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Using Travel Insurance to Protect Your Mobile Phone Abroad
Your mobile phone may be the most valuable item you take on your travels. How do you protect it against theft, loss or damage when abroad? We’ll explain what to look for in a plan and how to determine which holiday cover policies cover mobile phones.
Finding Out if a Travel Insurance Plan Covers Mobile Phones
Travel Cover varies widely in the treatment of mobile phones. Some plans specifically exclude mobile phones from cover, leaving you out of pocket should something happen to your phone while you’re abroad.
If mobile phones are covered by your travel insurance then the protection is either via the “Valuables” section of Personal Belongings/Baggage or specific “Gadget” cover (which should include mobile phones). “Gadget” cover may be included as standard or it may be an optional add-on—or a low level of cover may be included as standard (e.g., £200) with an option to increase the cover to a higher amount (e.g., £1,000).
Valuables Cover It’s possible you have cover for your mobile through Valuables cover, but it depends on the specific plan—in our observations, mobile phones are commonly excluded on travel insurance under the Valuables section of most Personal Belongings/Baggage cover. Regardless, the amount of Valuables cover is subject to a limit, and consumes part of your overall Personal Belongings/Baggage cover should you need to claim.
Standard Gadget Cover Some travel insurance plans offer protection for a mobile phone through standard Gadget cover. Oftentimes, however, the amount of cover offered as standard will be quite low—too low, in fact, to replace a recent-model iPhone.
Optional Gadget Cover More and more, travel insurance plans offer additional Gadget cover for an extra charge. Typically, you should expect to pay around £25 to add Gadget cover to the average cost of travel insurance for an Annual, Multi-trip policy, though the price varies widely. When buying travel insurance through travel insurance comparison, you’re able to purchase the optional Gadget cover (should it be available for a particular plan) as part of the buying process.
Before You Buy
We think it’s useful to check the Policy Wording of a travel insurance plan before you buy to look for any relevant wording—wording that could related to what is covered, what is not covered and what is specifically excluded. All holiday cover websites should provide a link to the Policy Wording somewhere in the quote process. Once you have to document open, search for terms like “mobile”, “gadget”, “valuables” and any others about which you might like more information.
Separately, you may already have cover through your home contents insurance, although some people don’t like to rely on this because a claim on your home contents cover could adversely affect the no claims discount on your home contents policy, causing your home contents cover premium to increase when you renew or look for a new policy.