Travel insurance set for slow recovery

Whilst business travel accounts for a small proportion of total travel insurance policies held by consumers, it nevertheless represents an important revenue stream for the sector.

According to GlobalData’s 2019 UK Insurance Consumer Survey, just 1.1 per cent of respondents indicated that they held a business travel policy, with a holiday being the most common reason for travel for 86.0 per cent of policyholders.

GlobalData senior insurance analyst Beatriz Benito commented: “While the recovery of the travel insurance industry will be largely dictated by the ability – and willingness – of holidaymakers to travel, the impact of Covid-19 will have longer-lasting effects on business travel. When we have a sense of what the new normal looks like once staff return to the office, companies are still likely to continue keeping business travel to a minimum.”

Employers have a duty of care to their employees and if governments continue to recommend against all non-essential travel, scheduling business trips will be deemed a non-essential activity when technology can provide the means to run meetings remotely online.

Benito added: “It is likely that employees will return back to the office on staggered hours or on a rotation basis to manage densities. This will contribute to a generalized feeling that it is still not entirely safe to carry on with life and business as usual, leaving many employees unwilling to travel for business purposes. Equally, as coronavirus squeezes company budgets, the business travel insurance sector is set to take years to recover to pre-Covid-19 levels and will lag behind the recovery trajectory of the wider travel insurance space.”