BCA travel insurance

A

AMW

Guest
I normally take out a rescue insurance policy for my trips away, so this year with a trip to France and Switzerland in June and July. I would prefer not to have to lose my house to pay for a rescue.

I did the normal thing of sending an e-mail to to the BCA provider RBPM General Lt. This bounced so I followed the link to RBPM General Ltd, web site the link took me instead to http://www.towergate.co.uk has there been a change or buy out ?

Andrew.
 
A

AMW

Guest
After some  trawling around I found this .

"RBPM - Scheme & Specialist Insurance
From 1st November 2006 RBPM General Limited became a member of the Towergate Group of companies."

Had this slipped the BCA by ? (or me) I have e-mailed Towergate inquiring about the rescue insurance.

Andrew.
 
D

DavidGibson

Member
AMW said:
Had this slipped the BCA by ? (or me) I have e-mailed Towergate inquiring about the rescue insurance.
Click to expand...

The BCA officers concerned knew about this but - unfortunately - they did not inform anyone else. In particular, me. I do not know whose job it is in BCA to update their web site, but I have now updated the BCRA page at http://bcra.org.uk/detail/travel/ to reflect the new information.  Thanks to those of you who took the trouble to email me (as BCRA web site editor) personally to inform me of the change in circumstances.

Unfortunately, I have not been provided by BCA with any usable information with regard to an enquiries address, contact details, policy schedue for 2007, etc. and, in all honesty, I cannot put information on the BCRA web site that I do not believe to be "genuine and correct".  I do not have the time to go and complain to BCA about this - if they do not want to tell anyone about the policy its up to them!  :) 
 
O

old spot

Member
Good luck with Towergate,
I sent in a request for a quote for a caving expedition
and in reply was sent 31 pages of policy documents,
none of which answered my questions.
I never got my quote.
 
A

AMW

Guest
I have been told to have a look at the Activcard (thanks Dave) (http://www.snowcard.co.uk/pages/index.asp) this looks good as they cover "caving and potholing" there words. Although I am checking if it covers cave diving. BCA seem a bit slow in making this change public ?

Andrew.
 
S

slippery_matt

New member
Sports level 3
"For activcard.diver scuba diving at depths greater than 40 metres and diving using nitrox/trimix (subject to qualification or training with a recognised dive school) and cave diving."

http://www.snowcard.co.uk/pages/policy_activity.asp
 
whitelackington

whitelackington

New member
We BDCC are off to The Ardeche again in September, we still have not got our ordinary insurance cards from The BCA.
What chance to get caving abroad insurance through them?
 
A

AMW

Guest
Just to reinforce what has been said in a previous e-mail.

my reply from Snowcard:

Thanks for your email enquiry.

The activcard sports level 3 will cover caving and cave diving.  If you
are doing exploratory caving we would need details for the trip before
quoting.

If you need any further assistance or advice, please do contact us.

So I will go with them.
Andrew
 
Glenn

Glenn

Member
whitelackington said:
We BDCC are off to The Ardeche again in September, we still have not got our ordinary insurance cards from The BCA.
What chance to get caving abroad insurance through them?
Click to expand...


I'm currently out of the country until Friday evening, so will check when I get home, but if BDCC is Bracknell and District CC, then I seem to think that your cards were posted some time ago.

Glenn

via Speleo Vercors wifi LAN
 
menacer

menacer

Active member
AMW said:
Thanks for your email enquiry.
The activcard sports level 3 will cover caving and cave diving.  If you
are doing exploratory caving we would need details for the trip before
quoting.
Click to expand...


I Love this bit....

Dear snowcard, yes I will be doing some exploratory caving...the details for the trip are as follows....

I am going to stumble across a piece of passage in a known cave that after 2 minutes of digging will break through to a rather magnificant 4m by 4m phreatic passage approx 2km long with numerous helictities and stals decorating the walls. There will be several finely decorated side passages all of walking proportion with no dodgy boulders hanging in the roof anywhere.
At the end of one of these a canyon passage will bring me to the top of a 30m pitch with superb natural belay points and smooth walls, the decent will be simple..........etc etc etc....


Ok Ok perhaps im missing the point ..... :-[
 
D

DavidGibson

Member
whitelackington said:
We BDCC are off to The Ardeche again in September, we still have not got our ordinary insurance cards from The BCA.
What chance to get caving abroad insurance through them?
Click to expand...

To that question, as posed, and assuming you mean "Travel Insurance" the answer is "no chance whatsoever". 
BCA has never, does not and never will provide travel insurance for caving.

The travel insurance policy that is loosely described as "provided by BCA" is actually nothing of the sort. It comes from a completely independent company with whom BCA has negotiated a discount for its members. This is explained at http://bcra.org.uk/detail/travel/    OK, so BCA is not doing a very good job of promoting it, but that's another issue.

 
nickwilliams

nickwilliams

Well-known member
DavidGibson said:
AMW said:
Had this slipped the BCA by ? (or me) I have e-mailed Towergate inquiring about the rescue insurance.
Click to expand...

The BCA officers concerned knew about this but - unfortunately - they did not inform anyone else. In particular, me. I do not know whose job it is in BCA to update their web site, but I have now updated the BCRA page at http://bcra.org.uk/detail/travel/ to reflect the new information.  Thanks to those of you who took the trouble to email me (as BCRA web site editor) personally to inform me of the change in circumstances.

Unfortunately, I have not been provided by BCA with any usable information with regard to an enquiries address, contact details, policy schedue for 2007, etc. and, in all honesty, I cannot put information on the BCRA web site that I do not believe to be "genuine and correct".  I do not have the time to go and complain to BCA about this - if they do not want to tell anyone about the policy its up to them!  :) 
Click to expand...

May I say, in our defence, that were were assured by RBPM (with whom the travel insurance arrangement was originally established) that after the sale of their business to Towergate, any enquiries made to RBPM would be dealt with in the normal way.  It appears that has not in fact been the case, but Dave Judson has given them a good kicking today and I hope they will improve their peformance from now on.

Unfortunately, there is no way of us knowing whether the arrangement is working OK in practice until someone complains that it is not.

As you have already said, BCA does not and never has sold travel insurance. We could not legally do so without setting ourselves up as a broker and registering with the Financial Services Authority. (We don't sell PL insurance either, but that's another issue and I'm not going to get sidetracked by it here.)

What we have done is ensure that there is at least one provider in the market place who will provide adequate rescue cover for all types of caving expeditions. It's not the only deal in the market place and it may not be the best for many circumstances (e.g. European tourist caving), but there are other circumstances (e.g. original exploration in remote locations where there is no formal rescue organisation and the costs of self rescue need to be insured) where it is the only policy we are aware of which definitely ticks all the boxes. BCA receives a very small 'introduction' commission for leading possible purchasers to Towergate but the main reason we bother with it at all is that if we did not, there are some overseas caving activities which would probably be uninsurable.

Nick.




 
D

DavidGibson

Member
nickwilliams said:
What we have done is ensure that there is at least one provider in the market place who will provide adequate rescue cover for all types of caving expeditions. It's not the only deal in the market place and it may not be the best for many circumstances (e.g. European tourist caving), but there are other circumstances (e.g. original exploration in remote locations where there is no formal rescue organisation and the costs of self rescue need to be insured) where it is the only policy we are aware of which definitely ticks all the boxes.
Click to expand...

I'd endorse that; whilst reminding people that you should, if any doubt, do some shopping around. :)

There is a check-list on the web page - e.g. if you find a policy that covers you for the cost of rescue, does it limit this to rescue provided by an offical rescue group?  As Nick says, the BCA-arranged policy covers self-rescue, which many do not.

I'll update the web page with new contact info (now trickling in) a.s.a.p. 
 
A

AMW

Guest
The insurance cover needing extra information is a possible problem although the definition of exploration is down to semantics. We intend to lay line (don't we always  ;)) ,but if you swim to the end of an existing line you are not exploring you then lay 50M of line that is exploration. You then swim to the end of the line again (including the extra 50M) what is this counted as? (y) In reality for the trip we are on self rescue would be the only likely recourse any way.

I have used what ever flavour of cover the BCRA have offered since the early 1990,s I now think I will go with the snowcover.  Very straight forward and easy to use (all web based).
Andrew.
 
C

ChrisB

Active member
I've used Snowcard for climbing / skiing / white water paddling - very easy to use. I haven't had to claim but I haven't heard of problems from people who have.

Chris
 
paul

paul

Moderator
I've always used Snowcard when caving in Europe.

Strangely enough, when on a caving trip to Thailand a couple of years ago (including original exploration), the guy who organised it advised us to use ADAC in Germany (a sort of German AA) as he was doing.

He has been on many caving trips abroad - mostly exploration, including diving. There was an incident when, dur to injury, a caver needed to call on the services of their previous insurer (which many cavers use and still do) and they found that it was perfectly useless at the time. So after investigatinga alternatives for future trips, they came up with ADAC as an alternative and were more than happy with the cover provided. This was at the suggestion of some German cavers who were in their group and had always been happy using ADAC - who are happy to insure any EEC-based cavers.
 
Glenn

Glenn

Member
Glenn said:
whitelackington said:
We BDCC are off to The Ardeche again in September, we still have not got our ordinary insurance cards from The BCA.
What chance to get caving abroad insurance through them?
Click to expand...


I'm currently out of the country until Friday evening, so will check when I get home, but if BDCC is Bracknell and District CC, then I seem to think that your cards were posted some time ago.

Glenn

via Speleo Vercors wifi LAN
Click to expand...


whitelackington: You have not confiirmed if BDCC is Bracknell. If it is, your cards were posted on May 3rd.

Cheers,

Glenn
 
whitelackington

whitelackington

New member
Glenn said:
Glenn said:
whitelackington said:
We BDCC are off to The Ardeche again in September, we still have not got our ordinary insurance cards from The BCA.
What chance to get caving abroad insurance through them?
Click to expand...


I'm currently out of the country until Friday evening, so will check when I get home, but if BDCC is Bracknell and District CC, then I seem to think that your cards were posted some time ago.

Glenn

via Speleo Vercors wifi LAN
Click to expand...


whitelackington: You have not confiirmed if BDCC is Bracknell. If it is, your cards were posted on May 3rd.

Cheers,


Glenn
Click to expand...


Bracknell District Caving Club,
yes thankyou Glen, they arrived last week. :clap:
 
A

AMW

Guest
I have e-mailed Towergate inquiring about the rescue insurance.
Click to expand...

This was last week.

So far no reply from them, lucky I have sorted out the cover with another provider.

Andrew.
 
J

Joel Corrigan

New member
ADAC insurance were the only ones even remotely able or willing to cover me for almost 3 months of caving and cave diving in Papua New Guinea.  Certainly worth considering for more remote expeditions.  Not sure how straight forward it is to sort out though as a member of my caving club in Austria works for them and arranged everything.  My German lingo certainly isn't up to translating it all out on the internet...
 
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