I’ve lived and travelled in Europe on and off for more than 18 years. I’ve travelled around Western Europe, Central Europe, Eastern Europe, the Balkans and parts of Scandinavia. In other words, I’ve travelled more or less all over the continent.
My experience is that pretty much all of Europe is safe and there is little to worry about from a safety perspective (outside of war zones and pandemic hotspots).
All the regular precautions you take in your home country should generally be sufficient to keep you safe and your travels stress-free.
European Travel Insurance
Of course that’s not what insurance is about. Travel insurance concerns cancelled flights, lost luggage, maybe a stolen camera or other personal items and the occasional unfortunate accident or illness.
Travel insurance covers you for all the unforeseen bad stuff, things that could happen anywhere, even in your hometown. Sure, worse things could happen and that’s when you really need insurance but for most of us, it’s for those smaller incidents which are out of our control.
Travelling in Europe
I must admit I travelled for a long time without travel insurance, relying on reciprocal health care agreements with Australia and the countries I was travelling to.
That was a massive risk!
Half the countries in Europe don’t even have reciprocal health agreements and of course, I was never covered for theft, loss or delayed flights.
I don’t know what possessed me to take that risk and when I mentioned it on social media one time I received so many comments of shock and horror! Rightly so.
Since then I have always taken out travel insurance and I use World Nomads for my needs, including when I was a long-term traveller.
One of the huge benefits with World Nomads is that I can renew or extend my insurance while I’m out of my home country. This won’t be important for everyone but this helped me a lot and I know this option isn’t always available with other insurers.
I also like that they have been around for a long time and continue to have an excellent reputation. As an insurance provider, I know they’re not going to be perfect but I do believe they are the best out there for most people.
Click here to book your own travel insurance for your European trip.
Are they reliable?
I’ve used World Nomads for several years now and many of my travel blogger friends use it too. I’m lucky in that I’ve yet to need to make a claim so I can’t judge it from that perspective.
But I do know people who have and they have generally had things sorted out quickly, while they were still on the road. I haven’t heard of anyone having any major issues with World Nomads.
The only problem I have heard is where the insurance didn’t cover all of their electrical items but this is clearly stated in the contract and you even have the option to pay extra for a little extra coverage (although not full coverage). Unfortunately, this is a fairly common scenario among travel insurance companies.
Buying Travel Insurance Abroad
With World Nomads you can take out insurance at any time during your trip. You don’t have to do it before you start travelling so if you forget, you can hop online and purchase a policy.
And as I said, you can renew your policy while you are on the road or extend your coverage if you need extra or to cover destinations outside of Europe.
I strongly recommend taking out travel insurance before travelling anywhere in Europe or anywhere in the world for that matter. You want to be covered from that first flight or train.
Don’t risk your health or belongings.
Click here to get a quote from World Nomads as a starting point, fill in the form when you’re ready and remember to save your account login information for the future. You don’t need to download the policy but you can save the confirmation in your email for extra peace of mind if you like.
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Recommendations on the blog are independently chosen based on personal travel experiences and extensive research. This post contains affiliate links to travel insurance in Europe. This means I get a small commission from any bookings at no extra cost to you.