This has never occurred to me before, but are you guys taking your health insurance card with you when travelling abroad? I mean, it would only be useful on the way to and from the airport (maybe a copy would suffice?) and losing it abroad would be very annoying. Am I overlooking something?
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I usually keep it in my wallet, even after converting my wallet to travel mode. I feel like it’s important to have it for the trip to/from the airport just in case, even if I can’t use it while I’m abroad. I feel like if I lost my wallet the health insurance card would be the least annoying thing to have to replace.
I don’t bank on losing my things because I’m not a child. why don’t you put the card in your wallet and just not lose your wallet?
Actually if you are injured abroad you can claim on your Japanese health insurance, so the card might be useful to have. Claims have to be filed within 2 years and are paid at Japanese rates.
It’s probably a good idea to leave it at home. In the unlikely event that you need it between your house and the airport then someone would have bring it. Anyway you can sort that out.
A bigger problem would be if you lost it abroad then you’d have to request a new one.
A copy is useless. Japanese clinics/dentists etc need to see the real one.
One thing not to do is to leave the card in “a safe place” and forget where you have put it.
It helps as a form of ID. Sometimes you get asked to show another kind of ID. It seems annoying to risk losing it in another country, but you may find you need it in emergencies. What if you go to board the plane and spike an unknown fever? Or there is an earthquake and you have a layover, or accident on an escalator. So many things… better to just have it on you.
If something happens and you lose it then you cancel it and they will issue you another one right away. You may wait a week for it in the mail.
That’s always in my wallet. It’d go in the hotel safe (which may not be entirely trustworthy anyway) when we get there.
You should arrange travel insurance for when you’re out of the country anyway.
You don’t need to bring the card.. there’s a form you may want to bring for overseas medical problems .. obviously the card has no meaning overseas ..