Vietnam travel insurance, and the clause that voids it

Nobody in Vietnam will ask whether you are insured. The e-visa form has no field for it, immigration does not check, and a hotel will not either. Whether Vietnam travel insurance was worth buying gets decided later, usually on a rented motorbike, and it turns on a clause most people never read.

Is travel insurance mandatory for Vietnam?

Vietnam requires no travel insurance from tourists. The e-visa form asks for a photograph, a passport scan and 25 USD. It has no box for a policy. Nobody asks at the border either, and no hotel or domestic airline asks at all.

The brief pandemic rule about medical cover went with the rest of the entry rules, and nothing took its place. Any site still calling insurance a must for Vietnam is describing 2022.

So the choice is yours, and it turns on what treatment costs rather than on what the border wants.

Do you need it anyway?

Buy it if you are riding a motorbike, diving, caving or travelling with anyone over 60, and buy it anyway if a bill in the tens of thousands of dollars would hurt. Travel insurance for Vietnam is a bet on one outcome: a crash or an illness serious enough to need a flight home.

The arithmetic is lopsided. Everyday medicine here is cheap enough to pay for out of pocket — a pharmacy consultation costs very little and a clinic visit runs into the low hundreds of dollars — so a policy is not what gets you through a sore throat. An air ambulance to Bangkok or Singapore runs into the tens of thousands, and that is the number the policy exists for.

Anyone who decides against cover should at least know what the alternative looks like: a deposit demanded at admission, in cash or on a card, before treatment starts.

What do people actually claim for here?

Motorbike injuries lead by a wide margin and everything else trails them. Road crashes are the biggest health risk a visitor faces here, as the safety guide sets out with the numbers behind it.

After that come the infections that put somebody in a bed for a few days: dengue most often, then a stomach infection bad enough to need a drip. Then theft of phones and cameras, and, in autumn, flights and buses stopped by weather.

Why are motorbike claims refused?

Almost every policy covers a motorbike only while you ride it legally, and most visitors in Vietnam do not. Vietnam recognises international driving permits issued under the 1968 Vienna Convention. The United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand issue theirs under the 1949 Geneva Convention, and those are not valid here.

A rider holding the wrong permit has no licence as far as the traffic police and the insurer are concerned, and the insurer matters more. The bill for a serious crash does not stop at the hospital. It takes in the hire company's bike, and sometimes the other vehicle.

Two further conditions void the cover even for riders who did everything else right. Helmets are compulsory on every Vietnamese road. And Vietnam applies a zero-alcohol limit to anyone driving anything, not a lower limit but zero, so one beer with lunch puts a later claim outside the policy.

The motorbike guide covers what riding here is actually like. The helmet guide covers why the 100,000-dong shell handed over with the keys is not the one to wear.

What does a hospital expect before it treats you?

Vietnamese hospitals expect payment, not a policy number. International hospitals in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City ask for a deposit, or for a written guarantee of payment from the insurer, before they admit anybody. Public hospitals outside the big cities work in cash.

Direct billing exists, but somebody has to set it up. That means calling the insurer's emergency line before treatment rather than after. The same call signs off an air evacuation, and one signed off afterwards is one argued about afterwards.

Costs are low by Western standards and high against a policy excess. A consultation at an international clinic runs into the low hundreds of US dollars, and a few nights on a ward into the low thousands. An air ambulance to Bangkok or Singapore runs into the tens of thousands. The health guide covers what to do before any of that arises.

Which activities have to be declared?

Diving, caving and anything with an engine sit outside a standard policy until you add them on. Recreational diving is usually an add-on with a depth limit attached, commonly 18 metres for an open-water certification and 30 for an advanced one. That limit matters at Nha Trang and Con Dao rather than in a swimming pool.

Trekking is covered up to a height limit. Fansipan, the highest point in the country at 3,143 m, sits under that limit on most policies, so the northern treks are rarely the problem. Caving in Phong Nha is. Ordinary policies leave it out, so the cave operators there build cover into the trip price.

Read the list of what is left out rather than the list of what is in. It is shorter, and it is where kayaking, canyoning in Da Lat and riding pillion on somebody else's bike turn up.

What does the storm season do to a policy?

Storm cover pays out only for a storm nobody had forecast when you booked. Between September and November the central coast takes most of the country's typhoons, and a flight cancelled by one is a straightforward claim. The condition is that you booked the trip before that particular storm was named.

Book afterwards and the insurer treats it as a known event, which is the same principle that applies to a strike or a volcano anywhere else. The typhoon season guide explains how the season actually behaves and which weeks are worth avoiding.

Delay cover has a trigger too, usually six or twelve hours, and it pays for the hotel and the meals rather than for the ruined plan. Nothing covers a sailing cancelled in Ha Long Bay because the harbour master closed the bay, beyond the refund the operator owes you.

What has to happen after a theft?

A theft claim needs a police report, and insurers refuse the ones that arrive without it. Report it at the ward police station covering the street where it happened, the same day if you can. Ask for a stamped copy before you leave.

Hotel reception is the shortcut: staff know which station covers the address and will usually translate. Without that document a stolen phone is an anecdote, however genuine it is.

Most thefts in Vietnam are snatch-and-go rather than violent. A phone taken from a hand by a passing rider is the classic one. The scams guide covers the price-based tricks, which are a different problem entirely. Note too that a single-item limit of 300 to 500 US dollars is standard unless you declared the item, and a camera body passes that on its own.

How do you compare policies, when nobody here names one?

Compare five numbers and ignore the marketing: the medical limit, the repatriation limit, the excess, the single-item limit, and the price of the motorbike add-on. Those five decide what a Vietnam policy is worth, and every insurer publishes them in the same place in the schedule.

Vietnam Notes names no insurer and takes no commission from one, which is also why there is no "best travel insurance for Vietnam" list here — see the disclosure page. A ranking written by somebody paid per sale tells you about the commission rather than about the cover.

Two practical constraints when you buy. A policy generally has to be bought in the country you live in, so "travel insurance for Vietnam" bought from an Indian, British or Australian insurer means an Indian, British or Australian resident. And cancellation cover starts the day you buy, so buying the week before you fly protects the flight and not the booking.

What should you read before buying?

Read five things, in this order: the motorbike clause, the medical limit, the repatriation limit, the excess, and the list of excluded activities. Everything else on a policy schedule matters less. The first of the five decides more Vietnam travel insurance claims than the other four combined.

Check when cover starts, too. Cancellation cover runs from the day you buy. A policy bought the week before departure therefore protects the trip far less than one bought the week you booked it.

And weigh the excess against local prices honestly. A clinic visit in Vietnam can cost less than the excess on the policy covering it. You are insuring the crash, the ward and the flight home rather than the sore throat. What a trip costs otherwise is in the trip cost guide.