By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile 

If you’re traveling to a foreign country you need to have private travel insurance.  You probably know that. But if you have a medical condition, or need to take drugs, or are under the care of a doctor, can you get coverage without breaking the bank? Yes.  But here’s what you need to know.

Many travel insurance companies say they will cover pre-existing medical conditions. But you can’t take that claim at face value. It’s not quite that simple.  The rules about what they cover in their policies and what they exclude vary a great deal from company to company.  But there is one rule you can be sure of—No one company covers pre-existing conditions without condition. There are limits and you need to know what they are. This knowledge is going to be very important as the new 2011/2012 snowbird season ramps up, and new insurance products, with new levels of premium pricing come into the travel insurance marketplace. Stay with us in the coming months, and we’ll be here to guide you through the new products, and make your comparisons and purchases a lot easier and more reliable. More about this later.

Each insurer has different criteria for covering your medical  conditions.  First, you need to meet specific eligibility standards, and it’s up to you to know what they are.  Usually, terminal illnesses, certain cancers, HIV/AIDS conditions, recent organ transplants, or conditions that require more than a certain number of medications, may disqualify you from even applying. But these standards vary among insurers, so if one turns you down, don’t give up, look elsewhere.

Most insurers will cover medical conditions that have been stable for a certain period of time and are well controlled by medication. But they, and not your doctors, will define what is stable and controlled.  That’s not your doctor’s decision. They may require that your condition has not shown any resurgence, or symptoms, or has not required investigation by tests, or a change in your medication, or treatment by your physician (over and above routine monitoring), or required referral to a specialist, for a given period.  That period may be 90 or 180 or 365 days.  The insurer will determine the length of the stability period. You need to know those limits.

You will be asked questions when applying for insurance.  You need to pay attention to answer them accurately and completely. This is not a formality. Insurers need to know your health status before they can assume the risk of covering you. If you’re not sure about certain symptoms, or medication changes, or why you were referred for tests, ask your doctor. Not nearly enough applicants ask their doctor for assistance when applying for health insurance, and as a result end of having the pay the full hospital bill because their insurer denies their claim.

Insurers will go a long way to cover people with pre-existing conditions.  Most applicants, especially those in their “mature” years, have some ailments that need medical attention or monitoring.  And if insurers are to remain competitive, they must have products for the full marketplace, not just for young, healthy, athletes.

This year, close to one million Canadians over the age of 55 will make extended out-of-country trips.

That’s a huge market. Insurer’s plan to capture every slice of it. That benefits you.  But you have to know the rules and you must abode by them. A travel insurance policy is a contract between two parties—the issuer, and the applicant. Both have responsibilities and obligations.  When the risk being covered can amount to six figures—you better know where you stand.

The high loonie will help to moderate the price of insurance to you.  But the soaring cost of foreign hospital care—especially in the U.S.—will put a lot of pressure on insurers who have to pay the hugely expensive medical bills submitted by American hospital providers.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. Most will cover pre-existing conditions that are stable and controlled. Insurance plans offered on TIF are provided by Ingle International, a brokerage that represents many of Canada’s major travel insurance administrators and underwriters. For further information about any of the products offered, visit the Insurance Products page or Contact Ingle at: 1 877-455-3541

By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile.

U.S. hospitals, especially those in high tourism areas such as Florida and Las Vegas, are getting tough on foreign patients, demanding deposits for treatment services, and calling in debt collectors if bills are not paid on time and as submitted. This is no time to neglect travel insurance.

Faced with shrinking, or negative, operating margins, many American hospitals are being forced to pursue revenues wherever they can.  The threat of pending health care reform, AKA Obamacare, is not helping, as it only raises the specter of further cuts in government reimbursements.

Consequently, many hospitals in areas catering to foreign tourists are hiring international and U.S.-based collection “specialists” (that’s the most charitable word I can use), to take over the billing of any patient who appears to be a non-U.S. resident. Normally that bill is first sent to the patient’s insurer and settled right then. But glitches happen, and you need to know of the possibilities.

Health insurers, including international travel insurers, normally get very substantial discounts on hospital bills—so long as they pay quickly and their clients (that’s you) are properly identified as qualified for those discounts on their insurance cards. But if those conditions are not met (perhaps the insurer disputes some charges, or your identification as a qualified patient can’t be verified) the collectors may nullify those discounts and demand full payment of you. They do this because you’re the most vulnerable party and they know that you will put pressure on the insurer to pay up—even if their demands may be unjustified. And because these collectors make their money on the percentages of recoveries they make for the hospital, they will use every trick in the book to get as much as they can—from you or your insurer.

In addition, many hospitals, those in the Las Vegas area being the best examples, now demand very substantial deposits—perhaps $2000 or $3000, based on what they are going to do to you—before you are discharged. By law, they must treat you for any medical emergency, whether you are insured or not. But that does not prevent them from hovering over you as you are being wheeled to or from the emergency room, “requesting” your signature on a credit card or other form of promissory note.

Your best defense is to carry your proof of insurance card, which contains an emergency number by which hospital admissions clerks can verify your verify your coverage, and which also contains the imprint of an emergency service or insurance carrier under which your coverage is guaranteed.

It’s best to carry your full policy with you. There are more than 1,500 different health insurance companies hospitals have to deal with, so don’t expect them to recognize your company instantly.

Obviously, if you are traveling without supplementary insurance—with only your provincial health plan as proof of coverage—you are in for a tough time, and you better have a lot of excess credit attached your card. I just recently saw a claim for $115,000, of which $42,000 was paid by the insurer as per its contractual agreement with the hospital. When the payment was made 48 hours late (because of a holiday weekend) the hospital’s collector went after the patient for the rest. Don’t let that happen to you.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. Most will cover pre-existing conditions that are stable and controlled. Insurance plans offered on TIF are provided by Ingle International, a brokerage that represents many of Canada’s major travel insurance administrators and underwriters. For further information about any of the products offered, visit the Insurance Products page or Contact Ingle at: 1 877-455-3541

By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile

Canadian snowbirds who own property in Texas’ Rio Grande region should keep an eye out for tropical storm Don, now headed directly for the south Texas coast. It’s not expected to become a hurricane, but have some of your Texas friends check it out for you anyway.

The emergence of Don, in the Gulf of Mexico, is a stark reminder that with the advent of August, we are entering hurricane prime time—from now to the end of September. This has implications not only for Canadian property owners in south Texas (Edinburg, Weslaco, Pharr, Donna, Harlingen, anywhere north of Brownsville), but the entire perimeter of Florida—the Gulf as well as Atlantic coasts, and the Caribbean basin as well. And if you’re planning a trip to these areas or any other coastal states in the eastern U.S., make sure you have trip cancellation/interruption insurance locked into your travel and accommodation reservations: it can protect the investment you may have tied up in your advance bookings.

You can get trip cancellation insurance from most travel insurance companies that also sell travel health insurance, as well as from agents and brokers, motor leagues, travel agents, the many associations that offer insurance benefits to their members, and—for your convenience—you can examine trip cancellation policies and buy them directly, online, right from this site.  Our advertisers represent most of the major travel insurance providers across Canada.

But when buying trip cancellation insurance, examine the policy well or discuss it thoroughly with your agent: this is a product that has exclusions and limitations on what it will cover, and you have to know that going in.  For example, if you have booked a trip at a resort, it may only cover your prepaid cost if more than one third of your trip has been cancelled out.  And then there are also dollar limits on how much the insurer will pay for any such incident.  This is still a substantial recovery, but you need to know the terms.

Also understand that trip cancellation/interruption insurance will only cover deposits or other payments you have already paid out that are not reimbursable by the tour operator, or air or cruise line or resort.

It will not pay for loss of your “dream vacation” or your anticipated pleasure or inconvenience.  But it will cover much of the hard cash you have spent on booking that trip.  And given the cost of trips these days, that is certainly worth the price of the premium.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents and most provide trip cancellation/interruption benefits to cover hurricane disturbances and other weather related events. You can buy online or get more information on each plan by visiting our Insurance Products section or click on the logos of insurers down the side of the homepage.

By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile.

With the Canadian dollar soaring higher above the moribund American greenback, fall and winter tourism to the U.S. sunbelt, the Caribbean and Mexico, will likely break all records with price offerings you’re not likely to see again. Take advantage of it. We’ll keep you posted on what to look for.

According to the Conference Board of Canada, tourism prices to the U.S. sunbelt and the Caribbean and Mexico, which have been low over the past several years due to a slowdown of American tourism will still be low this year, but are expected to pick up once the American market regains its economic strength and Americans start travelling abroad again.  Increasing oil prices will also force resort and tour operators to raise their prices in future.

In addition, hotel and resort destinations in Las Vegas and the U.S. south, which have been significantly hurt by the U.S. recession, are offering well-priced deals to those booking ahead.  These deals look even better if you’re buying with your strong Canadian dollar. This currency advantage extends to tourism properties in other countries that usually count heavily on American tourism but have been forced to drop their prices to be more competitive.

As you do your shopping over the next few weeks or months, also stay vigilant for travel insurance early- bird specials that offer coverage plans for pre-season discounts.  Insurers need to keep their cash flow up during the off season and they’re often willing to keep prices lower to do it.  Take advantage, but please understand that if you lock in a price on a given plan, you must tell your insurer about any change in your health status that occurs after you buy your policy. That means any change: even if you think it insignificant—like a change in medication, a surge or return of symptoms, a referral for medical tests. Insurers grant you coverage on the basis of your health at the time you leave on your trip. If that is different from your health status when you filled in your application, you must tell your insurer.  If not, and you have a claim while on your trip, your insurer can invalidate your policy and leave you responsible for your medical costs.

So by all means get the best plan you can at the most advantageous price, and do it early.  But understand your obligations.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. You can buy online or get more information on travel or expatriate insurance by visiting our Insurance Products section or click on the logos of insurers down the side of the homepage. Ask about early-bird special prices.

By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile.

As we have urged travellers for many months, crossing into another country is a privilege not a right and is made infinitely easier if all your documentation is in order and you cooperate fully with both U.S. and Canadian border crossing officials. Don’t waste their time. Have your documentation ready and in order. Know the rules and comply.

According to The Canadian Press, Canadians returning home from the United States by car are being forced to undergo closer inspection—“ironically because of stricter U.S. security demands.”

The report, citing a newly-released government border crossing evaluation, links the tighter land-border scrutiny to Canadian government negotiations over a controversial perimeter security deal with the U.S.  The talks are part of a larger program called the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative imposed by the U.S. in the wake of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The point of that program is to safeguard crossing procedures between western hemisphere countries while strengthening security measures.

The CP reports that more than 190,000 people and almost $2 billion in goods cross the Canadian/U.S. border daily, and millions of Canadians have obtained passports and other security identification documents to comply with new and emerging border crossing regulations.

The evaluation notes that the fact more travellers are carrying detailed documents makes it easier for Canadian and U.S. border agents to check them out against police and intelligence databases. As a result, however, the number of people referred by Canadian officials for secondary inspection has increased by about 12 percent since the program was implemented and that has added to the overall delays.

The proposed North American perimeter security deal is ultimately designed to allow for a smoother flow of traffic across the common border,” said the CP report, but apparently it will take some time before that goal is met.

For most people, border crossing into the U.S. or back into Canada will remain a relatively simple procedure, although it may take a little more time. That’s part of the price we all pay for maintaining our security in dangerous times.

You can make it easier on yourself and border officials if you know the rules, have your documents in order, cooperate with the agents, and consider if it’s really worth carrying household food stuffs across the border just to save yourself some lunch money.  And think twice about stuffing your golf bags full of Canadian Club when returning from Florida or Arizona.

And don’t forget your travel insurance documents.  They are good proof of your intentions as a visitor and that you plan on returning home by a designated time. By all means carry your full policies with you.  They may help you at the border and if you need to be admitted to a U.S. hospital for a medical emergency.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. Most will cover pre-existing conditions that are stable and controlled. Insurance plans offered on TIF are provided by Ingle International, a brokerage that represents many of Canada’s major travel insurance administrators and underwriters. For further information about any of the products offered, visit the Insurance Products page or Contact Ingle at: 1 877-455-3541

By Milan Korcok, Editor, Travelinsurancefile.

Because Canada’s acute care hospital capacity is lower than that of almost every other industrialized nation, don’t expect that your travel insurer can always air ambulance you home after you’ve suffered a medical emergency while on vacation in the U.S. or some other foreign country. They’ll try their best, but it doesn’t always work.

Earlier this year, for example, a Toronto area resident who suffered a heart attack in St. Louis, Missouri, was forced to lie in a hospital bed in that city for 10 weeks because neither the health ministry nor hospital admissions personnel in the entire metro area could find a spare bed for him.  No matter how hard the insurer tried, the health ministry said it couldn’t help, that such placement was the insurer’s job, and hospital personnel said their emergency rooms were full, it was flu season.  Finally an opening appeared at North York General hospital, and the patient was repatriated by air, after his family spent thousands of dollars travelling back and forth to St. Louis to be with their husband and father, and the insurer got stuck with a huge hospital bill.

Travel insurance is designed and priced to cover unforeseen medical emergencies, not recuperative care.  That’s why insurers always prefer to handle the emergency, stabilize the patient, and if they still need care, get them to a hospital in their home community, even if they have to use an expensive air ambulance to do it.

But repatriation is often easier said than done because Canada has one of the lowest acute care hospital bed capacities in the industrialized world, and many of its hospital emergency rooms operate in crisis mode much of the year.

For example, among the 34 countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) the average acceptable emergency room occupancy rate is 75 percent. In Canada, the average is over 90 percent, and often exceeds 100 percent. At that rate, patients must be left in hallways, treatment times become much longer, and hospital inpatient beds gets backed up and incoming patients often must be deflected to other hospitals.  Sound familiar?

Here’s another statistic: of 34 countries in the OECD, Canada is second last in terms of acute care hospital bed capacity at 1.8 beds per 1000 population; that’s just a shade better than Mexico at 1.6. All other countries have higher acute care hospital bed ratios. By comparison, Germany’s acute care bed per 1000 population ratio is 5.7, France 3.5; U.S. 2.7; Australia 5.6; and Japan 8.1.

With that kind of hair’s breadth margin, you can understand why getting Canadians back home to hospital beds in their own country, beds they paid for through their taxes all their lives, can sometimes be a tough job. At least you know who not to blame.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. You can buy online or get more information on travel or expatriate insurance by visiting our Insurance Products section or click on the logos of insurers down the side of the homepage.

By Milan Korcok, Editor, TravelinsuranceFile

Retired Canadians permanently living out of the country are not qualified to receive provincial health benefits, even though they may hold property or do their banking and financial business there, or have long-standing family connections in Canada. Canadian citizenship is no guarantee of medicare coverage.

If you live abroad year-round, in Mexico, the U.S. sunbelt, the Caribbean, Europe or elsewhere, your options for obtaining comprehensive medical coverage are limited.  You need to do your research.  One thing though is certain: do not look for out-of-country health care coverage from Canada, even though you have taxes for it all your life.

Once you cease to be a legal resident of your home province—which means you have not physically resided there for the required six months in the year (five for Ontario and four for Newfoundland),– you will have lost your eligibility for Canadian medicare. You must then look to your new home country for domestic insurance (if available) or search out expatriate insurance on the international market.  Several of the insurers advertising on this site offer such coverage.  It is more inclusive than travel insurance, but also more expensive.

Mexico, for example, does offer some private forms of health insurance for expatriates from other countries, but you need to investigate it carefully for limitations and exclusions as well as for coverage of continuing care for chronic conditions, pre-existing conditions, health checkups, diagnostic services and the choice of  hospitals and doctors.

In the U.S., private insurance for seniors not qualified for U.S. Medicare is virtually impossible to get on the domestic market no matter how much you are willing to pay. If you plan on living permanently in the U.S. (provided you have a green card or other immigration authorization to do so) you need to go to international insurers for comprehensive expatriate products and you need to do this ahead of time. Do not think you can move to the U.S. and easily buy health insurance for the long term if you are not a legal permanent resident.

Similarly in Europe, you will need some guarantee of private health insurance coverage before you can get a visa to spend extended periods there. But you need to investigate this carefully before you make your plans to purchase a condo or villa.

In fact, the best rule of thumb I can offer is: before you consider buying property or committing to residing abroad permanently, get your health insurance confirmed.

Once you lose your provincial coverage, you cannot fly back to Canada for medical treatment and immediately reclaim your medicare benefits.  You will have to be physically present as a resident for at least three months before those benefits can be re-instated. Until then, you will be treated as a foreign visitor, paying the retail rates that Canadian hospitals charge foreigners–$4,000 to $5,000 or more per day.

Living abroad takes a lot of planning. You can’t just pick up and go.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. You can buy online or get more information on travel or expatriate insurance by visiting our Insurance Products section or click on the logos of insurers down the side of the homepage.

By Milan Korcok,  Editor,  TravelinsuranceFile.

Bookings have begun for next winter’s Caribbean cruises and it’s going to be a busy year. But when shopping for travel insurance, stay away from the products sold by cruise lines, and buy only from companies specializing in travel health and trip cancellation products.

This is especially important for Canadians sailing out of U.S. ports because the in-house cruise company insurance, often sold as part of the trip package, is grossly inadequate for your health needs because it is tailored for the average American passenger. Most Americans who have domestic health insurance from their working place or their retirement plan have some coverage for out-of-area emergency care and so the cruise line insurance provides only low supplemental health benefits–$10,000 to $25,000 in most cases.

For Canadians this won’t do because provincial health plans cover only a puny share of out-of-country health emergencies—sometimes not even 10 percent, depending on your province.  Consequently, most Canadian private travel insurance plans provide $1 million and $5 million of emergency health coverage, and they also include air ambulance repatriation to a hospital at home and direct payments to foreign hospitals and doctors, which American plans do not; neither do in-house cruise line plans.

Remember, that when travelling through the Caribbean, should you become ill and need to be offloaded in a foreign port or airlifted to the closest U.S. hospital, your bills could run into the thousands of dollars per day.  And if end up in a hospital in Aruba, Trinidad or St. Thomas, it will be up to you to arrange your travel home and pay for it, if you don’t have a repatriation benefit.

Fortunately, virtually all Canadian single-trip or annual multi-trip plans will provide you the coverage you need for your cruise, just as they would cover you on dry land in Florida, Arizona or Texas. In fact, if you are taking a cruise as part of your longer term winter vacation, the insurance you already have, will do the job for you. No need to pay for additional coverage from the cruise line. Your bills will only be paid once.

And if you’re combining trip cancellation benefits with your health coverage, which you should do to cover such a large investment that won’t kick in until the winter months, make sure you understand the limitations and exclusions of the plan.  It is subject to pre-existing conditions exclusions and limitations on what is reimbursable.  For example, it will not pay you for a cruise cancellation or interruption if the cruise liner offers you a free trip voucher on another cruise and you don’t want to use it.  It will only cover non-refundable, prepaid funds you have already put out, and out-of-pocket costs if you are stranded or waiting for alternate transportation—and then only up to certain limits. So read your policy well. It’s still a travel necessity, but one you need to verify.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents and all provide trip cancellation benefits and cruise ship coverage. You can buy online or get more information on each plan by visiting our Insurance Products section or click on the logos of insurers down the side of the homepage.

TORONTO, ONTARIO–(Marketwire – July 6, 2011) - With the 2011 hurricane season heating up, the Travel Health Insurance Association of Canada (THIA) urges all vacationers heading to the southern and eastern United States, or into the Caribbean region, to obtain trip-cancellation/interruption insurance to protect against the possibility of storms wiping out their travel investments.

David Hartman, president of THIA, says that trip cancellation/interruption policies helped many thousands of travellers affected by volcanic ash disruptions in Europe last year and more recently in Australia and New Zealand. “Since then, trip cancellation insurance has become an essential component of insurance coverage for experienced travellers and could be just as effective for vacationers impacted by tropical storms over the next several months,” he adds.

Traditionally, hurricane season runs from June 1 to November 30, with the peak occurring during August and September, although major storms have also caused considerable personal and property damage in July and October in recent years.

Mr. Hartman emphasizes that trip cancellation/interruption policies are specifically designed to reimburse travellers for monetary losses due to trips, tours or services cancelled, delayed or interrupted because of unforeseen natural events such as bad weather, volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, wild fires, even man-made civil disturbances such as those that occurred in Egypt earlier this year.

Trip cancellation/interruption insurance normally covers:

• The prepaid, non-refundable portions of airfares, tours, hotel or resort fees, or other cancelled or interrupted trip events or services, up to limits specified in each policy.
• Accommodation, meal, telephone, ground transportation and other out-of-pocket costs for travellers stranded or delayed by missed flights or rerouting of cruise ships due to weather or other unexpected contingencies.
• 24/7 emergency assistance to help insured travellers disrupted by natural or man-made events get home safely and as quickly as possible.
• Baggage and other personal items lost to storms or other unforeseeable disruptions.

Most travel insurers in Canada offer either stand-alone trip cancellation policies or include such benefits in comprehensive travel health insurance plans, says Mr. Hartman. But he cautions that plans differ, they have limits on the amounts and the events they will cover, and travellers need to understand their policies and discuss them with their travel insurance advisors.

He also notes that trip cancellation/interruption plans need to be bought concurrently with trip purchases or very shortly thereafter. Once hurricane warnings are posted by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) or by Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (DFAIT), new trip cancellation policies will not cover losses in the affected areas.

About THIA. THIA is the national organization representing travel insurers, brokers, underwriters, re-insurers, emergency assistance companies, air ambulance companies and allied services in the travel insurance field. Its website is http://www.thiaonline.com/

By Milan Korcok, Editor, TravelinsuranceFile.

I get countless inquiries from snowbirds expressing astonishment that after spending six months in Mexico, Arizona, Jamaica or wherever, they can’t visit relatives in another province without risking loss of their medicare. Can’t even travel in Canada?  What the hell’s going on?  Well, technically, for residents of most provinces—that’s true. Read on.

Too many people, especially snowbirds, make the mistake of assuming that travel within Canada doesn’t count against their out-of-province quota; that they can only lose their medicare entitlements by overstaying their vacations while in a foreign country. Let’s make this perfectly clear:  in order to remain eligible for your provincial health insurance, you must reside and be physically present in your province for a specified time.  These are provincial rules, not federal rules.

In B.C., Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Quebec, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia you are required to be physically present in your province for at least 183 days (six months) during each calendar year. In Alberta and New Brunswick you must be present in the province for 183 days during a 12-month period (not the same as a calendar year).  In Ontario you must be present in the province for a total of five months in the previous 12.  In Newfoundland and Labrador you must be present for at least four months in the previous 12. These days can be in the aggregate (several short trips), or one long one.

If you don’t meet that in-province requirement, it is possible you might be disqualified from eligibility for your provincial health insurance. So, if you are from B.C and go to Mexico for six months and then decide you want to visit your family in another province for a month, you are in contravention of your own provincial rules. Sound crazy.  Maybe. But technically, it’s true.

Some provinces, especially Quebec, and to an extent Saskatchewan and Manitoba are more lenient than others.  Quebec allows you take short trips of up to 21 days beyond your six month quota anywhere you choose, in another province or country.  Saskatchewan says it will allow its snowbirds to take additional short trips during the summer, and Manitoba allows its residents to take additional interprovincial trips up to a total of 30 days without penalty.

Now, you can say, who will know if you take a trip to another province?  Good question.  Canada has no border guards stationed at provincial boundaries and you don’t need to get your passport stamped if you travel from Nova Scotia to Manitoba.  And that’s perfectly true.

But occasionally, people with nomadic spirits do get caught out—perhaps by a nosy neighbor, or a nasty relative, or by some other artifacts, like hospital bills sent to their home health ministry by providers in other provinces or countries. Once they are caught, they have to re-apply for eligibility and that takes at least three months of well documented residence in the province and during that time.

I suggest you don’t get panicked, and don’t become obsessive. A few days here or there probably will make no difference. But if you want to make sure you don’t break the rules, you have to know them first. And then, use commonsense and good judgment. Don’t get greedy.

We’re going to be issuing clear guidelines and updated rules for each province over the summer on our site. Make sure you tune in frequently.  Best idea is to sign on for our free email newsletter which will alert you to these updates.

All travel insurers advertising on this site meet TravelinsuranceFile’s acceptability criteria for out-of-country health benefits for Canadian residents. Most will cover pre-existing conditions that are stable and controlled. Insurance plans offered on TIF are provided by Ingle International, a brokerage that represents many of Canada’s major travel insurance administrators and underwriters. For further information about any of the products offered, visit the Insurance Products page or Contact Ingle at: 1 877-455-3541