Summary of Credit Card Trip Delay Benefits

physixfan      2015-10-15     2017-09-15 7 Comments

Today let us talk about Trip Delay Insurance. Most of common trip interruption and cancellation can be reimbursed by most of credit cards with extremely strict conditions, such as extreme weather or illness. However, conditions required by Trip Delay Insurance are not as strict as those required by credit cards described above. For example, trip delays of common flights caused by weather, strike, aircraft maintenance etc., can be compensated economically. At present, only Citi and Chase can provide personal credit card involving Trip Delay Insurance, but there is one thing should be noted that the two banks above will not compensate you directly through money. As to reasonable spending occurred in the delay process, including food, accommodation, clothes or hygienic goods, banks will reimburse up to 500 dollars. First, I want to introduce the characteristics of the two banks to you:

Citi

1. All the expenses occurred during the trip must be paid by the card or TYP;
2. Delayed period must be twelve hours at least (three hours at least for a high-end card).

Chase

1. Expenses occurred during the trip should be paid in part by the card, which is very useful for award tickets;
2. Delayed period must be twelve hours at least or overnight.

Common Grounds between Citi and Chase

1. 500 dollars at most can be reimbursed;
2. Delayed place is not near the billing address;
3. Flight ticket must be a round-trip ticket, and a one-way ticket is invalid. Can you buy two one-way tickets in two times? I think readers can provide your DP.

The following chart describes Delay requirements for Citi and Chase credit cards and we also describe whether corresponding compensation limit for luggage delay or car rental insurance is Secondary or Primary. It should be noted that car rental insurance outside U.S. will become Primary from Secondary. Place of your luggage delay cannot be near your living place, which means credit card only provides insurance for your luggage delay onward, rather than luggage delay backward. Citi Prestige is a good card that you can get compensation for three-hour delay through an extremely low equivalent annual fee, while Chase can reimburse your delay expenses through part of your flight ticket, which is suitable for award ticket or tickets bought through voucher/gift card in particular. Thus, you should have one CSP and one Prestige card, if the conditions are allowed.

You should put away itemized invoice obtained as you buy food, clothes or live in hotels, and insurance companies will judge whether items can be covered through receipt. If your spending occurred in your trip are outside China, insurance companies will judge those items through receipt translated by professional translators. It should be noted that tips and alcoholic drinks cannot be reimbursed. For example, if tips can be reimbursed under the condition that you have communicated with sellers in advance, insurance companies will suffer a great loss. Theoretically speaking, things above can be bought through any credit card. But I advise you to buy flight tickets through credit card used for claim.

When the trip is over, you can file your claim. You can submit your claim to customer service, and then customer service will submit your claim to departments of insurance company which will send you an email posting a Claim form. Documents required are as following:

• Claim form;
• Card billing statement showing card member name and transaction charge for the common carrier ticket (bank’s statement can be used to prove your flight ticket is bought through this credit card for file claim);
• Copy of travel itinerary/reservation confirming dates of travel and carrier used （confirmation email of this airline company）
• Receipts for travel expenses as a result of the delay (itemized list is required for food, clothes, while receipt is required for transportation and accommodations);
• Itinerary after Delay and your boarding card;
• Support of Trip Delay below;
• Written proof of settlement or outcome of the claim filed with the airline or common carrier below;

There are some ways concerning the support of the trip delay as following:

1. Very famous airline companies can directly provide your delay proof. Take All Nippon Airways for example;
2. Bills can be offered on the counter in the departure lounge, because you can write or print your bill on the counter;
3. You can get in touch with airline companies after the trip delay, which will send you a proof through an email. Take AA for example;
4. Sometimes the flight screenshots of Flight Aware can also be valid;
5. Airlines with low-price flight tickets will not provide you any proof, but some passengers can obtain the support of the trip delay through Weather Report.

Written proof of settlement or outcome of the claim filed with the airline or common carrier can be used to clarify whether airline companies should undertake any responsibilities. Laws in North America stipulate that trip delay caused by uncontrollable reasons under airlines should not be reimbursed. For example, the weather is an uncertain element during a flight. But if the trip delay is caused by reasons like strike or mechanical faults which are controllable under airlines, what you should do is to seek the Primary reimbursement of airlines first, and then the Secondary reimbursement of the company that issues your credit card. Good airline companies, such as All Nippon Airways, will also provide you certain amount of reimbursement fees due to weather reasons. And you can also contact the airline companies for denial of compensation after the trip delay due to weather reasons.

You should send your documents prepared to insurance companies and then wait for your cheque in two or three weeks. After enjoying this benefit, some students even like the trip delay. Actually I have a short one-day tour in Tokyo for free through this trip delay. There are other advantages except trip delay insurance as following:

1. You should resolutely write a letter for a claim into American airline companies, such as UA and AA which will offer you miles or ETC vouchers as the compensation. Small airlines like CX may provide you nothing as the compensation;
2. After the trip delay, you seat in the flight generally is in the Y class with a full price. Actually, the seat in Y class can enjoy many rights. For example, you can transfer your flight for free or upgrade your class through a little mile theoretically, which is, in fact, very hard to upgrade your class into the Business class due to the surging increase in the number of people in this flight. If you earn your UA miles through the Y class in UA, PQM will rise by 150 percent and PQD calculated by RDM will also greatly increase. If you do not want to earn your UA miles through the Y class in UA, you can choose Aeroplan of Air Canada which can provide 125 percent miles for the Y class in UA, or Singapore Airlines, All Nippon Airways and AV which all can provide 100 percent miles for the Y class in UA. If you want to earn miles in Delta through the Y class in Delta, MQM of grading mile should be 150 percent. If you want to earn miles in AS through the Y class, then you will obtain 125 percent miles.
3. If you are lucky to transfer your tickets to airlines outside this alliance, then you can enjoy many advantages. For example, some students of 1k in UA transferred tickets to the Y class in BA, then they can earn 100 percent miles in BA, AA and AS through the Y class in BA. What’s more, you can also require UA to accumulate your miles of the planned route, according to the Original Routing Credit (ORC), which means that you can enjoy mile accumulations twice in one flight. Certainly, UA will provide you flights of Star Alliance, which can not be used through the Original Routing Credit (ORC).

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