UKH

It's rapidly approaching that time of year to renew my annual family alpine insurance. Looking at BMC vs Snowcard again.

Given the well publicised issues around the unavailability of BMC insurance earlier this year, what is the view on whether the BMC insurance offer is currently up to scratch?

If anybody has claimed on it this year it would be great to understand what the service is like. The one time I had to put in a claim, and needed getting home in a hurry (close relative in intensive care) they couldn't have been better. But that was 15 years ago!

Is it still good?

They were great when I needed to be repatriated after subluxating my AC joint back in 2020 (I had driven out to Austria and couldn't safely drive home due to the injury). 

A friend had a pretty bad experience when she was rescued from a route in the Alps while on a guided trip in 2017 or 2018, I think she did eventually sort it out, but it was a massive amount of stress for her.

I ended up having to be helicoptered off while freeriding in Switzerland four years ago - I had BMC insurance, but whichever company they use was worse than useless, to the point where I was being threatened with debt collectors from both the helicopter service and the hospital, despite me having done all of the required paperwork absolutely to the letter. In short, they were pathetic.

Depending on what you need, i'd recommend the AAC (Austrian Alpine Club). Very cost effective. I've not (fingers crossed!) needed to make a claim for rescue but every story i've heard about them has been positive.

https://www.alpenverein.at/britannia/membership/member-benefits.php

Positive; but the cover is fairly limited in level and scope. It seems to be predicated on the level of reciprocal healthcare rights in the Alpine arc countries with associated low repatriation costs.

I've never had to claim (and I do use OAV membership as my cover!) but I've heard it's relatively easy to run out of cover in a complex situation.

With AAC I always add on the additional health insurance they offer for x months. Then you have 500k€ health cover, plus it covers you for health stuff that isn't explicitly SAR related. Like vehicle accidents.

Its all to do with who underwrites the insurance, it was general accident when I made a claim with the BMC and they were dreadful. It varies from year to year with the BMC as far as I am aware. People have the mistaken assumption you pay for what you get with insurance and the more you pay, the better the quality. That's not my experience and I just go with the cheapest I can get now, its served me well with travel, car and house insurance ever since.

I was just looking into this earlier today. 

AAC : "insurance for rescues out of wayless area up to EUR 25.000"
https://www.alpenverein.at/portal/service/mitgliedschaft/mitgliedervorteile...

That is a significantly less than BMC or Snowcard rescue cover which both provide rescue cover for up to £100,000

BMC:  https://www.thebmc.co.uk/modules/insurance/r/downloads/HARA%20Policy%20Summ...

Snowcard  "All Snowcard Policy levels include search and rescue under the Medical and Accident section of the policy unto £100,000 (see condition 06.)" ('Is search and rescue insurance included?' on the Snowcard FAQs: https://www.snowcard.co.uk/faq

I've heard it said that Helicopter rescue costs can be as much as 10,000 euros per hour in Switzerland. An hour is a long time if its a pickup and drop off but there are some interesting anectodes on that point here:
https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?t=84948

Checked BMC as usual for the USA and it was £900 for 3 weeks.

Always a complete rip off.

Wow, that is almost double the cost of Snowcard annual insurance which would cover me in the US for rock & ski.

For 3 weeks trekking in USA I was charged £300 this was 2022. The same cover for Scandinavia was £60 ish last time I went 2017.

I claimed this year when my Dad was diagnosed with cancer and needed immediate chemo and we had to cancel our expedition. BMC underwriters were terrible, they refused our claim saying that because my Dad was already undergoing investigations into his throat abnormalities that we wouldn't be covered. When I threw their own policy wording at them which in no way stated that family members pre-existing conditions causing a trip cancellation weren't covered they eventually paid out. The policy wording seemed intentionally vague about family members health and as far as I'm concerned they were abusing it to try and get out of paying. When I complained to the BMC they just forwarded it back to the underwriter who apologised, a bit of a pointless exercise...

I got BMC insurance for 2 and a half weeks to Lofoten, Norway a few months ago - given it's within the Arctic circle and compared to others, I thought the £60 I paid was very reasonable. 

My partner had a serious accident in Morocco last November and the BMC were very good.