I recently purchased a travel insurance policy online from Staysure in readiness for a family holiday on behalf of my elderly Father.

He has several health conditions and as a health care professional myself I understand the importance of a comprehensive cover.

Although I completed the online application on the 16/01/24, I stipulated that this was due to start on the 15/04/2024 for 1 year to ensure that my Father had the correct cover in place for our upcoming trip in April and hopefully others throughout the year.

The price was £830.66 which we believed was the cost of an annual policy however mid-April my Father printed the documentation received from Staysure only to find that the policy ran from 15/04/24 (which was the start date I had stipulated), finishing on the 08/05/24 on our return from Portugal consequently we contacted Staysure to query this as I was adamant due to the price of the initial quotation this was for an 'annual policy'. I certainly wouldn't have paid such a large amount for 1 single trip to Portugal!

Staysure insisted that the policy was for a single trip only. We reluctantly accepted their decision but requested the cost of upgrading this to an annual policy for which then they refused and subsequently told us that they could no longer cover even the single trip (cover from 15/04/24-08/05/24) with the policy we had already paid for back in January despite having documentation from Staysure to confirm medical acceptance of all pre-existing conditions.

I must confirm there has been no change in my Father's pre-existing health conditions and everything documented on the original application was the same, in fact in terms of my Father's CLL (Chronic Lymphatic Leukaemia) his bloods were in fact better than they have ever been and have continued to improve.

As the cover had not yet started when we made contact we were prepared as they were cancelling to accept a full refund and shop elsewhere to obtain the appropriate cover however on the 15/04 after various correspondence and conversations in the week prior to I was told the underwriter had finally agreed to refund 60% of the policy cost but this was to be referred to Staysure’s pricing department. I then spoke to Kay at Staysure to follow up yet again on the 17/04 to be told an urgent email had now been sent to the senior customer service team.

Gem, another member of the Staysure Team emailed me on 18/04/24 to confirm the policy had been cancelled & a refund would be processed which we would receive within 5 working days. We were told we would receive only £196.74 as we had paid in full for the policy when purchased on 16/01/24.

We requested a breakdown calculation as to how they calculated the refund to be emailed the following:
If the policy was cancelled on 12/04/2024 , the refund amount would be £196.74.
Please see the calculation below.
Refund = ((£830.66-£0)*(27/114))+£0 = £196.74

My point is that as we had contacted Staysure prior to the cover start date, having already being in receipt of our money for almost 3 months how can they justify making such a huge deduction for a trip that hadn't even began! I know for a fact I selected an annual policy; it is simply their word against mine and I believe this to be a case of total mis selling! I would never have agreed to paying such a huge amount for a single trip policy but then for them to turn round & say they wouldn't even cover my Father for the 'single trip' that we already had paid for and have documentation to proof their acceptance of his medical conditions is wrong on so many levels.

I only wish I had looked at Staysure’s reviews prior to proceeding!! It seems lots of people are finding themselves in similar positions.