Every year UK residents make around 59 million overseas journeys. (Source: Department of Health website). We buy travel insurance for the same reason we purchase any insurance policy: to cover us when things go wrong. You may not be very impressed by the National Health Service but remember, not every country has a free health service and you could find yourself facing a hefty bill if you fall ill abroad.

Stressful situations such as losing luggage, cancelled flights etc could all be protected by an insurance policy. It is important to take out an insurance policy unless you're prepared to find yourself out-of-pocket as a result of any holiday mishaps. However, if you're only going to be traveling within the UK you are unlikely to need holiday insurance, with the exception possibly of cancellation cover in case you need to cancel a pre-booked holiday.
The level of emergency medical cover available to UK residents around the world falls into three broad categories: the European Economic Area; Reciprocal Agreement Countries; and countries with no health care agreements with the UK.

The European Economic Area (EEA) consists of the European Union together with Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein. The European Community reciprocal health care arrangements apply in these countries and also Switzerland. You are entitled to free or reduced-cost emergency medical treatment in the other 27 EEA countries (and Switzerland) provided you have with you a European Health Insurance Card.

The UK also has reciprocal health care agreements with more than 40 countries around the world, including Australia, New Zealand, certain Caribbean Islands, and most republics of the former Soviet Union, including Russia itself. These agreements entitle you to emergency treatment in those countries.
In the rest of the world, which means more than 100 other countries, including some of the most popular tourist destinations from the UK, such as Canada, the USA, India, the Far East, the whole of Africa and Latin America, no such reciprocal agreement exists. If you are travelling to any country outside the EEA or with which the UK has no reciprocal agreement, you would be wise to take out full medical insurance to cover the cost of treatment.

Your travel insurance policy should cover: medical expenses, personal liability, cancellation and curtailment, loss of baggage and theft.
The two most important parts of the cover are the medical expenses to cover the cost of any emergency medical treatment you may require, over and above the basic cover offered by governmental arrangements and your European Health Insurance Card, and personal liability - this covers you in the event that you're faced with a bill for any damage or injury you cause to anyone else or their property while abroad.

You should also have cover to pay out a lump sum if you're injured or if you die while abroad. The amount of insurance for each of these categories obviously differs from policy to policy, generally the cheaper the policy, the lower the cover.

In addition to basic disaster scenario insurance, your policy should include cover for those awkward moments when you discover that you have arrived in one continent while your baggage has been dispatched to another. Cover against theft of valuables such as clothing, jewellery, cameras, foreign currency and credit cards is no more than common sense!

Some policies offer a range of value-added services, such as replacement vehicles, house watching and so on. It may also be worthwhile choosing a policy, which offers an international helpline, especially if you are going to a country where English is not readily spoken.

Travel agents want you to buy the travel insurance they offer because they can earn substantial commission by getting you to sign up for cover when you pay for your holiday. It used to be a nifty marketing ploy for travel firms to offer discounts on the package if you took out their insurance policy. This so-called "conditional" selling is now illegal but the convenience of taking the cover offered by your travel agent remains persuasive as, indeed, do the salespeople.