Will you need an international 9-1-1?
A business traveler or vacationer’s worst nightmare can be needing emergency medical attention in a strange city or country, only to find that their employee benefits don’t cover them more than 100 miles from home.
Fortunately, there is a solution for this frightening , and sometimes deadly , problem available to business and vacationing travelers that guarantees them access to medical coverage beyond this distance.
According to a survey conducted by the Travel Industry Association, more U.S. business travelers are taking business trips than ever before.
The association also estimated that in 1999, 57.4 million Americans, almost 24 percent of the population, traveled to foreign destinations and an estimated 1.32 billion Americans took trips 100 miles or more away from home.
Even with this increase of travelers, most Americans continue to travel without knowledge of, or access to, qualified physicians and medical facilities along their itineraries.
Virtually none are prepared psychologically or financially to deal with bringing home a seriously ill family member or business associate.
Even crisis-ready corporations face confusion and large, unbudgeted expenses.
– Barriers To Receiving Care
Overseas access to “U.S.-style” care can be difficult at best or, in some cases, not possible. Language and cultural barriers compound such crises and few can afford the cost of an air ambulance that can run from $30,000 to $75,000 depending on the location of the patient and the type of emergency.
Unfortunately, predicaments such as these can destroy travelers emotionally, physically, and economically.
As business travel continues its upward increase, a solution is finding its way into the employee benefits departments of companies throughout the United States.
Travel assistance, an alternative to insurance, guarantees immediate access to appropriate health care anywhere in the world. If it’s not available locally, an assistance plan will get it to you, even if an air ambulance is required, with no charge back to a medical plan.
– ‘Assistance’ Vs. Insurance
“Assistance” is a term used in many other countries and refers to a service that provides help in medical emergencies. Travelers who are unfamiliar with how to obtain help far from home or in a foreign country use “assistance” instead of their regular insurance plan.
While insurance will reimburse you for medical bills, it won’t know of qualified English-speaking physicians in other countries, or how to secure hospital admission , which in most cases will be unfamiliar with an insurance plan , from a hospital that is asking for immediate cash up front from a “foreigner.”
Insurance will also not dispatch and pay for an air ambulance to relocate someone who is in a foreign medical facility not up to U.S. standards. Nor will it bring a person back to the United States under the supervision of a medical team once that person is able to travel.
These are some of the reasons there are currently more than 7 million people with travel assistance available to them through their employee benefits programs, and many companies have positioned the service as a major enhancement to these benefits.
Employees are attracted to the coverage because it is in effect during all personal, vacation and business travel.
King is a vice president of employee benefits at John Burnham & Co. Insurance Services, a private insurance brokerage.