Travel Insurance

Remember the ordeal we went through trying to get back from our trip a month ago? When we returned, I was lamenting to a friend about it, and how it was a lot of money that we weren't expecting to spend. She mentioned that some credit cards offer travel interruption/delay insurance and I should look into it. I wasn't feeling overly confident at my chances, since weather delays aren't paid for by airlines and I assume it would carry into insurance carriers, but I decided it wouldn't hurt to look into it.

When we moved here, we looked into a few different travel reward credit cards and eventually ended up with the platinum American Express Aeroplan. The annual fee is daunting when you see it, I know. BUT it comes with a 2 for 1 annual pass that allows us to fly a short-haul flight for half the points (a $3,000+ value in itself considering Baker to Winnipeg is considered short-haul) and it comes with a wide range of insurance options as well, apparently! It was a really painless process to make a claim - I called the customer service line, explained my situation, had a claim started and they sent me forms to fill out. The forms were easy and didn't take much time, so I packaged them up with my receipts, sent it ExpressPost mail (ugh, $20 for an envelope with a tracking number. That hurt.) Within 2 weeks I was mailed a cheque back for my expenses! Considering I wasn't expecting any of the money to be returned, what a nice surprise to open my mail and see it waiting for me. The only thing that the policy does not cover is transportation (car rental, gas, taxis, etc.) but everything else was covered. That almost made the frustration of a 6 day delay better. Almost.

To summarize, the moral of the story is - check to see if you have travel insurance through your credit card! If you don't, it is definitely something I would look into - especially if you're traveling in and out of the north!

-L