Has anyone actually had DCL insurance come through (or not)?

[MomOTwins]

On our past two Dream 3-night cruises, we got the DCL insurance. My DH got norovirus on one, and was quarantined. This is clearly covered by the DCL policy, so we kept all our medical paperwork and submitted it, but DCL insurance proved to pay because while we could prove from the doctor's records that he had norovirus, we could not "prove" he actually was quarantined because DCL just tells you to stay in the cabin--they don't actually lock you up somewhere--so we can't prove he had a qualified "vacation interruption."

It left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. I don't know if we were just unlucky, but my experience with insurance is that they always try to weasel out of paying you (I'll never forget the time my health insurance kept denying one of my twin's hospital expenses as birth because it was a "duplicate" entry of his twin brother's treatments on the same days/time), and I'm about ready to throw in the towel and just not get insurance for my next trip.

Also, all the issues I can think of why we would need insurance seem like things that DCL can find an "out" in the contract so they don't have to cover it. E.g, if we need Medical care on ship, the contract says we have to exhaust our own medical insurance first. Likewise if we lose luggage, the policy we have to exhaust our homeowner's insurance policy first. And if we are denied boarding I imagine we'll get the same answer as the quarantine: that while we can prove we were sick, we can't prove we were refused boarding. The last thing I worry about needing insurance for is that my MIL has stage 4 cancer and we may need to be there for her, but DCL would no doubt refuse coverage because that is a pre-existing condition.

Side note: I am in one of the states that allows you to just purchase the "cancel for any reason" 75% refund without buying the full insurance, but whenever I call the line in the DCL insurance policy page for that they say they will have to call me back and never call. Drives me nuts.

At the same time, the worrier in me just likes the idea of having insurance. So if it was just our bad luck and others have had more positive experiences, I might consider it. But if everyone has had as frustrating an experience with insurance, that would be useful to know too so I'd know it's not just me.

Go to town people: rant, rave, tell me your experiences

 

[LovesBelle]

What a terrible experience. I am so sorry your DH got a norovirus and now you can't get the insurance to pay. That is horrible! Thank you for sharing that experience because now I know that if I'm ever in the same situation, I should ask for some sort of proof that we've been quarantined. Did the rest of your family have to stay in quarantine too?

As for experiences, I've used the trip insurance that comes free with my credit card to get reimbursed for airline tickets when we had to cancel a trip for medical reasons and that was fine. I typically don't buy extra insurance on top of that, but I may be in the minority.