Travel Insurance Research Articles

Purchasing insurance – the roles of individual differences in time perspectives and regulatory foci

ABSTRACT Objective The present studies focused on the role of time perspectives (TPs) and regulatory foci (promotion and prevention) in explaining people’s purchases of car, accident, home, life, and travel insurance. Method Two correlational studies on nationwide Polish samples (N = 1,093 and N = 1,047) were conducted. Results The first study showed that, after controlling for age and sex, higher levels of Future TP and lower levels of Past Negative TP were related to the propensity to make voluntary purchases of car, life, home, and accident insurance. Higher levels of Present Hedonistic TP and lower levels of Present Fatalistic TP were related to the propensity to buy travel insurance. The second study identified significant positive roles of both promotion and prevention regulatory foci in explaining people’s possession of all five types of insurance considered. Conclusions TPs (mainly Future and Past Negative) and regulatory foci (promotion and prevention) seem to be important in explaining people’s insurance-related behaviours. KEY POINTS What is already known about the topic? Insurance decisions are influenced by many psychological variables, e.g., social norms, previous personal experience, emotions and cognitive biases and heuristics Future time oriented individuals focus on future consequences of today decisions and have a greater propensity to save and to invest money Prevention focused individuals try to avoid the negative consequences of unexpected event, so they prefer to invest in financial tools which are characterized by minimal risk What this topic adds? People declaring possession of car, life, home and accident insurance policies were characterized by lower levels of past negative TP and higher levels of future TP than those not possessing such policies Individuals declaring possession of all types of insurance (life, accident, car, home, and travel) were more prevention oriented than those not having such insurance Individuals declaring possession of all types of insurance (life, accident, car, home, and travel) were more promotion oriented than those not having such insurance

Traveler’s adoption of travel advisory system: a case of Hong Kong’s outbound travel alert system

ABSTRACT This study attempts to test the applicability of the theory of protection motivation (PMT) model and explores the effect of travel-related and sociodemographic factors on travel advisory compliance intention. The findings revealed that travelers’ behavioral intention to follow travel advice is driven by self-efficacy, response efficacy, perceived severity, and the insignificant benefit of maladaptive behaviors. The results also indicated that female travelers and travelers who are aged 45 or above, have young child/children, have high income, prefer packaged travel, and are inclined to buy travel insurance tend to consult and adhere to travel advice.

Changing dynamics and travel evading: a case of Indian tourists amidst the COVID 19 pandemic

PurposeThis study aims to analyse the factors that caused Indian tourists to avoid travelling abroad because of the recent outbreak of COVID-19 in 2020. It will also identify the relationship between the perceived risk of travelling and the probability of travel evading in India owing to COVID-19.Design/methodology/approachThis study used an online structured questionnaire to collect data from Indian tourists to study six independent variables linked with their behavioural intentions (travel evading). The health belief model was used to examine tourist behaviour.FindingsThe results revealed a positive correlation between the perceived risk associated with COVID-19 and travel avoidance. Familiarity with COVID-19 was positively correlated with travel evading behaviours.Practical implicationsThis study will assist stakeholders from around the world to adequately identify and thoroughly plan for logistical problems associated with travel such as travel insurance and pre-travel booking expenses to reduce travel evading behaviour and promote travel.Originality/valueWhile a few studies have been conducted related to pandemics (Ebola, MERS-CoV, SARS), there is a paucity of literature that examines the factors which influence tourists’ travel evading behaviour owing to COVID-19. Moreover, most of the previous literature on pandemics is concentrated on American and European countries, whereas studies on the Indian sub-continent are very scarce. This study will fill this gap and will identify the factors which influence tourists in India to evade travel in response to COVID-19.

ROLE OF ASSISTANCE AND INSURANCE COMPANIES WHILE PROVIDING TRAVEL, HEALTH AND TRANSPORTATION SERVICES

Introduction. In the article, the theoretical bases (principles) of insurance assistance are investigated. The formation prerequisites of interaction of assistance and insurance companies are analyzed. The necessity of assistance companies activities in the insurance market while providing tourism, health and transportation services is grounded. Purpose. The aim of the investigation is to substantiate the theoretical and organizational principles of the insurance and assistance companies cooperation. Method (methodology) of the work is based on the methodology of insurance assistance, assistance companies in the insurance market in providing travel, medical and motor transport services. Results. We note that the necessity for activities of the assistance companies at the insurance market is undeniable today. The cooperation of assistance and insurance companies will continue to grow, as it enables the insurer to develop competitive and attractive insurance products to potential policyholders, to provide legal support, regulation of consequences and financial aspects of the insurance cases in various fields of the insurance, travel insurance, including health, motor vehicle and so on.

Insurance of active and extreme types of tourism in Ukraine: current situation and prospects

The purpose of the article is to analyze the modern state and problems of insurance of active recreation and extreme types of tourism in the market of insurance services of Ukraine and develop measures to improve them. The study used methods of comparison, analysis and synthesis, and the method of generalization. In order to rank insurance companies in accordance with their attractiveness to customers for insurance of active recreation and extreme tourism, the authors proposed criteria and developed their own methods of carrying out the estimation of the companies. The market for active and extreme tourism is developing quite rapidly. Tourists who prefer active and extreme recreation are a high-risk group, and tourist safety is a top priority and depends on quality insurance. The share of insurance companies in Ukraine going in for travel insurance is about 10% of their total. The conducted study of insurance services in the sphere of tourism indicates the following features of this market in Ukraine: the lack of insurance packages for active recreation and extreme tourism in the packages of individual companies; the lack of a unified regulatory approach to classification of tariff packages and the attribution to them of certain types of tourism; high cost of insurance services and the presence of restrictions in insurance of certain extreme types of tourism. The authors selected the criteria when ranking insurance companies in the extreme tourism insurance sector: availability of transparent policy programs to insure active recreation and extreme tourism, availability and adequacy of pricing policy, customer comments, economic indices of companies’ activities. One of the priority ways to develop insurance services in this sector is the introduction of European insurance practice for specialized types of active and extreme tourism through the activities of tourist clubs and associations that will attract a wide. The article for the first time analyzes in detail the problems of insurance of active recreation and extreme tourism in the market of insurance services of Ukraine, offers its own approaches to the methods of rating insurance companies in the field of active recreation and extreme tourism. The present international experience in providing similar insurance services is described and the ways of its implementation in Ukraine are considered. The practical significance of the obtained results is that the conducted assessment of the insurance market of active and extreme tourism can be used at different levels from local to national, in particular: when choosing travel insurance packages for both individuals and tour operators or travel agents; to improve insurance packages by insurance companies of Ukraine; public organizations, associations promoting the development of active and extreme tourism; to improve insurance policy at the state level.

An Insurtech for the Online Insurance: A Customer Repurchasing Behavior Study in Taiwan

This study explores online insurance ventures by customers’ behavioral profiles from data mining and visualization. First, we employ a simple decision-tree statistical learning method on unique hand-collected and processed data in Taiwan. This method considers first-time online insurance subscribers as new ones without a proper marketing connection after six months. Second, using advanced clustering technique and decision tree statistical learning on first-time purchasing customers, we find they repurchase online travel insurance for different purposes varying periods. Finally, we get robust results engaging different segmentations of customer data. In these ways, we enable marketing strategies to work with generating decision rules.

Cancel-for-Any-Reason Insurance Recommendation Using Customer Transaction-Based Clustering

In the travel insurance industry, <italic xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">cancel-for-any-reason</i> insurance, also known as a cancellation protection service (CPS), is a recent attempt to strike a balance between customer satisfaction and service provider (SP) profits. However, some exceptional circumstances, particularly the COVID-19 pandemic, have led to a dramatic decrease in SP revenues, especially for non-refundable tickets purchased early with CPS. This paper begins by presenting a risk group segmentation of customers in an online ticket reservation system. Then, a CPS fee is recommended depending on the different customer risk groups provided by the cluster segmentation via different clustering algorithms such as centroid-based K-means, hierarchical agglomerative, DBSCAN, and artificial neural network-based SOM algorithms. According to the implemented cluster metrics, which include the Silhouette index, Davies-Bouldin index, Entropy index, and DBCV index, the SOM algorithm presents the most appropriate result. After predicting the new customer cluster, a CPS fee will be calculated with the proposed adaptive CPS method based on the cluster segmentation weights. Determining the weight of each cluster is related to the total CPS revenue threshold for all clusters defined by the SP. Therefore, to avoid a loss for SPs, the total CPS revenue will be kept constant with the threshold that the SP has been adjusted. The experimental results based on real-world data show that the risk group segmentation of customers helps to maintain a balance between CPS fees and SP profits. Finally, according to the calculated weights, the proposed model pegs the SP gain/loss variation with a 0.00012 exchange ratio.

Extreme traveler.

Although they may pose a serious health risk or may even turn out to be life-threatening, extreme sports, i.e. high-risk physical activities of varied difficulty, are growing in popularity among international travelers in recent years. Extreme sports encompass a wide range of activities such as scuba diving, rafting, surfing, bungee jumping and mountaineering. It is not unusual for travelers to engage in extreme sports far off the beaten path, in destinations where environmental conditions are difficult and specialist healthcare is not easily available. Therefore, before taking the decision to engage in any form of adventurous activity, travelers should be encouraged to take certain precautionary measures. The most important are: identification of potential health risk factors related to travel or the activity itself, physical conditioning and fitness training prior to travel (depending on the type of activity) and prophylaxis (a travel health kit, mandatory and recommended vaccinations, a pre-travel consultation to assess a person's fitness to travel and identify any potential contraindications for certain types of adventure sports, a comprehensive travel insurance policy). The article focuses on popular extreme sports, common risk factors associated with extreme activities as well as the recommended prophylaxis and precautionary measures.

The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on medical and travel insurance pricing and fraud risks: An exploratory study

This study investigates how the emergence of the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has raised many concerns in medical and travel insurance, how insurers perceive and react to this pandemic, and the role of governments in this new context, with a particular focus on the Gulf Cooperation Council region (GCC). Data has been collected using archival research and conversations with some chief risk officers (CROs), internal auditors and insurance practitioners. The authors explain how, following the COVID-19 pandemic, the GCC medical and travel insurance industry faces pricing and fraud risks that need specific planning and control. In the GCC, pricing risk is found to represent an immediate risk that is not easy to manage as historical data is not available. This causes the failure of the present risk models in anticipating the probability and severity of the claims. As a response, insurers rely on scenario analysis and brainstorming to anticipate the costs. Fraud risk is harder to manage, as traditional internal controls are inefficient. Further, both risk managers and internal auditors are currently struggling because of the ‘working from home’ situation and the massive digital transformation in all the transactions. Moreover, the time spent in fraud investigation will delay the payment for hospitalised insurance claims, which would raise concerns about the insurer’s reputation. To resolve this conundrum and manage reputational risk, most GCC insurers seek trade-offs and negotiations with the insured. The authors’ observations and analyses revealed that current responses by GCC insurers are insufficient and need enhancements. Therefore, the authors propose some potential policy solutions that would help insurers overcome both pricing and fraud risks. Through explaining medical and travel insurance risks and proposing potential solutions in this emerging market, this paper provides some practical insights for insurance researchers, insurers and CROs who are seeking solutions to pandemic-related risks.

Designing Social Campaign for The Usage of Travel Insurance

With the current growth of traveling in Indonesia, the needs of travel insurance are very important for every traveller since there are a lot of risks that could happen anytime while traveling. Unfortunately, the number of travel insurance usage in Indonesia is still very low. 52.2% respondents of the research never use travel insurance before. The proportion of travel insurance is only about less than 10% of total national’s insurance premium. In this report, the author will design how to communicate the increasement for the usage of travel insurance for traveller through social campaign and to design the visual that show the bad possibilities that could happen without a travel insurance through social campaign. The author has collected data by doing interviews, questionnaire, and Focus Group Discussion. By designing this project, the author hopes that the literacy and penetration of the travel insurance will increase.

COVID-19 and the public perception of travel insurance

• Many travellers have had their insurance claims denied during the COVID-19 crisis. • Catastrophic risks are not diversifiable by insurers and excluded in coverage. • Travellers will likely revise the perceived value of travel insurance downwards. • This will exacerbate the economic fallout via a reverse moral hazard effect. • We discuss recommended actions for stakeholders.

Barriers to international travel in inflammatory bowel disease patients

Inflammatory bowel disease poses substantial challenges to travel. We aimed to investigate inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD)-associated challenges to travel, information-seeking behaviour and associated factors. We collected data on patients' demographics, disease characteristics, travel barriers, information-seeking behaviour and travel outcomes in UK, Australia, New Zealand and Israel (2016-2018). Summary statistics were used to describe the sample, whereas multivariate binary and nominal logistic regression were used to model the outcome variables. Almost 75.4% (1878/2491) participants' data were analysed with 71.14%, 15.4%, 11.2% and 2.1% from UK, Australia, NZ and Israel, respectively (76.3% females, 48.2% 30-49years old 58.8% Crohn's disease). About 7.7% of study participants sought medical advice/were hospitalised while overseas. About 43.8% cancelled/changed their plans due to IBD. The most common barriers were worry about toilet facilities (76.3%), cleanliness/sanitation (50.9%) and availability of medical care (41.1%). Only 60.5% sought travel advice; the most popular information source was IBD doctor/nurse (32.6%). Almost 32.6% of study participants did not get travel insurance that covered their IBD. Those who did not receive advice or found obtaining travel insurance difficult, were less likely to obtain travel insurance (P < 0.001). Participants who travelled for work were more likely to be hospitalised/seek medical advice overseas and not obtain travel insurance. We report a detailed investigation on the IBD-associated barriers while travelling abroad, common information-seeking behaviours and factors associated with worse outcomes. Importantly, patients from all the surveyed countries provided similar travel barrier and preparation habits, highlighting the consistent nature of the challenge.

COVID-19 Consequences and Travel Insurance Policy in Leading Cruise Shipping Corporations

Purpose: The study aims to evaluate the insurance packages offered to cruise travellers by cruise ship companies The following research questions have been raised: 1) What kind of insurance is offered to passengers by cruise ship companies within the tourist package? 2) What is the insurance coverage offered to passengers within the tourist package? Design/Methodology/Approach: A few research methods were applied: literature review, data exploration method, desk research and comparative analysis Findings: Research revealed lack of publications on cruise travellers' insurance cover The conducted analysis has indicated that cruise travellers cannot expect compensation from cruise lines in case of cancelled cruise travels in case of pandemic and can only choose cruise travel in a different time, which is frequently unsatisfactory Practical Implications: The results of the foregoing may constitute an interesting source of information for both the potential cruise travellers, but also tour-operators, cruise shipowners and insurance policy makers Originality/Value: The review of literature revealed lack of publications regarding the issue of insurance policy applied by cruise lines towards cruise travellers, and the scope of their liability in this respect

A study on travel insurance related with tourism - A study on disputed cases related with insurance accidents under travel insurance -

A study on travel insurance related with tourism - A study on disputed cases related with insurance accidents under travel insurance -

Biological therapy and international travel: A questionnaire survey among Danish patients with rheumatic disease.

To describe travel activities, preparations, and health problems encountered by patients with arthritis receiving biological therapy. A travel survey was conducted in a Danish rheumatology outpatient clinic by distribution of a semistructured questionnaire to 300 consecutive patients with arthritis. Among the 273 (91%) patients returning the questionnaire, a history of traveling outside Denmark was reported by 203 (74%) respondents and outside Europe by 92 (34%). In 81% of the patients, travel activities had not decreased after the initiation of biological treatment. However, 24% reported that they had become more cautious regarding the choice of travel destination. Pre-travel advice was sought by less than one-third of the patients, whereas travel insurance was taken out by 86%, but only half of them had disclosed information about the biological treatment. Treatment was discontinued temporarily while traveling in 26% of patients on subcutaneous biologics. The main reason for discontinuation was concern about transport and storage of medicine. Only 6% of the travelers had experienced health problems, which were of only minor importance. Treatment with biologics seems not to have any major influence on international travel activity among Danish patients with arthritis. Health problems when traveling were of minor importance. However, pre-travel advice issues, including treatment compliance, transport of medicine, and insurance coverage, need to be addressed proactively by the outpatient clinic staff as part of patient consultation.

Impacts of COVID-19 on global tourism industry: A cross-regional comparison

The tourism industry was one of the world's greatest markets; until the world met a pandemic in the 21st century, COVID-19. This study aims to present the reactions of travelers during the pandemic trends outlined by adopting text mining techniques. Between December 30, 2019–March 15, 2020, approximately 75,000 comments are retrieved from the TripAdvisor forums, and 23,515 cases from the US, Europe, and Asia forums are employed for analyses.The results reveal that the tourism sector is easily affected by global crises. It is almost the same day that travelers decide to cancel or delay their trips, with the spread of the news. More in-depth analyses uncovered several topics consisted of comments on benefiting from travel insurance and refund due to the travel cancellations. Travel insurance has become a hot topic, which may be a way of reanimating the industry by offering travel packages, including travel insurance services.

Factors affecting cost and patient choice of travel insurance in cardiac disease: a web-based case-control study.

The aim of this study was to explore variations in cost and choice of travel insurance in patients with cardiac disease. Clinical data from patients with myocardial infarction (MI, n = 20), Marfan syndrome (MFS, n = 10) and dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM, n = 10) were input to insurance websites for a proposed ten-day holiday and data for premium cost (£) and choice of quotes (n) collated for each condition. Age-matched healthy individuals were used as controls. Median cost of insurance was significantly higher for MI (£233.07; interquartile range (IQR) = £222.95-£245.47 versus £24.29; IQR = £11.9-£34.09, p = < 0.001), MFS (£37.43; IQR = £23.61-58.83 versus £19.20; IQR = £9.09-£27.31, p = 0.0378)) and DCM (£166.87; IQR = £129.71-£198.62 versus £23.96; IQR = £11.99-£32.44, p = <0.001) compared to controls. Choice of quotes was also significantly reduced for MI (5; IQR = 5-14 versus 89; IQR = 26-110, p = <0.001) MFS (61; IQR = 26-83 versus 105; 26-105, p = <0.001) and DCM (19; IQR = 16-28 versus 89; IQR = 26-106, p = <0.001) compared to controls. Modifiable factors, such as time after cardiac event or awaiting further investigations, and clinical factors, such as persistent symptoms and disease severity, lead to a significant increase in cost. This study provides insight into the factors affecting cost and choice of travel insurance for patients with cardiac disease. The findings highlight ways in which healthcare professionals can support patients to obtain travel insurance.

Tourism and the Highlands: A cross-sectional study on trauma and orthopaedic service use by tourists in 2017

BackgroundNHS Highland covers a wide geographical region encompassing the Isle of Skye, and Ben Nevis. Tourism is a significant contributor to the local economy and in 2017 the Highlands welcomed 534,000 visitors. Health services across the region treat tourists in addition to the local population. We investigated how many tourists accessed the Trauma and Orthopaedic (T&O) Department at Raigmore Hospital, Inverness. MethodsWe conducted a cross-sectional study with data collected over one year (2017). The number of tourists referred to T&O including patient demographics, country of origin, type of injury and their clinical outcome were recorded. A freedom of information (FOI) request to NHS Highland was sought to investigate associated costs incurred by tourists. Results376 tourists accessed T&O services in 2017. Country of origin: 47 (12.5%) Scotland; 177 (47.1%) rest of UK; 74 (19.7%) EU; 45 (12.0%) non-EU. Highest referral month August (61), lowest referral month November (8). Injuries: 224 (59.6%) fracture; 62 (16.5%) soft tissue injury; 20 (5.3%) laceration. Commonest sites of injury were ankle, distal radius and finger. Outcomes: 28 (7.4%) Virtual clinic; 137 (36.4%) hospital admission; 193 (51.3%) advice to referring team and discharge; 13 (3.5%) direct discharge by T&O; 4 (1.1%) missing. No. of trauma cases booked: tourists 133 (9%), local population 1415 (91%). ConclusionsTourists account for fewer than ten percent of the T&O surgical workload over one year with common injuries being fractures affecting the extremities. Seasonal variation was observed with more referrals occurring in the summer months. Just under half of tourists originated from outside the UK and EU. Health boards should consider increasing resources over the summer months to deal with expected increases in tourist numbers and should be able to recover the cost of treatment from the patient or their travel insurance companies directly at point of care.

Cost analysis of road traffic crashes in China

Fatalities and injuries resulting from road traffic crashes is always a serious problem. The overall economic losses caused by road traffic crashes are beyond imagination. Including the economic cost of property damage, productivity loss, medical cost, travel delay time cost, legal cost and insurance cost, the total economic cost of traffic crashes in China in 2017 is calculated as 490.1 billion yuan (72.6 billion USD 2017), which is equivalent to 0.60% of the GDP. The cost of productivity loss accounts for the highest proportion of total economic cost, which is 72%. The second is the travel delay cost, accounting for 12% insurance cost, property damage cost and medical cost are followed. The more serious the injury, the higher the unit economic cost. The unit cost of a crash that caused only property damage is 11,274 yuan. The unit cost of a minor injured crash is 20,223 yuan. The highest unit economic cost is the unit cost of a fatal crash, which is 3,181,394 yuan. This study provides important insights into the cost-benefit analysis of China's road safety policies.

Improvement of the tourist insurance system in Ukraine

The purpose of the article is to theoretically substantiate and improved travel insurance systems in Ukraine in accordance with international insurance standards. Methodology.The research methodology consists in the use of general scientific and special research methods: the method of theoretical generalization and comparison, hermeneutic – to study the legal aspects of insurance services in the field of in- ternational tourism, comparative – to identify differences between: foreign and domestic insurance practices in international tourism. The scientific novelty of theobtained results lies in the substantiated expediency of introducing internationalexperience in the organization of the tourism insurance system in Ukraine. The mechanism of introduction of the international experience of the organization of system of insurance of tourism in Ukraine is offered. Conclusions. The study of the essence and concept of insurance in the field of tourism, allowed to determine the specifics of insurance activities in Ukraine. The article presents an analysis of the problems of travel insurance in Ukraine, improved the system of tourism in- suranceinUkraine,inaccordancewithinternationalinsurancestandards.