Trip Mate What they promise in the brochures is NOT what you get! Kansas City Missouri
On the 23rd of June 2006, my wife and I departed West Palm Beach Florida for Bangkok, Thailand and upon arriving in Houston, TX, she lost her purse containing her passport and some cash which was immediately reported to the local police.
Prior to departure I purchased trip insurance from NWA vacations which issued a Trip Mate policy. Trip mate was immediately called and a full report forwared to the. After two weeks I called trip mate and asked if any additional documenmts were required so that I could obtain them and thereby save unnecessary waste of time. They said that they had alal that was needed but I was after two weeks told that another houston police department report was needed and this has been the case ever since that date. Te case is still awaiting more documents from the travel agency which I originally sent to them in my initial report. Yet they claim that they have ten days from the original date of filing to complete the report in full. DON'T BELIEVE THEM AND FOR GOODNESS SAKES DON'T BUY A TRIP CANCELLATION POLICY THAT IS BEING SOLD BY TRIP MATE BECAUSE YOU WILL SURELY GET INVOLVED WITH MULTIPLES BEHIND-THE-SCENE REVIEWERS WHOM YOU WILL NEVER SPEAK TO.
William
Port Saint Lucie, Florida
U.S.A.
1 Updates & Rebuttals
Gwaters
Overland Park,Kansas,
U.S.A.
The Cold Facts
#2UPDATE EX-employee responds
Wed, August 15, 2007
I was a claims examiner at Trip Mate for 2 years and 6 months to the day. 6 Months of my time working there was spent in the denial/appeals unit reviewing denied claims, appeals, and additional information submitted. If claims were still unpayable after this 2nd review, I'd have to compose a denial letter. This is not something that I enjoyed as it is easier to pay a claim than deny a claim. I disliked writing these letters so much that it eventually became one of the main reasons for leaving the company.
While I honestly do sympathize with your situation and understand that you feel cheated, your case is not a rare one and sadly it does not appear to be a legitimate case of being "ripped-off." In order for a claim to be approved for payment, documentation of a covered loss (according to the protection plan provisions) must be submitted. There's no deadline for when you can submit it...in fact your claim is probably still open with Trip Mate, but in "limbo" waiting for you to submit a police report. In the case of lost baggage, there is documentation that must be submitted for your claim to be covered under the policy. Basically, you have to report it to somebody (such as the police station) at the time the loss actually occurs and obtain a written report of loss. It has to state what was lost, when it was lost, and who it belonged to...etc. Enough to document that you actually did lose your baggage/items and that it happened while you were on your Trip. Also, you have to submit documentation of the value of the items lost. This could be the original receipt or even something out of a catalogue for the same item or an item like it. There's more detail to it in the actual provisions, but I'll just leave it at that and recommend you read the fine print.
As far as the 7-10 business days. That means that your claim will be finalized 7-10 business days from the date that all of the information needed to finalize your claim has been received. Based on what you wrote, it sounds like they didn't receive everything they need to make a claim decision and your claim is still in limbo, I do have to admit that they don't always finalize claims within 7-10 business days even if all the information is there - that's just a problem of not having enough employees to process spikes in the number of claims submitted (i.e. Hurricanes, Airline problems, other natural disasters effecting large numbers of travelers...etc).
I left the company on extremely bad terms; however, it sounds like your report is not a case of "rip-off." You just didn't submit enough documentation for them to be able to make a claims decision. I'm not saying that it's ethical or humane; I'm just saying that it's legitimately legal for your claim to remain unpaid.