An arm and a leg

Brian wrote on 06/08/2009 at 22:57 from (47.525054, -122.048447)

Nothing works quite so well to suppress excitement as buying insurance. It's not the cost or the tedious process that's offputting so much as it is the graphic detail in which policies describe what is or is not covered.

While Marijana is wrapping up her obligations in Croatia, I spent the weekend trying to take care of some of the hurdles we need to clear before we leave. I researched credit unions, credit cards, immunization requirements, and travel insurance.

The travel insurance, I think, was the most amusing of an otherwise boring bunch of weekend tasks. Sure, the thought of moving away from our bank (Chase appears to suck even worse than Washington Mutual did) is liberating, and the seemingly endless comparison between the various fees (foreign transaction fees, network fees, annual fees, advance fees, interest rates, and so very many more) associated with credit cards was fascinating in some strange, shameful way.

However, nothing compares to the bizarre fun of parsing the fine language of insurance policies. The simple act of reading the pages-long lists of exceptions and partially-covered accidents invariably led me to ask, "So what does this plan cover?" for every single insurance policy.

For instance, if my hand is severed below the wrist, well some plans just don't cover that.

But what if it's cut off above the wrist?

Of course that's covered! What a silly question.

And on it goes, with no explanation for why the loss of all my fingers is acceptable, but the loss of my wrist joint is a tragedy. The level of detail to which some of the exceptions went was at once gruesome and amusing. Suicide and war are obviously excluded, but also singled out are such odd pairings as nuclear disasters, scuba diving, and "pollution" (and no, I still have no idea what that means).

I get it that the exclusions are to prevent fraud or excessive claims due to stupidity. But really, how is it sane that something so ridiculous as the location of my dismemberment matters? If I'm hospitalized by "pollution", how is that any less of an ailment (or less accidental) than traveler's diarrhea or altitude sickness?

For the most part, we're buying travel insurance because other travelers insist upon it, not because it looks like a good deal. Based on my reading of the policies, there are so many loopholes by which the insurers could dodge paying on a claim, we're just going to have to trust to history (in this case, good reviews by previous clients) and take a little leap.

Ah well. Here's hoping we never have cause to use it...