Irish Living in Australia and looking for travel insurance

MadMardegan

My first year in Australia has just come to an end and my insurance (with 123.ie) has just ran up also.

I emailed them asking was it possible to renew my policy but apparently they won't offer me cover because I've been out of the country for more than 6 of the last 12 months.

So now I'm without cover and I'm trying to sort it out asap.

Does anyone know if any Irish companies will insure me while I'm over here? Or know of any other companies that I can get cover with?

A quick search of some Aussi companies are giving me quotes of 2000+ dollars which is ridiculously expensive, seeing as my previous cover only cost me 230 euro.

Thanks for any help!

coylemj

There's an implicit contradiction in the thread title, you are 'living' in Australia but you want 'travel' insurance. What are you looking to cover?

The problem as an insurance company will see is that you are now more than 12 months away from home and you still consider it 'travel' but if you have a serious accident, you potentially want them to fly you all the way back to your mammy in Ireland in an air ambulance and the longer you are away, the more likely it is that such an event will happen.

MadMardegan

coylemj wrote: »

There's an implicit contradiction in the thread title, you are 'living' in Australia but you want 'travel' insurance. What are you looking to cover?

The problem as an insurance company will see is that you are now more than 12 months away from home and you still consider it 'travel' but if you have a serious accident, you potentially want them to fly you all the way back to your mammy in Ireland in an air ambulance and the longer you are away, the more likely it is that such an event will happen.

I'm an Irish resident backpacking around Australia but am planning on taking trips to NZ, South Pacific Islands, South East Asia etc.
So yes, I'd be looking for cover to bring me, or my body, home in the event of an accident.

Sure by that logic why would an insurance company renew your car policy after several years, even if you've never had an accident? Surely there's a bigger likelihood of someone having an accident the longer they are on the roads?

munchkin_utd

maybe also post on the living abroad/australia forum as surely youre not the first person to encounter the problem

ProudDUB

MadMardegan wrote: »

I'm an Irish resident backpacking around Australia but am planning on taking trips to NZ, South Pacific Islands, South East Asia etc.
So yes, I'd be looking for cover to bring me, or my body, home in the event of an accident.

Sure by that logic why would an insurance company renew your car policy after several years, even if you've never had an accident? Surely there's a bigger likelihood of someone having an accident the longer they are on the roads?

But you are not an Irish resident. You are an Australian resident now. You stated that in your opening post. You are still an Irish citizen, but you are no longer an Irish resident. They are not the same thing.

The legal definition of residency is that you spend 6 months (or more) in a country. Once you spent 6 months and one day out of Ireland, you ceased to be an Irish resident, hence an Irish insurance company not being willing to write you up a new policy, or extend your current one past its expiration period. You don't live here anymore.

It may be your intention to return home after you have finished back packing around Asia and what not, but the insurance company won't base their decision on what your future intentions are. They'll base them on what you are doing now. And what you are doing now, is residing in a foreign county.