We’ve reviewed three UK travel insurers in full: Staysure, its cruise-focused sister brand Avanti, and Goodtogoinsurance, the strongest option here if you’ve been declined or quoted punitively elsewhere over a medical condition. Each guide below covers policy limits, regulatory protection and what genuine customers say on Trustpilot.
Our travel insurance reviews
Staysure
The UK’s biggest travel insurer by Trustpilot review count (546,000+), with unlimited medical cover on its top policy.
Full Staysure review
Avanti Travel Insurance
Staysure’s sister brand, built around cruise cover, with the highest Trustpilot score of the three at 4.8/5.
Full Avanti review
Goodtogoinsurance
Cover for serious or complex medical histories that other insurers turn away, with a 14-day cooling-off period.
Full Goodtogoinsurance reviewHow the three compare
We’ve left prices out of this table on purpose. A quote moves with your age, destination and any condition you declare, so a snapshot price goes stale within weeks. Policy substance doesn’t. Figures below are each insurer’s mid-range tier; cheaper and pricier tiers exist for all three.
| Max medical cover | Cancellation limit | Baggage limit | Standard excess | FSCS protected | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Staysure | Unlimited | £5,000 | £2,500 | £99 | Yes |
| Avanti | Unlimited | £7,500 | £3,000 | Nil | Yes |
| Goodtogo- insurance | £10,000,000 | £2,000 | £2,000 | £75 | Yes |
Staysure and Avanti: same owner, different specialism
Staysure and Avanti aren’t independent alternatives to each other. Both trade under the same Staysure Group ownership and both underwrite the bulk of their cover through Great Lakes Insurance UK Limited. Staysure covers the widest range of pre-existing conditions of the two; Avanti is built around cruise-specific extras like cabin confinement and missed-port compensation that Staysure doesn’t carry. One practical difference either way: Staysure’s own quote tool asks for an email address and phone number before it shows a price, while Avanti quotes anonymously.
What FSCS protection actually means
All three insurers here underwrite through an insurer within Financial Services Compensation Scheme protection. That’s a specific legal backstop, not a marketing claim: if the underwriter behind your policy collapsed before you claimed, the FSCS’s own rules guarantee 90% of a valid claim with no upper limit. Staysure and Avanti underwrite through Great Lakes Insurance UK Limited, directly authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority. Goodtogoinsurance underwrites through Red Sands Insurance Company (Europe) Limited, a Gibraltar-regulated insurer also within FSCS scope. It’s a real safety net if an underwriter fails. It doesn’t guarantee your own claim gets paid quickly.
If you have a pre-existing medical condition
Declare every condition accurately at the point of quote. An insurer can refuse a claim outright over an undisclosed condition, even one unrelated to what went wrong, and this is the single biggest reason genuine claims get refused. Beyond that, the three diverge: Staysure states it considers over 1,300 pre-existing conditions, a figure it attributes to itself, not audited independently. Goodtogoinsurance states its cover extends “up to a very high level of severity” and carries over 30,000 combined ratings across Trustpilot and Smart Money People. Avanti covers pre-existing conditions too, but its strength is cruise extras, not medical breadth.
COVID-19 cover and FCDO advice
Every one of the three either excludes COVID-19 costs outright or attaches conditions to any cover that exists, and all three void cover if you travel against Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) advice. Neither is a genuine point of difference between them, whatever a comparison site’s marketing implies.
Checking your airline’s own cover instead
Some airlines sell their own bundled travel insurance at checkout, and it’s worth checking the terms before you buy rather than assuming it matches a standalone policy. We’ve reviewed the add-on cover sold by British Airways, Virgin Atlantic, Jet2, TUI, easyJet, Wizz Air and Ryanair individually, with the specific cover limits set out on each page. Looking for flight and holiday prices instead? See the latest UK travel deals.