Heymondo Review: My Travel Insurance Experience

In 2024, disaster struck and I had to have emergency surgery while traveling in Thailand. Here’s my review of making a claim with HeyMondo.

I’ve been on the road now full-time since 2018 and luckily, I’ve only had to make small travel insurance claims, for example when my entire backpack was stolen in Barcelona.

So, when I ruptured my distal bicep tendon in Thailand and was told that I needed surgery within 14 days or risk a messed up bicep for life– I was pretty stoked that I had maintained a long term active policy.

Note: While I did have an overall good experience claiming my surgery with HeyMondo, this is an honest review of my experience and there were things I wasn’t happy about that left me out of pocket slightly.

A Long Story Short

Sh** happens when you travel. Unfortunately, ripping my bicep off the bone put a halt to my trip plans in Thailand. Luckily, Thailand has one of the best medical systems in the world and is known for offering high-quality healthcare services and things worked out well for me.

Here's a quick overview of my experience dealing with HeyMondo for this surgery.

The good:

• I needed several hospital visits and doctor's appointments. I was able to pay for small consultations myself to speed up the process and HeyMondo reimbursed me for all of these within a week.
• I needed an MRI to confirm the rupture of my distal biceps tendon prior to surgery. HeyMondo organized and paid for this immediately ($500+) with no issues.
• I had surgery to attach my bicep back to my arm within 10 days of the injury, which is considered quite good. The total cost was over $10,000 and HeyMondo covered the majority of this.

The bad:

• Unfortunately, there was a clause in the policy that didn't cover "surgical implants"– which meant I was out of pocket around $2,000 for the tiny button the surgeon had to use to complete the surgery. I was annoyed about this but it's clear in their terms.
• I was also out of pocket for travel costs back and forth from the hospital, which added up quite a bit since I was taking the ferries from Koh Lanta back to Phuket. I tried to claim this with Heymondo but again, it wasn't covered under their policy since it wasn't an "emergency". I was not impressed with this.
• I needed to buy a sling and a rather expensive range of motion limiting brace for $350– HeyMondo did not cover this.
• I needed physiotherapy to regain my range of motion after surgery, HeyMondo covered $150 of this, which was luckily enough for on consultation to set out a plan that I could follow by myself.
• There was a bit of back and forth between several different "agents" handling my claim. It got very annoying having to explain my situation over and over again to different agents but in the end, they never tried to get out of paying for the surgery which was always my biggest concern.

Overall, I'm aware that HeyMondo is a relatively cheap backpacker travel insurance option. And for the price of their coverage, I was very happy about the overall service and coverage. Of course, I wasn't happy about the clauses that left me out of pocket– but I knew what I was getting into when I chose a cheaper option and was willing to make that sacrifice.

The Claim Process

Immediately after the injury, I contacted HeyMondo immediately via their app (online call). This was a welcome feature for me since trying to claim with international calls is an absolute nightmare.

The initial call went well and I was feeling a bit more confident that I wasn't out here on my own.

However, I was surprised that I had to line up the hospital consultation myself if I wanted to speed up the process. Otherwise, they told me that it would take some time to organize a "local agent" to handle my case.

I've visited Thailand countless times over the years so I decided to organize everything myself to speed up the process, which involved organizing a taxi to the hospital and paying for the consultation up-front, to be reimbursed later.

Hospital Visits and MRI Scans

Each hospital visit went very smoothly, and I never had to fight for my claim. To be honest, after reading the terms and conditions of HeyMondo's policy, they were pretty clear-cut, and there wasn't much they could do to get out of paying for the surgery.

The Surgery

HeyMondo took charge after the initial consultations and MRI scans and sent me to Bangkok Hospital Phuket, which has a very good reputation internationally. At first, I thought that I was going to be having surgery that very day.

However, the hospital asked me to sign some estimates for the pricing, which they would send HeyMondo. They told me that I couldn't have the surgery before we got the preapproval from them. They told me that in some cases, this can take up to 48 hours, which I was not happy about.

To my surprise, HeyMondo approved the payment within an hour and I was set to have surgery the following day. They told me immediately that they would not cover the "surgical button", which I'd already discussed with my agents.

At this point, this didn't bother me too much, since I knew that I needed surgery as quickly as possible.

Growing up in Australia, I'm used to very long waiting lines and rather slow movement on the insurance and surgery front. So, I was stoked that on day 10 I was admitted for surgery. I stayed for two nights and HeyMondo paid for everything besides the brace, button, and transport.

Verdict: Would I Recommend HeyMondo?

After having to make a rather large claim and dealing with several hospital visits, scans, surgery, and follow-up medical visits, I do recommend HeyMondo travel insurance if you are looking for a low-cost option with decent coverage (make sure to check if it's a right fit for you).

In fact, I still use HeyMondo's Long stay insurance as my main travel coverage now.

As mentioned above, there were some things that I wasn't able to claim and things that could have been better. However, I find their policies to be well priced for me, saving me potentially $1,000s per month if I was paying for the premium travel insurance companies.

After the rather smooth process & happy result, I've partnered with HeyMondo to offer 5% OFF HeyMondo their policies for We Seek Travel readers. As you can see from this post, this has not influenced my opinion and I will always tell it to you like it is.