Page 5 - Scleroderm NZ Inc Newsletter November 16
P. 5
Insuring yourself for travel - the hardest part is being
believed Barbara's battle with bureacracy
I was excited about going away. With such Gestapo thought I was lying about was in fact incorrect. More
phone calls from Gestapo lady at the insurance company: I
a lot to do I thought I would get a start and was getting pretty stressed now and decided to take a step
back from everything. I talked to others who had travelled and
apply for travel insurance. then I decided I'd seek another insurance company.
Insurance is always hard when you have many health issues. If you get ‘red flagged’ from one insurance company you
We knew an insurance agent so rang her for advice. She put have to declare that for any future insurance companies you
us in touch with an insurance company who dealt with travel deal with. I didn’t want that, especially as it wasn’t true, so I
insurance, as her's didn’t. Ringing the 0800 number I had to rang the travel agent I had used to buy the tickets, filled out a
answer 50 questions the operator had lined up for me. I also questionnaire on line, got a number, emailed the agent back
sent scans of two of the latest medical reports: one from my with the number and WHAMO insurance covered!
GP and the other from my specialist rheumatologist. All went
well, and I answered the questions as best I could. A few weeks later I decided to write back to the original
insurance company telling them why I decided not to go
The next day, the woman I had talked to from the insurer rang ahead with their insurance. The chap I spoke to listened to
back. She had been reading my doctor reports and lambasted their internal recording of calls between Gestapo and me and
me for not disclosing that I had been in hospital recently agreed with me that ‘things could have been much better’. I
and or that I had autoimmune hepatitis. I tried to explain suggested Gestapo get more training on reading reports, sent
the reason I didn’t disclose those things was because I had him the copies of my letters from the specialists proving I was
not been in hospital recently and I did not have autoimmune not lying and am happy I went elsewhere.
hepatitis. However, with her Gestapo training she knew best
and wanted me to prove that these things were not true. I had Now I am packed, insured and determined not to take crap
to get more reports from the doctors concerned. from clipboard-wielding and poorly trained inquisitors again.
I’ll let you know how I get on when I get back.
Knowing that if she couldn’t read the reports already in front
of her, she was not likely to be able to interpret the next Company not to go with: Allianz
lot either. I didn’t know what to do so I contacted my two
specialists and asked if they could write stating that what Company to go with: FlightCentre
www.scleroderma.org.nz
