Hello sk,

We offer most of the plans from most major companies in the U.S.

There are two types of insurance plans:
Fixed: Cheaper, limited coverage
Comprehensive: More expensive, better coverage
More details at http://www.buyamericaninsurance.com/guide/visitors-insurance-types.jsp

We always recommend that you purchase comprehensive coverage plans. We have several different comprehensive plans available at http://www.buyamericaninsurance.com
I recommend that you visit the web site, get the quotes, compare the plans side by side and accordingly decide which one suits you the best.

If you have any specific questions, please feel free to contact us at any time at (866) INSU-BUY

Hi all!

  I am looking to buy insurance for my in-laws who are arriving in California the first week of December. Mother-in-law is 56 and father-in-law is 61 years old. They both are relatively healthy for their age but do have high-BP (mother-in-law) and high cholestrol (father-in-law).

What would be a good insurance for their age group and health condition?

Thanks,
SK

Arjun,

My parents and in-laws keep coming alternatively to visit us. Therefore, I have purchased both of the plans you mentioned, earlier Liaison International and then Protection America recently. I had ended up using both of the plans.

While both are excellent plans from two companies, there are few differences that I have noticed.

* Liaison International participates in Hygeia PPO network. Even though many doctors come show up in the network, when I called them, they said that they have never heard of Hygeia. I never had that kind of problem with First Health PPO in Protection America.

* Liaison International only has 80/20 coinsurance option but Protection America has either 80/20 or 90/10 coinsurance choices. I took 90/10.

* There are some other minor differences that I don't quite remember, something to do with ambulance, dental etc. You can compare the plans side by side on this web site to find those diffrences.

Does anyone have any experience with Protection America - IMG ( First Health PPO) or Liason International ( Hygeia - Seven corners) ? I checked buyamericaninsurance.com and both seem very similar interms of providers etc. I am not sure which one is better. I am buying for a person below 60 years of age with no health problems. I was wondering if anyone would recommend one over the other...

Niranjan,

I am sorry to hear about your father's cancer. I can exactly understand what you are going through as I went through the same sickness of my own close family member around 8.5 years ago.

However, I would request you to rationally rethink about this entire situation regarding insurance coverage. And please note that what I am writing below is based on the fact that I as a broker, work for you and not for any particular insurance company. Therefore, whatever I am saying is definitely not to inappropriately defend any insurance company.

Travel medical insurance plans (IMG or any other company) are specifically designed to cover any new medical conditions that may occur after the effective date of the policy. Your father was diagnosed with cancer just two weeks after the effective date of the policy. Obviously, your father already had the cancer developed before the effective date of the policy. Insurance company does not cover pre-existing conditions, not just pre-known conditions. Pre-existing conditions is not determined by when symptoms or treatment occur and travel insurance is not designed or priced to cover pre-existing conditions. If you ask your father's doctor, he would tell approximately for how long his cancer was developing. And yes I personally know that doctors can tell that.

In addition to each product from each company describing about pre-existing conditions exclusion clause in the brochure and in the policy wording, we have also written extensive and detailed FAQ about pre-existing conditions at http://www.buyamericaninsurance.com/guide/faq/pre-existing-conditions-visitor-medical-insurance.jsp

Please note that in case of IMG, before they deny any claim as pre-existing conditions, at least for our customers, they already send the claim documents to another independent team of doctors outside of IMG for peer review. If you can contact me with the certificate number, I can confirm whether it was sent for outside peer review in your case. You might also have received the papers from outside peer review company.

You can appeal the denial, and in most cases, IMG will re-send to a different outside peer review doctor.

The fact that IMG (and other similar companies) pay millions of dollars of claims each year would seem to indicate that there is a legitimate need for the type of coverage provided by travel medical insurance. You may want to review http://www.buyamericaninsurance.com/forum/showthread.php?t=48375 to see some examples of the claims IMG paid.

If there is anything else I can help you with, please feel free to contact us at any time.

Purchased IMG Patriot america for my parents. After couple of weeks my father had difficulty swallowing and we saw a gastroenterologist. The doctor recommended endoscopy and during the procedure found a mass in esophagus. After biopsy, it was confirmed as esophageal cancer. Now, IMG does not want to pay for anything. They are saying that its a pre-existing condition, though obviously this was the first diagnosis. It is difficult enough to deal with such devastating news. Now we have to deal with this insurance company, whom we paid good amount of money for coverage. As any illness/disease that could have existed in last 3 years is not covered, they can basically find someway to say that its a pre-existing condition. Hopefully our experience serves as a good lesson for other folks.

Hyderabad: The insurance regulator IRDA has asked for reports from Tata AIG Life and Tata AIG General Insurance in the backdrop of concerns over the financial problems plaguing their American partner.

While making it clear that AIG’s Indian partners have satisfactory solvency margins, the IRDA, however, said having regard to the developments reported in USA, we have asked reports from the two companies in the matter.

The life and general insurance companies promoted by M/s Tata Sons and AIG are registered under the Indian Companies Act and bound by the provisions of the Insurance Act and other regulations, the watchdog said today.

The accounts of these two companies as on March 31, 2008 indicate that they have satisfactory solvency margins which are adequate to meet their liabilities, the insurance regulator said in a statement here.

The recent developments in the New York financial markets have caused concern in the financial markets in India. There are concerns over the liquidity problems of insurance giant AIG.

Certain newspapers have reported that AIG, a leading insurance group of the United States, has sought financial support from the Fed Reserve and have voiced concerns about the impact the developments in AIG would have on the general and life insurance companies in India in which the American firm has partnered with Tata Sons, the statement added.

I applied for health protector plan of TATA AIG Insurance in month of august. First of all there collection executive said we dont give receipt. This was my biggest mistake to trust that as... face. I was told i will get the policy in 7 working days i called him after 14 days he had some excuse. Then i called after one more week than he had some other excuse. Now he has stopped picking up the phone. And there is no help from TATA AIG call center guys. Better die without insurance but DO NOT opt of TATA AIG. They have no value for customer. They have left all these agents in open market who doesnt have any credibility. And will u beleive one excuse was it is getting delayed because first the applicant has to go thru medical tests ha ha . Remember these three lovely words "NO TATA AIG". For better mental health

Hello,

I'm planning to take insurance for my mother who is visiting for 3 months. Can you please suggest if I should go with Patriot America or Atlas America as she has BP and diabetes.

Please let me know based on coverage , features and doctors/hospitals who accept these plans.

Thanks.

Recently I've got a really bad experience from Tata AIG... I hold a credit card of HSBC, one day I got a call from HSBC person giving an information about this health care insurance from TATA AIG, it was supposed to be different than mediclaim and bla bla bla... I declined the offer from HSBC, however the guy on phone played the first trick, he told me that they will send me information papers about the policies and then I can decide whether to take the policy or not within 14 days of receiving the papers... I made a mistake by saying OK to send the papers, then the call was transferred to TATA AIG executive, who got the necessary information from me...

During this call with TATA AIG, I realized that I've been trapped by this trick and now actually I was availing the policy... At that time what I thought was, let's take the policy (something like which I anyway needed) and go through the documents and as the HSBC guy told me, I can anyway cancel it in 14 days...

At the end of the conversation with TATA AIG (by the way, all this conversation was being recorded for confirmation), the executive told me that only changing the policy level could be done in 14 days without any charges and if I wanted to cancel the policy then I will have to pay Rs.99 per person (I was going for myself, my father and my mother)... here I realized that I was being cheated in daylight!!! but I could not do anything at that moment...

I decided that when the papers arrive, I will cancel the 3 policies and pay Rs.297... so I called the TATA AIG helpline numbers to cancel this... And here came the big blow... now the TATA AIG executive told me that there was no clause at all which said about the Rs.99 per person charges for cancellation, on the contrary I will be charged 25% of the annual premium amount (which worked out to be about Rs.2200)...

When I told him to refer the recorded earlier conversation, he held the call for 2 minutes and came up with a typical cheater's statement "There is no mention of Rs.99 per person for cancellation"...

I am feeling really disgusted "How can I be made so fool"... but in reality, these companies are not fooling... they are "CHEATING"...

So please spread the word and do not fall into such traps.