If you had bought travel insurance from MSIG Singapore and now you are feeling a blissful peace of mind that can go for your holidays covered against the medical expenses, unexpected disasters, and that your belongings are insured against theft or loss I’m going to have to spoil your good feel. You are going to be really fine as long as nothing happens to you – just as it would have been if you didn’t buy MSIG travel insurance. They will readily accept your application, of course, and immediately charge you the premium. But if you try to make a claim you are most likely going to find that the great service you had received from MSIG ended right at the moment you’d paid your money. Learn from my example.

I had bought the MSIG travel insurance several times; whenever I did I always chose their Premier Plan which offers the best coverage (read: You pay the highest premium). I never made a claim. I also bought the MSIG travel insurance Premier Plan before going to Austria in April 2017. Unfortunately, a couple of very well-organised thieves stole mine and my wife’s hand luggage when we were on the train from Vienna to Salzburg. Vexed as we were, we filed a police report, went through all the necessary formalities, got the rest of our trip screwed up, and eventually came back home thinking naively that at least we had the insurance so we will be reimbursed for some of the loss. Nothing further from the truth.

I filled the claim form through the MSIG Singapore website within the time frame specified by them, submitted the copies of the required documents (proof of entry/exit to the foreign country, police report, and what-not) and waited for some reply from MSIG. The auto-response informed me that my “claim will be registered within 3 working days” and that I may be contacted by a MSIG Claims Officer to provide more details. To cut the long story short: Nine days after I submitted the claim I received an email that in order to enable MSIG review my claim I need to submit “more detailed circumstances leading to the loss”, “ownership of the stolen items”, receipts for the stolen items, and several more things. I replied within a few days describing in great detail how the theft happened and that I unfortunately didn’t have the receipts for the stolen items as most of them were not purchased recently (will you ever intend to make an insurance claim? Please make sure that you keep receipts for all the items you ever bought throughout your entire life – you would need them, apparently). I also asked them to advise how I could prove the ownership of the items that were stolen from me (after all it could have been me who stole the stuff from the shops and/or other passengers on the train, tried to pass them off as mine, and then file a reimbursement claim – such things must be happening all the time but it’s kept as a great secret by the insurance companies who are the only ones aware of such misdeeds).

The email I wrote was sent to MSIG Singapore on 15th of May – exactly six weeks ago. I thought I’d give them enough time to look into the case so I wasn’t pushing for any answers. But MSIG hasn’t bothered with replying – they simply ignored me. Not even an automated email that they were looking into the matter. Now, I understand that the insurance companies are not charities – they are there to make money. Fair enough. I would surely understand if my travel insurance by MSIG didn’t reimburse 100% of the contents listed in the police report as it could be argued that there was wear and tear on my stuff or that in case of cash stolen from me the only proof is my declaration made at the Austrian police station (mind you, such a declaration is made under oath so nobody in his right mind would be lying about it). But this is not the case with MSIG Singapore. They don’t even pretend that they are doing something about your case – they simply take your money and then they apparently feel that it’s not worth their precious time and resources to reply to your rightful claim. The arrogance of MSIG Singapore is staggering. Their lack of any response creates one impression: You don’t matter to them. Oh yes, you are most welcome to come to them and spend your money, that’s for sure. But MSIG is a big corporation with hundreds of employees, operating with huge amounts of money, while compared to them you are a little guy who is apparently perceived by them as no threat and hence of no importance. So they seemingly feel that they can be condescending and ignore you as they please.

It’s never fun to have your stuff stolen. It actually feels much worse if you are travelling overseas. You are suddenly without the things you need to get back home – depending on how unlucky you were your passport, IC, driving licence, money, credit cards, phone, air tickets, hotel bookings, vouchers, and whatever else are gone. I’m not even talking about things which may cost less than a dollar but can be worth for you more than anything in life, like the only souvenir you had from your deceased parents. You think that buying travelling insurance will ease your burden and that in case of emergency you will be assisted to get home safely and then be reimbursed, at least in part, for your losses. Yes, that should certainly be the case. After all, the moment you pay and are issued with an insurance certificate, you and the insurance company enter a legally binding contract – as long as you don’t breach any rules you are supposed to be covered. But my case shows that MSIG Singapore apparently doesn’t feel this way and instead ignores a little guy.

I hope that there are some better insurance companies out there who look into your valid case and do what they are supposed to do. But basing it on my experience I would strongly suggest that you look into other travel insurances instead of wasting your money on a company as arrogant as MSIG Singapore. Please help me spread this long post to warn the others about the way MSIG handled my case so nobody else gets conned by some worthless assurances.