When you’re buying travel insurance, you have one big decision to make: Do you want an annual plan that covers all your trips for 365 days? Or a single-trip plan that protects one specific journey?

There’s no one-size-fits all answer. The best travel protection for you depends on your travel style, your budget, and your plans. To figure it out, here’s what you’ll want to consider.

How many trips are you taking in the next 365 days?

A cousin’s wedding in Santa Fe. A 40^th-birthday beach trip. A late-summer escape to the mountains. Another cousin’s wedding in Boston. If the year ahead is speckled with short getaways, annual travel insurance is a wise purchase. One plan can cover all your trips, whether near or far, short or long, domestic or international.

Annual plans can also offer significant savings when you compare their cost to buying several single-trip plans. However, they have a few drawbacks. (We’ll get to those in a second.)

The takeaway: AllTrips plans are great for frequent travelers… but they’re not the best choice for everybody.

Are you planning any long trips?

Annual travel insurance plans can cover trips up to 45 days. For longer trips—such as mission trips, semesters abroad, or an around-the-world cruise—you’ll need a single-trip plan. These can protect trips up to 120-365 days long (depending on the plan).

The takeaway: Single-plan trips can protect longer journeys. Check the maximum trip length before purchasing your plan.

How much are you spending on travel?

A lot of people don’t realize that multi-trip travel insurance has an annual cap on trip cancellation benefits and trip interruption benefits—for all the trips you take combined. These limits are:

• AllTrips Prime: $3,000 per insured person, per year
• AllTrips Executive: $5,000, $7,500, or $10,000 per insured person, per year
• AllTrips Premier: $2,000, $5,000, $10,000, or $15,000 per policy, per year

So if you have an AllTrips Prime plan and you file a trip cancellation claim for $3,000, you won’t get reimbursed for any subsequent cancellations.

The takeaway: An annual plan may not include enough trip cancellation/interruption benefits for big international trips.

Do you usually travel solo, or with family?

The OneTrip Prime and OneTrip Premier plans include an extraordinary benefit for families: kids 17 and under are covered for free when traveling with a parent or grandparent (not available on policies issued to Pennsylvania residents). For that reason alone, one of these single-trip plans may be the best choice for family vacations. Keep in mind, however, that older children, spouses and other family members who are traveling with you should buy their own individual travel insurance policies.

Frequent solo travelers may be able to save money with an annual plan. AllTrips Premier can cover your entire household as well, but the cost will be much higher than for a single traveler.

The takeaway: OneTrip Prime or OneTrip Premier may be best for your family vacation, while AllTrips plans work well for people who often travel on their own.

How often do you travel for work?

An annual travel insurance plan can make life a lot easier for business travelers. While you’re probably not paying for business trips out of your own pocket, travel insurance can help when you experience common travel problems, such as lost or delayed baggage or trip delays. The AllTrips Executive plan includes a collision damage waiver in most states to protect your rental car, as well as protection for business equipment rental and/or replacement, if it’s lost, stolen, damaged or delayed by your travel supplier.

If your business travel takes you out of the country, you also need travel insurance for medical emergencies. U.S.-based companies have no legal “duty of care” for employees — in other words, there’s no law that requires companies to protect employees while they’re traveling.¹ That's why it’s wise to protect yourself with an annual plan that includes emergency medical and dental and emergency transportation benefits.

The takeaway: An AllTrips plan is a smart investment for frequent business travelers.

Do you take a lot of spontaneous trips?

Maybe you’ve only booked one big trip in the year to come. But, before you select a single-trip plan, consider the trips you haven’t yet penciled in! If you often take unexpected escapes and last-minute vacations, an annual travel insurance plan can be the best option. Your pre-paid travel costs can automatically be covered, up to the limits stated in your plan. Road trips can be covered too, as long as your destination is 100 miles or more from your home. 

The takeaway: If you love short getaways, an AllTrips plan is a smart (and affordable) way to protect them all.

Do you often rent a car when you travel?

Rental car insurance is an often-overlooked benefit of annual insurance plans from Allianz Travel. Included in your plan is Rental Car Damage & Theft Coverage (available to residents of most states), which covers costs if a car you're renting is stolen or is damaged in an accident or while it's left unattended. Rental car companies typically charge $10 to $30/day for similar coverage for economy vehicles, or 25 to 40 percent of the base rental price, according to WalletHub.²

The takeaway: Getting annual travel insurance can be a great deal for travelers who plan to rent a car.

How much is the deductible and co-pay for your health insurance plan?

Single-trip plans offer primary emergency medical benefits. That means your travel insurance benefits pay for covered medical emergency care costs up to your plan maximum without involving your regular health insurance plan. (Most OneTrip plans don’t require a deductible; OneTrip Basic does.)

Multi-trip plans offer secondary emergency medical benefits. That means your personal health insurance plan will be billed first, and you’ll have to pay any co-pays and/or deductible.

The takeaway: If medical costs are a concern, a single-trip plan can give you more protection.

Still weighing your options? Get a quote for both single-trip and annual travel insurance plans, and compare them head to head. Contact us anytime with questions.