Travel Guard Insurance Reviews: Is This The Right Coverage For You?

Looking for Travel Guard Insurance reviews? You’ve come to the right place. Sometimes referred to as AIG Travel, this company provides coverage to over 6 million Americans traveling every year. And with so many singing the high praise of AIG Travel, we’ve decided to put together our own Travel Guard insurance review.

At CoverTrip, we live and breathe travel insurance. Since 2006, we’ve helped people like you compare coverage and pick the right plan for their trip. And today, we’re going to help you do just that. Keep reading to discover whether or not AIG travel insurance is right for you – or if you’re better off with an alternative! Here is a brief summary of our findings:

Summary Of Our Travel Guard Insurance Review:

Travel Guard is the travel insurance branch of AIG, one of the world’s largest insurance companies. They have incredible financial backing and are a reputable and trustworthy company.

Travel Guard has good plans with good coverage. They match various aspects of other picks for best travel insurance but lack emergency medical coverage. For this reason, I recommend similar plans that have higher travel medical coverage.

Best Alternatives to Travel Guard:

• Travel Insured International
• Trawick International
• Best Cruise Insurance Plans
• Best Family Plans
• Best Budget-Friendly Plans

Travel Guard is a long-established travel insurance company providing three plans that fit the needs of most types of travelers. They are grouped in the common “good, better best” style with Essential, Preferred, and Deluxe. Each of these plans provides the basic travel insurance that most travelers are seeking, and the coverage and benefits increase with each level.

What does Travel Guard insurance cover?

Various providers have different policies regarding what is a covered reason for trip cancellation. The higher tier you choose, the more forgiving the terms will be. As you’ll soon discover, these guys offer cancel for any reason insurance policy that many travelers love. However, Travel Guard has three levels of travel insurance plans. This is the type of policy most travelers buy to protect their trip expenses in case they need to cancel.

Like all travel insurance plans, they cover:

• Trip cancellation & interruption
• Emergency medical expenses
• Medical evacuation expenses
• Lost, stolen, or damaged baggage
• Travel delays
• Delayed baggage
• 24/7 worldwide assistance

Breaking Down The Three Travel Guard Insurance Plans

As we mentioned previously, there are three different plans you can choose from: The essential, the preferred, and the deluxe. Here are the terms of each to help you identify which best suits your upcoming trip.

Essential

This is an economy plan from Travel Guard. It has coverage for trip cancellation and interruption, plus a basic level of post-departure coverage like emergency medical, baggage, and delays. All of these coverage amounts are low. For example, the medical coverage is $15,000 and it is Secondary vs Primary. There is no optional CFAR coverage available. This is a good plan for someone who wants coverage but is on a budget.

Preferred

This is Travel Guard’s most popular plan. It offers expanded coverage over Essential, such as emergency medical coverage of $50,000. This plan has the optional CFAR upgrade available, and NOAA hurricane warning coverage which is good. However, for a similar cost, you can get $100,000 medical coverage with a plan like Worldwide Trip Protector from Travel Insured International.

Deluxe

This plan includes all the benefits of Preferred but with higher limits. Here you get $100,000 of medical coverage, but as stated above there are similar plans with this coverage for less money.

Travel Guard & Cancel For Any Reason Insurance

As we briefly touched on above, Travel Guard offers the Cancel For Any Reason (CFAR) upgrade for their Preferred and Deluxe plans. It is not available with their budget-friendly Essential plan.

A few companies, such as Allianz, do not offer this upgrade. Travel Guard offering it with the mid and high-tier plan is a good thing. Since this is an optional upgrade, it costs extra. Travel Guard’s CFAR upgrade tends to be less expensive than competitors. But their plans are also slightly more expensive so the difference is not as large.

Most major companies offer CFAR as an upgrade to at least some of their plans. This coverage extends your cancellation coverage. Instead of just coverage for the covered reasons for cancellation, it covers everything.

Travelers like the peace of mind this coverage provides. It gives you a lot of flexibility in canceling your trip and still getting most of your money back.

Travel Guard Insurance for Covid

In this day and age, a highly-anticipated trip can end before it begins with COVID-19 affecting travel. The feeling of not only being sick and missing your most anticipated trip of the year – but also knowing you’re out thousands of dollars – can be soul-crushing. Thankfully, you won’t have to worry about the financial aspect when you’re insured through Travel Guard.

Travel Guard covers Covid as they do any other unexpected illness. This means you are covered for cancellation if you get Covid before departure and need to cancel. You are also covered on your trip if you get Covid and need medical care.

What does United & Frontier Airlines Travel Guard Insurance Cover?

Travel Guard is a popular partner with several travel suppliers like United Airlines and Frontier Airlines. When you check out, they offer you a “flight protection” plan– usually for a very small amount of money.

I always recommend buying insurance separately from your travel supplier. This is true for a cruise line, Disney, airlines, Kayak, Expedia, or tour companies. Here is why:

First, these are often stripped-down versions of travel insurance. The coverage and limits are adjusted to keep the costs low. Travelers might think they are getting full “travel insurance”. But it’s often just covering the cost of that airline ticket and nothing else.

Second, you aren’t in the mindset of insurance. You’re booking your trip. It is smart to take the time to figure out what you need to cover, and the best way to do it. This way you are not spending money you don’t need to spend. Or even worse, think you are getting coverage that you aren’t.

How much is AIG Travel Guard Insurance?

Travel Guard tends to be similar in price, maybe slightly higher, to comparable plans. But, you have to keep in mind that they also have lower medical emergency coverage. Here is an example of the difference in price and coverage with two of our favorite traveling insurance providers:

Trip information: Two-week trip with a trip cost of $4,000, one traveler aged 46.

• Travel Guard Preferred ($244) – Most coverage is similar, but this plan only has emergency medical coverage up to $50,000. This is a decent amount, but for trips like cruises and travel abroad, I recommend a minimum of $100,000.
• Travel Insured Worldwide Trip Protector ($228) – Similar coverage, but the medical limit here is $100,000. This is an adequate amount of travel medical coverage for most trips.
• Trawick Safe Travels Voyager ($241) – Similar coverage, but the medical limit here is even higher at $250,000. This is more than adequate travel medical coverage for most trips.

All of the plans are a little more than 5% of the trip cost, which falls within the usual travel insurance range of 4-10%.

Travel Guard Insurance FAQs

We’ve covered virtually everything you need to know in our Travel Guard insurance review – but there are probably a few other questions you have before pulling the trigger. Here are some of the most commonly asked questions surrounding AIG Travel insurance:

Is Travel Guard a good company?

Yes, absolutely. Travel Guard has been in business for a long time, and with its acquisition by AIG became part of the largest insurance company in the world. They have ample financial backing, are reputable, and are trustworthy.

Which Travel Guard plan is best?

The best plan from Travel Guard is their Preferred plan. I always factor in value when selecting plans, and this policy has good coverage for the cost. The main shortcoming is the lower medical limit of $50,000.

Are AIG and Travel Guard the same?

Travel Guard was a standalone travel insurance company. They were purchased by AIG, one of the world’s largest insurance companies. Now, Travel Guard is the travel insurance brand within AIG. You will see them called both Travel Guard and AIG Travel Guard.

How do I make a Travel Guard claim?

You can file claims directly with Travel Guard using their main contact line at 1-800-826-5248. They will guide you in terms of what documentation you need.

Parting Thoughts On Our Travel Guard Insurance Review (The Verdict)

That concludes our comprehensive review of Travel Guard insurance. In this in-depth review you’ve learned all about AIG Travel – including:

• Company information
• Coverage provided under various plans
• Cost of coverage
• Trip cancellation coverage (specific to COVID or any other reason)
• FAQs on AIG Travel

In summary, this is a great choice for a number of travelers. As you now know, they have a wide array of different plans to choose from – each offering good coverage. They can contend with many of our other top recommendations for insurance. However, they do fall short in some areas. Namely, they lack the emergency medical coverage of some other providers. Trust us – the last thing you want is to deal with the hassle of needing higher travel medical coverage while you’re away from home.

For this reason, we’ve listed five great alternatives. But ultimately, the best way to determine who offers the best coverage for you and your unique trip is to get a quote. Start the process today and let us help you travel in confidence and peace of mind – without breaking the bank!

Want to read other reviews of popular providers to see how they stack up? One of our personal favorites is our Travel Insured International review. If you’re traveling with a number of people, you may be interested in checking out some of our group travel insurance or family travel insurance recommendations.