CHOICE reviews travel insurance policies on a regular basis to provide you with up-to-date information on the different policies, what they cover and how much they cost.
We assign scores for pricing (based on thousands of online quotes) and policy coverage (looking at dozens of different product cover inclusions and limits).
These scores are combined to calculate the CHOICE Expert Rating, a percentage score that reflects a policy's level of cover and value for money.
On this page:
- How often we review travel insurance
- How we choose which insurers to compare
- How we calculate the CHOICE Expert Rating
- How we calculate the price score
- How we calculate the cover score
- Claims experience
How often we review travel insurance
We update our travel insurance comparison four times a year, in line with when we receive updated pricing data.
How we choose which insurers to compare
CHOICE international and domestic travel insurance comparisons at a glance:
- 14 insurance providers
- 40 insurers
- 183 policies
- 138 policy cover dimensions assessed
The insurers we choose to review cover the majority of the travel insurance market in Australia. They range from brands underwritten by the biggest insurance agencies to smaller local insurers and new entrants to the market.
To be included in a CHOICE insurance comparison, an insurance product must be available directly to the public. We do not include products targeting more niche travel markets such as corporate travel insurance.
The insurers whose policies we cover include the following (listed by provider, with typical brands in brackets):
Big travel insurers
- Zurich (Cover-more, NRMA, Webjet, Virgin Australia)
- Allianz (Allianz, Worldcare)
- NIB (NIB, Travel Insurance Direct, World Nomads)
- Mitsui Sumitomo (InsureandGo, Tick, AllClear)
Travel insurance newbies
- Pacific (Battleface, WAS)
- Guild (Passport Card)
State motoring group car insurers
- AANT
- RAA
- RAC
- RACQ
- RACT
- RACV
How we calculate the CHOICE Expert Rating
The CHOICE Expert Rating is an overall score out of 100. It is made up of the cover score (60%) and a national price score (40%).
How we determine recommended policies
Policy recommendations are made on the basis of the CHOICE Expert Rating. To be recommended, a policy must have pricing data available and have a CHOICE Expert Rating at or above a set score that is higher than the average of all the policies we looked at.
Recommendations are made on a general basis and do not take into account any individual's objectives, financial situation, or needs. Consider the appropriateness of a recommendation before acting on it and review the policy's product disclosure statement (PDS) and other documents.
How we obtain pricing data
We obtain pricing data from a third-party pricing provider that collects and sells its data to the insurance industry. If an insurer doesn't participate in the quote collection program, we can't compare them on price. This means we cannot calculate a CHOICE Expert Rating on the product, or recommend it.
How we collect policy cover data
The terms and conditions of an insurance policy are detailed in one or more disclosure documents available from the insurer. The key sources of information we use to collect product cover data include:
- insurer web pages
- product disclosure statements (PDS)
- supplementary product disclosure statements (SPDS).
How we calculate the price score
Our travel insurance comparison displays the results of our price as a price score. The higher the price score, the lower the policy premium is on average, compared to its competitors.
Price score
The price score is a score out of 100, indicating how expensive a policy is across all the markets it's available in. It contributes to the CHOICE Expert Rating, but should be used with caution when deciding which policy to buy. The reason for this is that travel insurance is not always consistently priced across different travel regions and different travellers.
An insurer that's cheap for forty-year-old travellers, might be very expensive for sixty-five-year-olds. And an insurer that's cheaper than its competitors for travel to Bali, might be more expensive than its competitors in Japan. The price score averages out those variations. So, while it is a good overall indication of how an insurance policy is priced, you may still find a better deal for your circumstances.
How we calculate the cover score
To calculate the overall cover score for each policy we look at what the policy covers, as well as the limits and conditions of these benefits.
Summary of cover we assess
Each cover feature is grouped into one of six sections and each section has its own weighting relative to the total cover score.
| Section | International policy weighting | Domestic policy weighting |
|---|---|---|
| Medical cover | 47% | 0% |
| Additional expenses | 10% | 19% |
| Cancellation | 18% | 33% |
| Amendment (travel delays and interruptions) | 5% | 10% |
| Baggage cover | 17% | 33% |
| Rental car | 3% | 5% |
Calculating a score for each individual feature
Each of these sections are made up of multiple individual features. These individual features are assigned a score out of ten according to how they measure against a market-wide benchmark. The features are then assigned their own weighting to determine how much they contribute to the section score.
The individual feature scores are calculated by taking into account the following:
- Coverage: Does the policy cover this feature at all? If a specific cover is included, the policy scores ten. If it's an optional extra, then the score is five. If it is not at all available, the score is zero.
- Category limits: What is the overall benefit for this feature? If there is a good level of benefit such as 'reasonable costs' or uncapped limits, it is scored at ten. Otherwise the policy with the highest benefit limit is awarded ten and policies with no benefit limit score zero. Those with benefit limits in between are scored relative to the upper and lower limits.
- Time limits: Some cover benefits have a time limit. For example, how long your journey has to be delayed before the insurer will pay out a travel delay or baggage delay benefit. We will score out of ten according to the length of time delay that is most or least beneficial to the policy holder.
Claims experience
The whole point of an insurance policy is to give you peace of mind when things go awry. So we all want to know how the insurer will behave when it comes time to claim. Will they cover what they promised they would, or will they run you through the ringer of exclusions and loopholes to get out of paying up?
CHOICE satisfaction survey
We have 'satisfaction scores' for car and home insurance, which is a combination of customer satisfaction with claims and customer service overall. This is also listed on our home insurance comparison and car insurance comparisons. We don't get enough responses for travel insurance for it to be representative.
Claims satisfaction is the holy grail, but due to the low rate of policyholders that actually claim (particularly for travel insurance), it's very difficult to do it using a survey-based method. You need very large sample sizes so you can capture the small percentage of people that actually claimed on their policy.
But those large sample sizes jeopardise control of how representative the sample population is (i.e. for gender, age, state etc). So even if you can afford to survey using large sample populations, you end up with a dodgy set of data.
User reviews
Anecdotal user reviews can be useful as a general indication of what to look for in insurance, that's why CHOICE has a user review function for the products on our site. But they are a poor indication of the overall performance of an insurer.
- No one buys an insurance policy for fun (it's what we refer to as a 'grudge purchase'), so people are far more likely to report a poor experience than a satisfactory experience. It doesn't mean no one had a good experience with the insurer, it just means they're less likely to tell anyone about it.
- User reviews are susceptible to manipulation. Insurers might offer incentives for people to post positive user reviews, or they might just post fake reviews to make themselves look good (we've caught them doing it), or make their competitors look bad.
- User review sites like Product Review don't include a measure of the number of complaints relative to the number of policies issued.
Complaints data
We used to score insurers on their performance in handling complaints, using data from the Financial Ombudsman Service. The Australian Financial Complaints Authority now compiles data about insurance complaints, and it publishes a dashboard summarising the complaints they receive. Unfortunately this data isn't reported as a proportion of policies issued, but instead as absolute complaint numbers. This tells us that insurers that issue more policies get more complaints, but doesn't indicate how likely you are to have a problem with your insurer.
Actual claims data
The best way to get accurate claims data would be if ASIC mandated claims reporting and made this public, as it does with life insurance. ASIC is in the process of developing a data collection process for claims handling. When this data is published, we'll know things like what percentage of claims are accepted, and how long, on average, an insurer takes to settle a claim.
We're on your side
For more than 60 years, we've been making a difference for Australian consumers. In that time, we've never taken ads or sponsorship.
Instead we're funded by members who value expert reviews and independent product testing.
With no self-interest behind our advice, you don't just buy smarter, you get the answers that you need.
You know without hesitation what's safe for you and your family.
And you'll never be alone when something goes wrong or a business treats you unfairly.
Learn more about CHOICE membership today
Stock images: Getty, unless otherwise stated.
