenses paid back to you. You've also got to think about lost or stolen belongings. So if like me you lose your baggage then your travel insurance could come to the rescue and pay out. Now one myth to get out of the way is that often people think if they're traveling within Europe they don't need travel insurance because they may have a European health insurance card the EHIC or the global health insurance card and that therefore eliminates their need for travel insurance. Well that's not entirely true and that's because those cards only allow you access to state provided health care in EU countries. So the travel insurance goes above and beyond that. So if something serious happens then your travel insurance should pick up the bill. The second myth I want to bust straight away is that people think they book the trip they can then take their time to buy their travel insurance and can do it at a later date as long as they do it before they travel. That is wrong. You need to book your travel insurance straight away and that's because if you fall sick for example can't travel because of illness or there are things like strikes or some other events that prevent you going on holiday then your insurance will pay out if you've taken it out before those things occur. If you leave it then let's say there's a strike that's been announced and you take out insurance after the announcement then you won't be covered so you will lose money. Now the first thing I would say is if you're looking for travel insurance obviously go to comparison sites look at things like MoneySupermarket, Confused.com and you look at and compare the various different policies out there and you tweak your excess to make it fall within your budget. So the excess is the amount that you're going to have to pay first of all in the event of a claim. Now when you do compare you're going to be asked a lot of questions about the type of cover that you want. For example how much medical expense cover do you want? Well most people have no idea so I'm going to give you a quick checklist. So when it comes to medical expenses this covers obviously things like emergency medical treatment, surgical costs etc while you're abroad. Aim for at least 1 million pound if you're traveling in Europe and 2 million pound if you're traveling abroad. Now when we've looked at this most of the basic covers do tend to have more than that anyway. With repatriation services this covers obviously returning you to the UK for medical reasons. This is normally automatically included so you don't have to worry about that. Cancellation and curtailment well this reimburses you for travel and accommodation costs if you need to cancel or cut short your trip for reasons that are covered under the policy. Now I would say look for coverage of 2,000 pound or more. A good rule of thumb is to have enough to reimburse you for the non-refundable parts of your trip. Typically when we look at these policies and we've done the analysis on the Money2Massage website we'll put a link to the show notes to pics of some of the best travel insurance policies out there. The typical range is between 5,000 and 10,000 pounds anyway. When it comes to missed departure coverage then look for something that covers you for 500 pounds or more. This covers you if you miss your flight, boat or train due to unforeseen circumstances beyond your control. Maybe your car broke down on the way to the airport. If you're looking at delay coverage then this compensates you for delays caused by situations like industrial action, bad weather or mechanical breakdowns. Then you should look for coverage of 200 pound or more with separate limits for the initial 12 hours and another limit for subsequent 12 hour periods. If you're looking for things to do with travel abandonment now this is where you have your travel and accommodation expenses paid if you have to abandon your trip or cancel your journey for reasons covered under the policy. Look for coverage of 2,000 pounds or more. Baggage cover now this covers you obviously if your bags are lost or stolen or damaged during transit. Now look for coverage of 1,500 pounds or more with separate limits for individual items so valuable things. When we've looked around the standard tends to be between 2,000 and 3,000 pounds but do opt for higher limits if needed. One thing I would say is do look at the T's and C's of the policy if this is something that is going to bother you because some of them do insist on having receipts for the items that you might claim for. So another way of looking at it is only take things that you have receipts for when you go on holiday and don't necessarily take valuable items. I don't. I leave them at home but also another point just check your home insurance because some people do have cover for when they lose items away from the home. Will it cover your trip for example? Something to look at. Personal liability cover. This is something that's standard in case you are legally held responsible for accidentally injuring someone or damaging property. Aim for something like 2 million pounds or more. So those were the must-haves. Other options you may have on your policy which they should really cover is the loss or damage of physical cash. Look for maybe 300 pounds or more coverage on that and dental emergencies. So this will cover obviously if you need dental treatment while abroad. A good level of coverage is probably 250 pounds or more. Also look for loss of passport cover. So you may incur additional travel costs or accommodation costs when you're trying to replace a passport. Aim for something like 250 pounds or more. Now other things you might look for on a policy but you don't have to have scheduled airline failure. This covers you if your airline ceases to operate. So you could aim for something like 1500 pounds coverage or more. Obviously bear in mind you may be covered in other ways. Maybe if you've got a package holiday under ATO or if you've booked your holiday using a credit card. Winter sports is an obvious one. If you are going skiing then do make sure that your policy covers winter sports. You may have to pay an additional amount for that as an add-on. So you've compared prices. You've looked at the things that the policy covers. I would suggest as well go and look at de facto. Now de facto they look at a whole range of financial products and give reviews based on what's within them. So it's not based on customer reviews but them analyzing the product. Now they have a website but it is a bit clunky to use and you can search products by alphabetical order. One thing I will say if you use compare the market then they actually show the de facto ratings next to the policies that are in the comparison tables and when you run a comparison. So that's incredibly useful. So that might still seem quite a bit of work for some people. So we've gone out and looked at the market and come up with some of the best travel insurance policies out there. There's an article on the Money to the Masses website where we pull this all into a neat summary table. We've even worked out rough prices and it's based on somebody who's age 30 who's traveling for seven nights and going to Spain. Of course your circumstances will be probably wildly different and in which case your price will be different. But this gives you a pretty good indication. Now I'm not going to go through all the detail in that article. I'll put a link in the notes of this video. But what I'll do is give you a broad summary based on a couple of scenarios and it'll give you some insurers possibly to go and look at. So the first scenario is somebody who's a budget traveler. So they're looking for affordability and basic coverage and they want adequate medical cover for the destinations they may be going to that might have high health care costs. Then maybe someone like Admiral looking at the data that we've analyzed because they offer good value for money with decent levels of coverage especially for medical expenses and they also offer some online discounts. If you are somebody who's a bit more of an adventure junkie you will want things that will cover you for extreme sports and activities but also have higher medical covers. So you need to make sure that your policy explicitly covers things like skiing, scuba diving, bungee jumping if that's what you're going to do and you'll want to opt for that higher medical cover. If you're doing that then look for providers like Stayshore and AA which provide optional winter sports and adventure cover. If your family going on holiday then you might want to have a quick look at post office when you're doing your research because they actually offer kids go free on family policies which could make them really good value. Now if you're somebody who's a bit of a frequent traveler and they do lots of small trips then you might want to look at somebody who offers good multi-trip policies and LV falls into that category and offers good value for money but as I said there's a link in the notes of the video so you can have a look at it in more detail. Now a couple of final tips if you have a pre-existing medical condition like I do make sure you declare that up front so you avoid any issues with claims further down the line if they arise. Now you may have to look at a specialist provider. Now Money Helper they actually have a part of their website that provides a list of specialist travel insurance providers. It's also useful for people who may be older say over 65 who are trying to get insurance because it can be difficult if you are older to secure travel insurance. Another alternative is to use a bespoke comparison site like payingtomuch.com which actually specializes in travel insurance for people with pre-existing conditions. Now finally do check if you've got travel insurance included as a benefit on something like a package bank account. You may not realize it but you've already got travel insurance. If that's you then check the coverage. Does it meet the standards I've mentioned earlier in this particular video? Does it cover everybody who is traveling? You can't assume that all family members will be covered just because they are traveling with you and if you've got a pre-existing medical condition it's probably not likely that it will be covered under the standard policy that's associated with the account so you'll need to contact the insurer to inform them and you'll probably have to pay an additional premium. Most likely you'll be better off shopping around and the other thing I would say is do bear in mind if a group of you are traveling that you may be better off looking at individual policies rather than just assuming a group one will be of benefit. So hopefully armed with that information and those tools you will find the best travel insurance policy for you.