How to Travel Prepared this Holiday Season, with Travel Protection

Weather is more unpredictable than ever. Snowstorms are heavier and rainstorms are more torrential, and even the cold snaps are colder.

Travelers looking to vacation in coastal areas need to be prepared for the possibility that winter storms may make their destination uninhabitable. Meanwhile, people living everywhere else can be waylaid by blizzards, tornadoes, floods, and more.

A travel protection plan from Generali Global Assistance can help in three ways when bad weather strikes:

• Helps cover trip cancellation and interruption for certain weather-related issues. 
• Helps cover for medical expenses due to weather-related medical emergencies if you suffer an illness or injury during travel. 
• By providing emergency travel assistance or helping you make alternate arrangements if you’re lost, stuck, or stranded because of weather-related issues.

Read more: How Travel Protection Works with Bad Weather

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Air Travel Consumer Report for December 2024, only 78.0% of flights arrived on time—down from 83.9% during the same month in 2023. That means more than one in five flights experienced delays, a significant concern during the busy holiday travel season. With nearly 632,000 scheduled domestic flights and a cancellation rate of 0.7%, travelers faced a higher likelihood of disruptions compared to previous years. These figures highlight the importance of planning ahead and considering travel protection, especially when flying through major hubs during peak periods.

Weather is one of the top reasons why flights are delayed during the winter, and it can manifest itself in multiple ways. In addition to wreaking havoc with flights where you are, storms can strike another part of the country and back up flights in a domino effect from Seattle to St. Pete.

The holidays only happen once a year. You have somewhere important to be, and you need to get there. Travel insurance with assistance services can help make it right if you can’t, reimbursing you for covered events such as flight cancellations or delays due to adverse weather, if you need to cancel. Not to mention the travel assistance services that come with every Generali Global Assistance plan on this site. Our team is just a phone call way and can help you make alternate arrangements if things go south.

Also read: What to do if Your Flight is Canceled

Not every holiday vacation is a trip to see family. Sometimes you just want to get away from it all during the holidays – and when you do, it’s often somewhere where you can ski, golf, or otherwise recreate. Sporting-equipment coverage is vital to help protect your holiday-season recreation if your equipment is delayed or damaged.

Traveling with sporting equipment that you love can be nerve-wracking. Fortunately, we have Sporting-Equipment coverage baked into our Premium and Preferred Plans, so you’ll have help if your clubs, rackets, skis, and fishing tackle are lost, stolen or damaged.

If they’re delayed for a certain period of time, we can even help cover your rental costs so you can make your tee time or don’t miss a day on the slopes.

Another popular type of holiday travel is renting a vacation property with the family. Generali Global Assistance has a wide range of vacation rental coverage options that may help protect you not only if your trip is canceled due to a covered event, but if you get our Travel Secure vacation rental protection, you may also be covered for accidental damage to the rental and be reimbursed if your damage deposit is withheld due to a covered loss.

Enough things go wrong during the holidays without adding vacation rental issues to the pile. For many of those types of issues, we can help.

See our vacation rental protection plans

Hundreds of thousands of bags were mishandled in just one month—August 2024—despite all the tracking tech and baggage system upgrades airlines tout. With a mishandling rate of 0.64%, that’s more than 272,000 bags that went missing, got delayed, or were damaged. Clearly, even with modern systems in place, luggage still manages to slip through the cracks—literally.

Our plans can help cover lost, damaged or stolen bags – and you may even be reimbursed if you have to buy personal effects because your bags were delayed for the amount of time specified in your state specific plan during your trip.

Who doesn’t need help during the holidays, especially if you’re traveling?

Our travel assistance services, included with every plan on this site, can help with everything from rebooking a flight to setting up an emergency cash transfer or finding a restaurant that’s open for Christmas dinner.

Travel assistance is particularly useful and helpful during the hectic holidays. Take advantage of it.

See all the services included with our Generali Travel Protection plans

If you’re renting a car on your holiday trip, you can get Rental Car Damage coverage as part of your travel protection plan.

Rental Car Damage coverage is available with our Standard, Preferred and Premium Plans that may reimburse you up to $25,000 if your rental car is damaged through collision, theft, vandalism, natural disasters or other covered events beyond your control while you’re on your trip. (Rental Car Damage is not available to TX residents.).

So, in addition to buying travel insurance with assistance services, how can you help your holiday travel goes off without a hitch – or if it doesn’t, that you’re prepared for the hitches? Try some of these strategies:

Be flexible about your departure airport. There are generally several alternate airports within a two- or three-hour drive of wherever you are. If you’re in New Orleans, try Mobile or Baton Rouge; in Columbus, Ohio, try Cincinnati or Dayton. Granted, if the weather’s bad no one really wants to dive into a three-hour road trip, but if it gets you where you’re going safely, it’s worth it.

Have a backup plan, and a backup to your backup plan. Know all the different ways you can get from where you are to where you need to be. Check out rental cars,  train and bus schedules, and alternate driving routes that may be able to get you where you need to go when main roads are closed.

Avoid regional air carriers. The U.S. DOT calls them “codeshare partners,” but we know them as those smaller carriers with smaller planes that fly into smaller airports.

For all their small size, regional carriers still punch above their weight when it comes to flight cancellations. In December 2022, U.S. airlines canceled 5.4% of scheduled domestic flights, with regional partners contributing significantly to that total. Even with fewer routes, these carriers can have an outsized impact on travel disruptions—especially during peak holiday periods.

Regional air carriers often get bumped back in priority when larger flights get delayed, which can lead to lengthy delays, especially at the end of a flying day, when all that day’s delays compound.

If you fly on a regional carrier, try to get a seat on the first flight of the day. That plane may be the least likely to be delayed.

Also read: 6 Fantastic Destinations for Christmas and Holiday Season Travel

Be prepared to spend the night at the airport, but don’t be nuts about it. Pack your carry-on with stuff that can help being in an airport semi-comfortably: an inflatable pillow, lightweight blanket, toothbrush, washcloth, towel, a change of clothes, and a paper book. Budget for a pass to an airline lounge, where the couches are cushier and the snacks don’t stop.

Help Protect your health. It probably goes without saying these days, but make sure you have at the ready a mask and hand sanitizer, along with travel-sized portions of eye drops, cold medications, pain relievers, prescription meds, tissues and more.

Reserve ahead. If you’re traveling over the holidays, figure out where you want to eat and what’s open, and make reservations (our Concierge Services can help with that). Note that online menus may not be accurate over the holidays, as many dining establishments have special, set menus.

Winterize. If you rent a car somewhere warm to drive somewhere cold (think Palm Springs to Lake Tahoe), make sure the vehicle has all the cold-weather stuff you’re going to need – scrapers, chains, a shovel. Inspect the car’s windshield wipers looking for peeling rubber, insist on a vehicle with all-weather tires, and make sure the heat and defrosters work.

Stay charged. Pack a charging station (or two) for your electronics, and make sure it’s full of juice before you leave.

There’s too much at stake with holiday travel to not have added travel protection, especially this year. Consider where you’re going and what you’ll be doing, and get a quote for the plan that's right for you.