Frequent Miler's latest team challenge, Million Mile Madness, is almost done! The last two weeks Greg, Nick, and Stephen competed to earn 1 Million SAS miles by flying 15 airlines. But who completed the challenge with the most Speed, Affordability, and Style?
In my post “Keep or cancel Sapphire Reserve?” I estimated how much I value each of the card’s benefits in order to decide whether or not to keep the card beyond the first year. As several readers pointed out, I didn’t originally include the value of the Sapphire Reserve card’s substantial travel insurance benefits. That was an oversight.
In order to estimate how much to value these benefits, I first reviewed them. I have to admit, I haven’t given these benefits much thought before now, but I’m impressed. The Sapphire Reserve offers valuable travel insurance coverage far beyond that offered by the similar Sapphire Preferred card.
Below you’ll find a summary of each of the Sapphire Reserve’s Travel Insurance benefits. For full details of each of these benefits, review the Chase Sapphire Reserve Benefit Guide.
I’ve also included information about how each benefit compares to coverage from Chase’s other travel card: the Sapphire Preferred. Specifically, the Sapphire Reserve includes the following benefits that the Sapphire Preferred does not have:
- Primary rental insurance for expensive and exotic rentals (up to $75K)
- Free Roadside Assistance (when you are 50+ miles from home)
- 6 hour Trip Delay reimbursement (Sapphire Preferred is 12 hours)
- Emergency Evacuation and Transportation (up to $100,000)
- Emergency Medical and Dental coverage (up to $2,500)
In most cases, immediate family members on the same trip are covered. Chase defines Immediate Family Member as “your Spouse or Domestic Partner and their children, including adopted children or step-children; legal guardians or wards; siblings or siblings-in-law; parents or parents-in-law; grandpa.”
Also, in most cases, with the notable exception of rental car insurance, coverage kicks in even if you pay only part of your trip with your Sapphire Reserve card. This is an awesome benefit for those of us who frequently use points and miles or even gift cards to make trips less expensive. For example, in the emergency evacuation details, Chase’s documentation states that you are covered when:
…a portion or the entire cost of the Trip, is purchased with Your Chase credit card account (“Account”).
Does this mean I don’t have to buy supplemental travel insurance?
Personally, I’ve never bought travel insurance anyway, so the coverage provided by the Sapphire Reserve card is great just for the additional peace of mind. For those who do usually buy travel insurance, the Sapphire Reserve could be a great way to save money by declining that insurance in the future. The question is whether it covers enough?
Most of the coverage seems to me to be more than adequate for my needs, but everyone should judge for themselves how much risk they are willing to take on. I could imagine people wanting more coverage for emergency evacuations, for example. If you need to be flown internationally via a medical transport, I expect that it will cost far more than the covered $100,000. Similarly emergency medical and dental work is likely to far exceed $2,500.
What about other premium cards?
In the future I’ll summarize coverage from other premium cards (Citi Prestige and Amex Platinum, for example) to see how they compare to the Sapphire Reserve. Off the top of my head I know, for example, that the Citi Prestige card offers better trip delay insurance (3 hours vs. 6 hours with the Sapphire Reserve).
And now, a summary of each Sapphire Reserve benefit…
Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver (Auto Rental CDW)
Primary rental car coverage, up to $75K. You must pay for the entire rental with your Sapphire Reserve card and you must decline the rental company’s collision damage waiver (CDW or LDW). Both the cardholder (named on the Sapphire Reserve card) and any additional drivers permitted under rental agreement are covered.
You are eligible for coverage when: You “1) Initiate and complete the entire rental transaction using your card that is eligible for the benefit. 2) Decline the rental company’s collision damage waiver or similar provision if it is offered to you.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Sapphire Preferred excludes “expensive” and “exotic” rentals such as Aston Martin, Bentley, Bricklin, Daimler, DeLorean, Excalibur, Ferrari, Jensen, Lamborghini, Lotus, Maserati, Porsche, and Rolls Royce. Selected models of BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Cadillac, and Lincoln are covered.
Roadside Assistance
Roadside Assistance covers flat tires, fuel delivery, dead battery, lockout assistance, towing, etc., up to $50 per service, up to 4 times per year. You are covered by Roadside Assistance when driving any vehicle you own or lease, and when you drive a vehicle that is furnished to you by the owner, while traveling away from home.
You are eligible for coverage when: “you drive any vehicle you own or lease, and when you drive a vehicle that is furnished to you by the owner, while traveling away from home.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: If you use the Sapphire Preferred card’s Roadside Dispatch service, you’ll pay $59.95 per service. With the Sapphire Reserve, service is free, up to $50.
Trip Cancellation and Trip Interruption
This benefit reimburses you for change or cancellation fees if your trip is cancelled or interrupted due to injury, death, sickness, severe weather, military orders, a terrorist action, jury duty or subpoena, etc. Coverage limit: $10K per per person per trip, up to $20K per trip (occurrence), and $40K in a 12 month period. Coverage includes trips paid partially with points or miles. You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered.
You are eligible for coverage when: “Any pre-paid tour, trip or vacation when some portion of the cost for such travel arrangements […] has been charged to your Account: while the insurance is in effect, to a destination of greater than one (1) mile from your primary residence, and is for a time period that doesn’t exceed sixty (60) days in duration.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Same.
Trip Delay Reimbursement
This benefit reimburses you for reasonable expenses incurred when your trip is delayed by more than 6 hours. Coverage limit: $500 per ticket. Coverage includes trips paid partially with points or miles. You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered.
You are eligible for coverage when: “A portion or the entire cost of the Common Carrier fare, is purchased with your Chase credit card account (“Account”).”
“A Common Carrier is any land, water, or air conveyance that operates under a valid license to transport passengers for hire and requires purchasing a ticket before travel begins. It does not include taxis, limousine services, commuter rail or bus lines, or rental vehicles.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Coverage kicks in only after a 12 hour delay with the Sapphire Preferred.
Lost Luggage
This benefit reimburses you for lost or damaged luggage, up to $3,000 per person. Certain items are limited to $500 (jewelry, watches, cameras, video recorders, and other electronic equipment). You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered.
You are eligible for coverage when: Traveling on a Common Carrier “when some portion of the fare for transportation has been charged to your Account issued by Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates. It’s also travel on a Common Carrier when free flights have been awarded from frequent flier or Rewards programs, provided that all of the miles or Rewards points were accumulated from a Rewards program sponsored by Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates.”
Common Carrier is defined as “any motorized land, water or air Conveyance, operated by an organization other than Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates, organized and licensed for the transportation of passengers for hire and operated by an employee or an individual under contract.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Same.
Baggage Delay
The benefit covers up to $100 per day for up to 5 days for emergency purchases of essential items (clothing, toiletries, charging cables, etc.). You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered.
You are eligible for coverage when: “Some portion of the fare for transportation has been charged to your Account issued by Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates.” or “”when free flights have been awarded from frequent flier or Rewards programs, provided that all of the miles or Rewards points were accumulated from a Rewards program sponsored by Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Same.
Travel Accident Insurance
This benefit pays up to $1,000,000 for accidental Death, Dismemberment, Loss of Speech, Sight, or Hearing. You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered. Coverage includes trips paid partially with points or miles. You are also covered when paying entirely with points as long as “the award was made from frequent flier or rewards programs provided that all of the miles or rewards points were accumulated from a rewards program sponsored by Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates.”
You are eligible for coverage when: “You charge some portion of a Common Carrier fare […] to Your Account”
Common Carrier means any motorized land, water or air Conveyance, operated by an organization, structured and licensed for the transportation of passengers for hire and operated by an employee of such organization or an individual under contract.
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Sapphire Preferred accident insurance is limited to $500,000.
Emergency Evacuation and Transportation
The evacuation benefit provides emergency evacuation and transportation if you are injured or become ill during your trip and it results in a necessary emergency evacuation. Evacuation must be pre-approved by the Benefit Administrator. Coverage limit: $100,000. The emergency transportation benefit pays for a round trip economy ticket for a friend or relative to visit your bedside when you are hospitalized for more than 8 days. This insurance also covers repatriation of remains, up to $1,000. You, the Primary Insured Person, and your Immediate Family Members are automatically covered when you pay for a portion of the trip with your Sapphire Reserve card.
You are eligible for coverage when: “You charge a portion of the cost, or the entire cost of a Trip, made via a Common Carrier, to Your Account.”
A Common Carrier is defined as “any motorized land, water or air Conveyance, operated by an organization other than Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates, organized and licensed for the transportation of passengers for hire.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Sapphire Preferred does not provide Emergency Evacuation and Transportation coverage.
Emergency Medical and Dental Benefit
This benefit reimburses certain emergency medical expenses incurred during a trip. Covered trips are more than 5 days long, but less than 60 days and must be more than 100 miles from your home. Max coverage: $2,500 with $50 deductible.
You are eligible for coverage when: “You, a person to whom a United States (U.S.) credit card has been issued (“Cardholder”), and Your Immediate Family Members when a portion or the entire cost of the Trip, is purchased with Your Chase credit card account (“Account”). This benefit applies when You use Your Account to pay for a Trip via a Common Carrier that is greater than five (5) consecutive days but less than sixty (60) consecutive days, and is in excess of one hundred (100) miles* from Your place of Residence.”
A Common Carrier is defined as “any motorized land, water or air Conveyance, operated by an organization other than Chase Bank USA, N.A. and/or its affiliates, organized and licensed for the transportation of passengers for hire.”
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Sapphire Preferred does not provide Emergency Medical and Dental coverage.
Travel and Emergency Assistance Services
This is like an emergency concierge who can arrange things for you. Examples include: medical referral, legal referral, emergency transportation assistance, pre-trip assistance (required visas and immunizations, for example). This service doesn’t cover the costs of any of these things, just the person on the phone to help.
How this compares to Sapphire Preferred coverage: Same.
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If I booked a flight with points for my son and paid taxes with my CSR, will trip delay work since I’m not traveling.
His flight is cancelled and he is put on next day flight. Thank you.
As like any insurance product, chase trip interruption has its catch. If the delay is due to common carrier, then you are not going to get reimbursed. This will be an issue if you have several connecting flights and your first leg is delayed because of which you lost the subsequent connections. You will end up loosing all the money unless the first carrier gives vouchers. For trip delay, you will have to produce the reason for delay in carrier letterhead which is next to impossible.
[…] When you pay with points for travel, Chase’s automatic travel protections do apply. So, you can be covered for things like car rentals, trip delays, trip cancellation & interruption, lost luggage, etc. The coverage you receive will be based on which card’s rewards were used to book the trip. For example, if you have both a Chase Sapphire Preferred and a Sapphire Reserve, you would want to move your Ultimate Rewards points from the Preferred to the Reserve and then use the Reserve points to book your trip. You will get both better value (1.5 cents per point) and better travel protections. See: Sapphire Reserve Travel Insurance. […]
I have a question about the Chase Sapphire Reserve trip accident, evacuation, cancellation insurance. Would this apply to traveling by your auto in the US? So if I take a trip in my own vehicle and have reserved and paid for hotel rooms that are non refundable on my CSR card before leaving on the trip, do all the trip insurance benefits still apply. What if a family member dies and we can’t go on the trip or have to return early from the trip…….what if we are 1/2 way across the country from home (still in US) and need evacuation to a hospital back home for a serious medical issue….So for our trip, we have remained in the US and are just driving our own vehicle cross country.
Also very confused by the 2 separate definitions for “Common Carrier”, and then “Common Carrier Covered Trip“????
Thanks if you can give any clarification…..
My understanding is that if the coverage is triggered by booking with a common carrier (which is true with most of these things) then you would not be covered when driving. Common carrier, I believe, refers to airplanes, trains, etc. Basically these are modes of transportation where you could use your card to buy a ticket.
I have a question…my card is on a United States address, but I am currently abroad. I will be booking a flight from Germany to Vietnam. Will I still have those benefits (emergency/medical/dental) even though I am booking the trip from a place other than my home residence? Thanks!
– Lars
I’d suggest reading over the full policy to be sure, but I’m not aware of anything that excludes flights by location in relation to billing address. I would expect that to be covered.
Chase Sapphire Reserve Trip Cancellation and Trip Interruption doesn’t work. We have medical reason to cancel our trip from US to Germany and they didn’t reimburse any dollar from it. We have provided all documnets and thy just ignored all of it. Super unpleasant experience dealing with their customer service.
question – we’re buying 4x RTW tickets so $40k total. My husband and I each have separate sapphire reserve card accounts. should we split it up and put 2 on each as the max refund is $20k for non-refundable expenses or would that be ‘worse’ ie if my kid gets sick/hurt and they are on a different itinerary would it not be covered? any better suggestions for cards with awesome (better than this card) benefits before we buy them?
I think that’s a good idea. Put you and one kid on one itinerary and your husband and the other kid on the other. One potential issue: if the airline has to re-book you on a different flight (maybe the original flight is cancelled for example), they won’t necessarily keep all 4 of you together.
Unrelated to insurance: Have you thought about getting RTW award tickets instead? ANA has a great RTW award chart and it’s possible to buy the required miles fairly cheaply. You can read about ANA RTW awards here: http://lazytravelers.net/ana-round-the-world-award-ticket-best-ff-program-for-u-s-travelers-part-6/
Let’s say that you buy miles for 2.5 cents each and you book RTW business class award at 145,000 miles per person. Then the price per person would be $3,625 plus fuel surcharges. On the other hand, it may be very difficult to find 4 business class seats on all of the flights you want.
Related posts:
Buy miles for 1.82 cents each (ends today): https://frequentmiler.com/2018/02/02/buy-spg-points-35-off/
Buy miles for 2.5 cents each anytime: https://frequentmiler.com/2018/01/30/buy-miles-via-amex-membership-rewards/
I purchased a ticket with another travel card. If I purchase a seat upgrade afterwards with my Chase Sapphire Reserve, is that considered “a portion or the entire cost of the Common Carrier fare”?
My guess is no. I think that you’d have to pay a portion of the original ticket price. On the other hand, it can’t hurt to do that just-in-case it helps
Hello Greg,
What medical condition justifies the travel cancellation claim for insurance? Any link of inputs on this area?
Thanks!
I believe that any medical condition (other than pre-existing conditions) can qualify as long as you have a physician recommendation that you don’t do the trip. The benefits guide states: ” If a Physician has advised that making the Covered Trip is medically inadvisable, you must immediately notify the appropriate Travel Supplier that you are cancelling your travel arrangements…”
I currently have the chase sapphire preferred and wanted to downgrade it to the freedom unlimited card for the 1.5 points and then open a new chase sapphire reserve. Does anyone know if there will be a better card and signing bonus offered by chase in the next few months as this would change my plan of opening a new reserve card.
Thank you!
I don’t know, but I think it is extremely unlikely that Chase will increase the signup bonus for the Reserve card anytime soon.
[…] week I reviewed the Chase Sapphire Reserve card’s travel insurance. I was impressed with how favorably it compared to the lower cost Sapphire Preferred card. But, […]
[…] Fantastic travel insurance although I would still recommend booking flights using the Citi Prestige […]
Even though we fly free and stay free using points we always buy real travel protection insurance for a number of reasons including much better medical coverage than what any cc offers. And, we’ve used it multiple times and have always been taken care of. Cc insurance can balk at award travel since the fare/hotel wasn’t purchased on the card (some won’t accept taxes/fees as requirements met. In some places in the world your own health insurance won’t cover you, so it’s important to have travel insurance. Even some doctor offices in US territories won’t even accept Medicare, but cash only. We use CSA. Try finding a doctor on a remote island. CSA found someone and sent them to our bungalow, provided a translator and paid the medical person. They also took care of flight delays, put us up for another night and another time paid for my transportation cost back and forth to a clinic.
Do the CSP or CSR have a deductible for collision insurance?
No, I don’t think so
As one who enjoys soft adventure travel, I would like to see a more detailed analysis of medical evacuation coverage across cards. As I read the fine print, it appears that some cards will only cover evacuation from a hospital, with no coverage for getting to that hospital – say if you injured yourself on a safari or rural area. The cost of getting a medical evacuation helicopter flight to a hospital could be very high. In this regard, I believe the Amex Platinum cards provide the best coverage since they provide coverage anywhere an aircraft can land. I believe the Platinum cards do not have an upper limit on the cost of that coverage. Nor do they require you pay for your trip with the Platinum card.