If things go awry while you’re traveling, you’ll be glad you booked your trip — and its associated expenses — with a card that has travel protection. Fortunately, many rewards credit cards offer complimentary coverage as long as you pay for prepaid, non-refundable travel expenses with the card.
For example, the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card is a popular travel rewards card with a reasonable $95 annual fee. Its great travel benefits include trip cancellation and interruption insurance and trip delay reimbursement.
This protection provides a significant level of coverage that can prevent the need to purchase separate travel insurance. With Sapphire Preferred, if your trip is delayed by 12 hours or more — or if you need to book overnight accommodations — you’re covered for related expenses, up to $500 per ticket.
Let’s examine the coverage you get with travel rewards cards, using the benefits of Sapphire Preferred as our primary example. Remember that protections and coverage vary from card to card, so carefully review the fine print of the specific card you hold (or plan to apply for) before booking your next adventure.
Trip cancellation and interruption insurance
First, let’s quickly go over trip cancellation and interruption insurance Sapphire preference, indicated by Chase:
“If your trip is canceled or shortened due to illness, severe weather and other covered conditions, you will receive up to $10,000 per person plus your pre-paid, non-refundable travel expenses, including passenger fares, tours and hotels.”
If the airline, hotel or tour operator does not refund you for your prepaid travel expenses, you can file a claim under trip cancellation and interruption insurance to get compensation for these expenses.
Note that you will not be reimbursed for any new tour accommodation due to cancellation or interruption.
Related: Best Travel Insurance Policies and Providers
Trip delay compensation
Conditions are the same for trip delay compensation Opt for Sapphire:
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“If your common carrier trip is delayed more than 12 hours or requires an overnight stay, you and your family are covered for incidental expenses such as meals and lodging up to $500 per ticket.”
Like trip cancellation and interruption insurance, trip delay policies only offer compensation for specific expenses, defined as “reasonable additional expenses incurred for food, lodging, toiletries, medicines and other personal use items due to the delay.”
Therefore, you can expect to be compensated for the essential items you have to purchase as a result of the delay. However, this does not mean that you can book a new flight on a different carrier and still get a refund.
Remember to keep in mind the $500 limit per ticket.
Related: Flight Canceled or Delayed? Here’s what to do next
Will trip insurance cover the cost of my new flight?
In short, the answer is no. Whether you file a claim under trip cancellation and interruption insurance or trip delay compensation, you will not be reimbursed for the new airfare.
That means if you buy $100 If a United flight is canceled (or delayed) and you purchase another $300 flight on Delta instead, the cost of the new Delta airfare will not be covered for reimbursement.
I learned this the hard way on a solo trip to Europe when my flight from Italy to Greece was cancelled. I rebooked and thus re-departed myself from an airport two hours away.
After purchasing a new flight, boarding a bus and waiting patiently in the terminal for the next flight, I attempted to file a claim on my Chase Sapphire Preferred.
This may sound frustrating, but trip cancellation and interruption insurance will still reimburse you for prepaid, non-refundable expenses.
Related: How to quickly reach airline customer service
The bottom line
It’s great that many travel credit cards come with benefits like trip cancellation and interruption insurance and trip delay reimbursement, but it’s important to read the terms and conditions to know exactly what these benefits do and don’t cover.
While these protections may be sufficient for most travelers, those who want more coverage should seriously consider purchasing travel insurance that offers more protection or “cancel for any reason” coverage.
RELATED: New airline rules go into effect — here’s what you need to know