Travel Insurance in Australia

Travel insurance in Australia is encouraged strongly by the Government of Australia and advised to all who Travel to foreign lands. Every year almost 20,000Australians are embroiled in overseas difficulties, among them about 1400 medical in origin. Travelers not covered by travel insurance face further trouble of huge monetary crisis , foreign medical care can be very expensive. Hence unless covered by insurance the personal liability of the traveler is total for the medical and associated costs. So families have been known to sell of assets, like family homes and superannuation to pay for the required services.

In this context the travel insurance in Australia becomes of paramount importance to save the traveling Australians from the medical and the usual theft and assault emergencies. However the policies do not support claims made for traveling in those countries where the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade advises against travel. The following are the list of countries to which no travel is advised.

Australians are advised against all travel to these countries:

• Afghanistan
• Burundi
• Central African Republic
• Democratic Republic of the Congo
• East Timor
• Guinea
• Iraq
• Ivory Coast
• Somalia
• Sudan

Destinations for which Australians are advised to reconsider their need to travel:

• Algeria
• Angola
• Colombia
• Haiti
• Indonesia,(including Bali)
• Israel, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank
• Lebanon
• Liberia
• Nigeria
• Pakistan
• Saudi Arabia
• Sri Lanka
• Syria
• Yemen

Therefore to minimize the hassles and risks to their traveling citizens the Australian Government asks its people to purchase travel insurance. The following list provides the names of the prominent on-line travel insurance providers:

• Allianz
• AMP Limited
• AXA
• Insurance Australia Group
• Promina Group
• Suncorp – Metway.
• Community Insurance Agency Inc.
• Worldnomads.com

Regardless of how healthy and fit you are, remember the first rule of travel — if you can't afford travel insurance, you can't afford to travel.