Who Should Consider Getting Travel Insurance for Disney World? This Summer, Almost Everyone.

You might think that travel insurance is really only important if you’re traveling internationally — but you’d be wrong.

Travel insurance can be helpful no matter where you’re traveling, especially if you’re taking flights, renting a car, staying at a hotel, booking tours, and yes, even going to Disney World. And, with hurricane season underway in the southeast, having travel insurance for your summer Disney World trip might not be a bad idea.

Florida, including Disney World, is no stranger to hurricanes and tropical storms. The Atlantic Hurricane Season runs from June 1st to November 30th, and if you’re planning a Disney World trip during this time, you might want to consider purchasing travel insurance.

Disney does have a Hurricane Cancelation Policy, but there are certain qualifications that need to be met in order for that policy to be triggered. The official Disney Hurricane Cancelation Policy states:

“If a hurricane warning is issued by the National Hurricane Center for the Orlando area—or for your place of residence—within 7 days of your scheduled arrival date, you may reschedule or cancel your Walt Disney Travel Company Disney Resort Hotel Package and most room only reservations (booked directly with Disney) without any cancellation or change fees imposed by Disney. Most room-only and vacation packages can be modified, or cancelled online, including changes to travel dates.”

If a hurricane warning isn’t issued by the National Hurricane Center, but a tropical storm or other severe weather impacts your trip, you won’t be covered under Disney’s Hurricane Cancelation Policy. This can leave you out of luck if your flights are canceled or you can’t make it to Disney World for whatever reason.

But that’s where travel insurance comes in.

According to Rick Steves, travel insurance can minimize the financial risks of traveling, including things like accidents, illness, missed flights, canceled tours, theft, emergency evacuations, and in some cases — hurricanes. Not every travel insurance policy is created equally, and some may have coverage for certain things while others don’t.

Deciding whether or not you need travel insurance isn’t always easy, either. Will you actually need it? What if nothing goes wrong and you feel like you’ve wasted money? Of course, these are questions only you can answer.

Your risk factor for loss likely depends on how much of your trip has been prepaid and whether or not any of those prepayments are refundable should something go wrong and you need to cancel or are unable to make certain commitments.

There are usually five types of travel insurance: trip cancelation and interruption, medical, evacuation, baggage, and flight insurance. You can also opt for comprehensive insurance, which covers all of the above plus expenses incurred if your trip is delayed or if you miss your flight.

Insurance prices can vary wildly, but most standard policies covering emergency health care and cancelations run around 5-10 percent of a total trip, with age being one of the biggest factors in rates. Some travel insurance is reimbursement only as well, meaning you’ll pay out-of-pocket for expenses, then submit paperwork to recoup your money.

For hurricane season at Disney World, trip cancelation or interruption insurance is likely the most useful and worthwhile kind. As an example, popular travel insurance company Travelex offers an “Ultimate” plan that will reimburse up to 100% of the insured trip cost for trip cancelation and up to 150% for trip interruption.

If you’re looking for a travel agent to help with your vacation, we recommend our friends at Mouse Fan Travel. They’re experts in the field with over 20 years of vacation planning experience, and they can help take a bunch of the stress out of the entire booking process for you!

We’ll continue to be on the lookout for more updates that could impact your Disney World vacation. In the meantime, make sure you stay tuned to AllEars for the latest Disney news and more!

6 Unspoken Rules for Going to Disney World During Hurricane Season This Year

Are you heading to Disney World this year? Let us know in the comments.

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