Axa won’t pay for trip lost to cancer shock

I BOOKED a family holiday to celebrate my 70th birthday but was forced to cancel it a few weeks later because my husband was diagnosed with incurable stomach cancer.

My insurer, Axa, was very sympathetic and told me I’d be able to claim for the whole trip. I provided evidence and when I phoned I was told everything was fine.

Weeks later, a woman said I could claim only our part of the cost (even though I’d shown I had paid for the whole family). She said my children would have to claim their share from their own insurance.

I have spoken to several people and received conflicting information. Axa has told me to pay the remaining villa cost and reclaim it, but I am nervous about doing this. K. I., by email. I can only imagine the anguish you are experiencing. Your travel insurance should have eased your financial concerns. Instead, people at axa appear to have gone out of their way to make your life more difficult.

You have basically been caught up in an internal debate at axa. It is one the company is quite entitled to have, but it should never have reached your ears or affected your life in the way it has.

The Financial Ombudsman has issued guidance on how group bookings should be treated and insurers have had to clarify their approach to such claims.

Generally, if it is a group of individuals, such as a stag or hen weekend, where one person books but each pays for themselves, then each is expected to take out their own travel cover. But where it is one person booking and paying, then only that person need buy insurance.

The latter clearly fits your case. Unfortunately, axa had drafted in extra people to help with the surge in claims after Low cost Holidays collapsed, and not everyone was fully au fait with how group bookings should be treated.

axa was doing its best to improve service levels generally, but your claim got caught in the whirlwind.

It has now paid your claim in full. This includes the £2,372 for air fares and the €2,300 (around £2,050) paid for the villa. axa says the total payment should be around £4,500.

There was a further mix-up. Your insurance came with a Lloyds bank account, so axa paid some of the money into this. But you had not used the account for several years as you’d kept it for the insurance. You thought you had not been paid while axa thought it had paid you.

I am pleased to say the whole issue is now resolved. axa has also paid you £250 compensation and sent a bouquet of flowers.

a spokesman says: ‘Mrs I. was given conflicting advice about her claim for which we have apologised, and we are glad that we have now been able to settle her claim in full.’

as a final point, I would suggest that even if parents or some other benefactor is paying for the holiday, each person should get their own insurance, not least in case they have a medical problem while away. I HAVE been a customer of Virgin Media for 20 years. In August, I received an email saying I’d amended my package to include BT Sport. I hadn’t done this so rang to correct it. But Virgin said a pin number that had been entered was proof the package had been requested.

I suggested that my TiVo box (a device that records TV shows) could be faulty. I was told it was not and that it would cost £90 if an engineer called in and it proved to be OK.

C. R., Swansea. FROM your letter, I get the distinct impression that you are not the sort of person who would spend very much time watching sport, let alone subscribing to a specialist channel for it. so why couldn’t the Virgin phone operator use a little common sense and simply cancel it and refund your money?

You tell me that you input your pin to watch a recorded show. Perhaps something went wrong here, but it appears that Virgin would not accept this reasonable explanation.

Its press office has intervened and the £18.60 for BT sport has been credited to your account along with a goodwill gesture of £10.

a representative has spoken to you and you have agreed there is no need to replace your TiVo box.

However, Virgin will be happy to do so in future if necessary.