IT PAYS TO READ THE FINE PRINT

Ateacher in Georgia, US, recently won $10,000 — about R142,000 — by being the first person to read the fine print in her travelinsurance policy, or at least to act on its unusual instructions. Donelan Andrews, who is headed to London on holiday in September, bought travel insurance from a Florida-based company called Squaremouth.

Andrews told CBS that, as nerdy as it sounds, she always reads the fine print on contracts, policies and agreements.

This time, her diligence really paid off because hidden deep within the text of her policy — on page seven of the document, in fact — there was a rather strange line.

“If you’ve read this far, then you are one of the very few … customers to review all of their policy documentation,” it said. It included an e-mail address and said the first person who sent a mail to the address would win the prize. So Andrews did.

Squaremouth explained it had “created the top-secret Pays to Read campaign in an effort to highlight the importance of reading policy documentation from start to finish”.

“Many travellers buy insurance and just assume they’re covered if anything goes wrong, without actually reading the details,” it said.