Article Sphere Logo
 

Travel Insurance and the EHIC Card

By Expert Author: Patrick Chong | Article Abstract
Word Count: 548 words | Views: 135 view(s)
The EHIC card replaced the old E111 forms which ceased to exist in July 2006. Quite simply the card provides either free or discounted health care in countries which belong to the European Union. Many tourists wonder why exactly they need to pay for travel insurance premiums which cover medical care around Europe when they already have an EHIC Card which provides free or discounted care in their intended country. The answer is because there are many cases which aren’t covered by the EHIC Card. The best scenario is an illness which requires flights home; as flight costs are not covered by the EHIC Card alone.

Most European countries don’t have a healthcare service which is anywhere near as comprehensive as the NHS, so many treatments or prescriptions require an additional cost, as either a percentage of the total amount or a fixed amount, such as we offer in the United Kingdom. Your holiday insurance premium will cover this additional supplement and any costs associated with it.

For example, if you decide to travel to France with just an EHIC Card and no travel insurance, you will be made to pay the following costs if unfortunately you or any of your family members fall ill:

Prescription Costs – You will need to pay for your prescription costs if you fall ill whilst on holiday in France. Travelling with the EHIC Card allows you to claim back a percentage of the costs at a later day, unless the doctor has marked the prescription form with a dreaded NR. However, without holiday insurance you may find yourself having to pay up to 45% of the total prescription cost, which can work out as very pricey with regard to certain types of medication.

Visiting The Doctor – No one wants to have to visit the doctor whilst on their holidays. However, if you fall ill whilst in France and don’t have travel insurance to match your EHIC documentation, then you’ll find yourself having to pay 30% of the doctor’s costs. This is something that just doesn’t bear thinking about in the situation that your child falls ill during the night and you have to cover 30% of the hefty call-out fee.

Hospital Stay – This isn’t really something you particularly want to think about whilst booking your city break to Paris in a glossy travel agency. However, if you end up in a Parisian hospital without travel insurance it’s a little to late to then discover your EHIC card won’t cover the fixed daily charge charged by French hospitals to their in-patients.

Meanwhile, if you’d had taken out holiday insurance this would have been covered in your medical costs. Paying a fixed daily charge isn’t the end to your worries, a hospital stay in France means that you also have to pay a non-refundable 25% of the cost of any in-patient treatment.

Spain, Switzerland and Portugal are further examples of countries which require a hefty percentage of your medical costs if you are just travelling with an EHIC Card and no holiday insurance. So if you’re travelling to Europe then the only way to save money and at the same time ensure you are well covered is by pairing your EHIC Card with a comprehensive travel insurance policy.
Patrick Chong

About the Author/Author Bio

Patrick Chong is the Managing Director of Journey’s Travel. Their commercial travel insurance website, Insuremore, offers travel insurance for families, couples and singles with a quick and easy online claims feature.

Article Source: http://www.articlesphere.com/Article/Travel-Insurance-and-the-EHIC-Card/187207

Article Submitted: 2009-05-22 | This Article has been viewed 135 times.

More "Travel Insurance" Related Articles

 
 

Listed below are more articles related to the above article from the "Travel Insurance" article category.

People interested in the above article "Travel Insurance and the EHIC Card" are also interested in the related articles listed below:

 
In the week that Scotland added dubious airport checks for passengers travelling within the UK, we take a look at how UK travel insurance can make holidays in the UK a little easier.
Travel insurance hit the headlines recently when it emerged that many Britons are losing out on their holiday insurance premiums after neglecting to mention pre-existing medical conditions at the time of booking. So what medical conditions should you mention when taking out travel insurance and what exactly are your rights in relation to existing conditions?
When travelling on a budget, many people want to cut down on expenses wherever possible, and travel insurance is one of the first items to go. But minor setbacks while travelling are common, and a cheap travel insurance policy could end up saving you quite a bit of cash in the long run.
Sometimes careless travellers are to blame for their own accidents. Take a look at these amusing lapses in judgement and try to judge whether the people involved even had the good sense to acquire any cheap travel insurance before they set off on their misadventures.
So you’ve booked your holiday, filled in your EHIC card and paid for your travel insurance. You’re all sorted right? Well you may want to check again. Here’s our list of important things that you should remember to check for when buying holiday insurance.
Buying cheap travel insurance has never been simpler, with a huge number of insurance companies offering easy online booking and claims. While the vast majority of people who buy travel insurance do so without a hitch, there are times when people are left scratching their heads, uncertain as to what policy they need to buy or what level of cover is on offer. Here are some answers to a few of the trickier travel insurance questions...
Holiday insurance - for some people buying it is almost instinctive as soon as they book a trip, whereas others will inevitably leave it until the last minute...if they choose to buy it at all! It is easy to say “it’ll never happen to me” but the risk simply isn’t worth taking - cheap holiday insurance is so easy to get (and the cost of an uninsured disaster so high) that there really is no acceptable excuse.
 
Article Directory Home All Categories Insurance Travel Insurance
 

Can't find what you're looking for? Try Google Search!
 
Copyright © 2005 - by Larry Lim, Singapore - Article Search Engine Directory at ArticleSphere.com™
All Rights Reserved Worldwide. All Trademarks and Servicemarks are the property of the respective owners.

Afrikaans Albanian Arabic Belarusian Bulgarian Catalan Chinese (Simplified) Chinese (Traditional) Croatian Czech Danish German English Estonian Filipino Finnish French Galician Greek Hebrew Hindi Hungarian Icelandic Indonesian Irish Italiano Japanese Korean Latvian Lithuanian Macedonian Malay Maltese Dutch Norwegian Persian Polish Portuguese Romanian Russian Serbian Slovak Slovenian Spanish Swahili Swedish Thai Turkish Ukrainian Vietnamese Welsh Yiddish