Medical Insurance!

I DID IT! Earlier this week I finally 'bit the bullet' and bought my medical insurance at long last!

*WARNING: This post is by no means a recommendation or advice page, just simply a post about who I went with and why. Please make sure to do your own research and get the best cover for you*

Brief Summary of Medical Insurance with relation to doing the Disney Cultural Representative Program:

It is worth knowing that Disney require you to be covered for the first 120 days as stated in your acceptance letter:

WALT DISNEY WORLD® Resort and its affiliated companies provide health and life insurance for employees; however, this coverage does not take effect until the first day of the month following completion of one hundred twenty (120) days of continuous service. It is mandatory that you insure yourself at least until this date and you must provide proof of insurance upon your arrival in Orlando.

As I am flying out on the 19th July 120 days from this point takes you to Nov 15th, BUT as stated above Disney will only protect you from the 1st day of the month following completion of the 120 days of continuous service. So I cannot be without cover whilst I wait for the 1st Oct so I have to get 5 months cover starting 19th July-30th November (STA also only work in whole months).

So who did I decide to go with and why?

I decided to go with the company STA Travel/Yummy Travel.

I went with them as they work in partnership with Yummy Travel (a sub company if you like from Yummy Jobs). I felt comfortable going with them for the fact that they have insured people going on my program and others similar for several years and hence they know exactly the kind of cover that is required. Plus it helps as being a Yummy Jobs participant you are also entitled to a cheeky 10% discount (and I am ALL about discounts!). PLUS, by recommendation of people who have already done the program before, once you are on Disney's Medical Insurance apparently it is alot easier to book appointments and see a Doctor than if you are not with them, so for peace of mind I'd like to be with Disney. The only slight downside is that the money will be deducted weekly from your paycheck. Whereas if you decided to never go on Disney's insurance and booked 1 years full cover you get to pay up front and won't have to see that money being taken out every week.

How did I go about sorting it?

I first contacted STA Travel via email outlining the program that I would be doing, how long I would like cover for and they replied giving me two options that best suited the cover I required.

We have 2 different Gap year Policies to choose from - our Premier blue and Standard blue. Both the Standard and Premier provide cover for cancellation (Cancellation fees for flights, experiences and anything else pre-booked if you have to cancel for reasons such as illness), medical cover, Repatriation (for reasons such as Illness or Death of a close relative), luggage, loss of passport and tickets, emergency dental treatment.

It also covers activities such as skydiving, bungee jumping, jet skiing, kayaking, elephant trekking, zip wiring, safaris, scuba diving, yachting in territorial waters, overland expeditions and mountain biking, amongst others.

The main difference between them is that Premier provides higher levels of cover, and covers some areas which Standard does not include; such as Search and Rescue (up to £5000), Cash (up to £200), Hijack and Hostage, Travel Trade Indemnity and Government travel restrictions. Also, it covers some activities standard doesn't cover such as shark cage diving, Black Water Rafting, River Kayaking, Skiing and Snowboarding, Trekking under 6000m, canyoning.

I went with the Standard Blue Policy as I'm not planning on going shark cage diving or Skiing etc. So yeah, I also better not need any search and rescue whilst I am out there and I'm praying there will be no hijack or hostage situation other than that I'm covered wahoo!

All I had to do to purchase it was contact the guy who had given me his contact number on the email, phone up confirm a few details and voilà in less than 10 minutes I was sorted!

So how much did it all cost?

So for me, 5 months Standard Blue Cover with the Yummy Jobs 10% discount PLUS I asked for the Medical Excess Waiver to be added (£14) brought my grand total to £214.70 .