Dear Travel Insurance Broker...

 

Apologies for disturbing you when you are obviously so very busy... frantically searching through the fine print of your policy wording to try and find any loophole that will save you from the dreadful possibility of having to compensate anyone for the financial losses incurred as a result of that inconvenient Icelandic volcanic eruption.

You see, it appears that I misunderstood the whole concept of insurance. I thought that this is how it works... we pay you some money, which you invest and make lots more money, and then, one day when something horrible happens and we have to ask you for some of our money back to pay for the fallout of that bad thing that happened, you give it to us. Apparently this is not the case, however....what actually happens is, we give you the money, you make money from it and then....well, that’s sort of where it all ends. So in fact, we are just giving you our money....a bit like a gift or charity, only you certainly don’t need charity as your bank accounts are pretty full thanks to all the money that people like me have been handing over for the past 10 years, and never asking for anything back in return.

Can I please take this opportunity to commend you on your craftiness....if any other industry tried something like this, it would be deemed a scam, fraud, daylight robbery and all offenders would be tried as common criminals and locked up for many years. I’d also like to thank you for broadening my knowledge of all things climate-related. Yesterday, I was informed by a member of your helpful claims team that ash blown by the prevailing winds from the erupting volcano on Iceland and now sitting in the airspace over northern Europe is not considered “adverse weather conditions”. I was intrigued to hear that Section 6.6.6 of your policy relating to “Cancellations due to adverse weather conditions” would therefore be null and void in this scenario.

When I queried exactly how one would define “volcanic ash”, your knowledgeable employee told me that it would fall under the category of “natural disasters” as a volcanic eruption is the work of Mother Nature... but, before I could get too carried away, assuming that my claim would thus qualify under Section 9.11 as “Cancellations as a result of natural disasters (such as earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, etc) deeming travel unsafe”, your team member was quick to point out that I was labouring under a misapprehension...the word “volcano” was not specified on that list in the brackets.

Now here I was able to give back something in return, with a quick lesson in basic grammar and language. I pointed out that the use of the phrase “such as” is another way of saying “for example” and is therefore not a reference to an exclusive list. At this point, your employee introduced me to his supervisor....what a sociable bunch you are! It’s always nice to meet new people. Your senior team member was able to plug the apparent gaps in my geographical knowledge by informing me that “Holland is not the same place as Iceland and it is a volcano erupting on Iceland that is the problem here!”

So all in, a rather educational experience... and for this I can only say thank you. I feel that we also learnt a lot about each other during that hour-long telephone call (at premium rates)....you learnt that I am a naive optimist who believes that most people are really good at heart, and I learnt that insurance brokers do not in fact have a heart, and would sooner sell their grandmother to the glue factory than fulfil their obligations to pay a claim.

I enclose my completed claims forms and evidence of the money I lost on my cancelled hotel booking, airport parking and museum entry tickets. As I told your ever considerate staff member, who was worried that I would be wasting my time completing these forms as they will only be formally rejected, I will need something in writing for when I take this matter further... to the Financial Ombudsman, the exposé TV programmes Watch Dog and Rogue Trader, or the tabloid press, whatever it takes. Expect to see your company name up in lights, but then I’m sure you don’t mind as, as the saying goes “There’s no such thing as bad publicity”.

I’d like to end by wishing you and all your staff all the best for the future, and I sincerely hope that the day all insurance underwriters arrive in hell to book into their specially reserved, pre-paid, deluxe suites...only to find them incinerated...the devil gleefully informs them that “Actually, fire is not considered a natural disaster in Hades!” and thus they have no grounds to claim...

With best regards

Nat