Ever tried to get something out of a travel insurance company?
I had a motorbike crash in spain and had to be rushed to hospital, patched up, slung into bed with a broken knee and hands too bruised to put any weight on (eventually both turned out to be broken too). Astoundingly, despite being passed out most of the time at the side of the road, I had managed to scoop up my insurance documents, and gave them a call as soon as I could get someone to manhandle me into a wheelchair, to say I needed their help.

The so called emergency helpline were not so helpful though. Various people repeatedly told me that I had to continue my holiday, and it was not their job to get me home just because I'd had an accident, despite the fact that I couldn't move without help and the spanish hospital wanted to get me on a plane home as soon as possible so they could use the bed. When I tried to tell tham about how my injuries made that impossible, they'd write it down and promise to call back, but never did. When I called back the information would have mysteriously vanished

Ok I was up to the eyeballs in morphine so not as forceful as normal, but you'de hope they'd be trained for that. It took my sister, a forceful exec type, flying down to Spain and rescuing me, calling the insurers every hour on the hour, faxing documents to them repeatedly and literally carrying me into a hotel when the hospital chucked me out, to get anything out of them.

Eventually they sent out a nurse and flew me home on a stretcher in state, but it makes you wonder what would have happened if I hadn't have got the documents.

Did they refund my sister's unnecesary, last minute and stupidly expensive flight that she wouldn't have had to take if they had done their job properly? Of course not, because it wasn't a direct cost relating to the accident. Nor the hotel bill while we waited for them to organise the flight.
(sticks Errol flynn in female form, Sat 14 May 2005, 22:53, Reply)