Yeah I know, wierd thread title - but it got you in here.

My queries relate to when one immigrates. Consider the following two scenarios.

Car rental:

You book your flights and set a date for moving. You book car rental for when you land at the POE. When car rental guy asks you for your current address....hmmm.....well when you booked the car rental online you put your UK address, which actually you no longer live at. But if you tell them you are moving and live in the US now, and give them your US address....does that affect your insurance coverage? Will they accept a UK drivers license even though you are an LPR....but don't yet have a US license? Will they accept your credit card linked to an address you no longer live at?

Health insurance:

Of course when immigrating you still buy a return ticket because it's cheaper. So in theory you could buy travel insurance for the duration of the "trip", ending when you are scheduled to land back in the UK. This in theory gives you coverage for a few weeks while you get your SSN sorted out and get covered by a company. But what happens if they find out you have immigrated - would this invalidate your coverage? I suppose one could argue that one intends to go back on the return flight to finalise one's arrangements.

I'd appreciate any views on the above two scenarios.

Car Rental:

I don't think there's a "textbook" answer to this question, but personally I wouldn't worry. I'd just give the car rental company an address they can contact you at, and leave it at that. Your UK license remains valid (DVLA won't accept a foreign change of address, and state that "must notify change of address" doesn't apply to a move abroad), however I imagine that most states require you to obtain their driving license upon "becoming resident". There's a treaty that allows foreigners to drive for up to a year on the foreign license, but that's for "visitors". I've never seen the distinction between resident and visitor defined precisely. I suggest you just put obtaining a driving license high up your priority list and leave it at that.


Travel Insurance:

The small print of policies I looked at insisted on the journey being a round trip. Ignoring the small print is probably a good way of turning the policy into an expensive piece of paper... We got round that by contacting a proper insurance broker, who contacted the underwriters and got them to waive that clause in the contract in writing.

On the insurance policy, you won't be covered most likely. Unless it's something major, you will have to pay and claim back once you are back in the UK. If it's major you will be required to spend as little time as possible being treated in the US. If you don't use the second part of the return, your policy will almost certainly end the second you walk through immigration. You will find there are a lot of little things that can void the policy very easily. Some companies will offer short term expat insurance, not sure who though.

Car rental.

We moved three years ago so it might be different.
We looked on line, found a rate that was OK and then called the company. We gave the address of the hotel we stayed in for the first few days and explained that we would be closing on our house a few days after arriving. We knew we would need the rental car for about 6 weeks and so they gave us a slightly better rate.

It wasn't a problem at all.

Thanks for the replies so far.

I would be interested if anyone does have any info about short term insurance for expats. Even a month or two would be good...just long enough to get my SSN (presuming it's very difficult to get insurance without one, and it will be more expensive, like everything else seems to be without one).

Try these guys - I have a long term policy with them and haven't had any issues with acceptance by providers in the US. Not sure about short term though.

Generali Worldwide - http://www.generali-gw.com/

We bought three months worth of medical insurance through a specialist company. Sadly I cannot remember who they were ...that's very helpful!

My OH's company gave us these contacts for insurance but none of them ring a bell

www.globaltowne.com
www.virginiarisk.com
www.specialtyrisk.com

I think I searched on the internet or there may have been a link on here. Have you done a search?

Try these guys for short term ex-pat insurance. I would go with a US based company rather than one in Europe.

http://www.sevencorners.com/

Car rental - we just gave Alamo our UK licenses and a US contact phone number.

Health insurance - we had arranged it before we got here and it started the day we arrived. You can do that online (we used Blue Cross/Blue Shield) or through a broker.

Great stuff. Thanks all.

Tried Sevencorners and they have an "inbound immigrant" option, works out about $560 for the two of us for 3 months, for up to $100,000 of coverage. Sounds like just what we need.

Will check out Blue Cross as well - a lot of folks on here seem to use them for their ongoing coverage.

We are going to go with Blue Cross in 6 months time, they would not take us on right away I think as we are new in the country. I know others have been insured with them right away but they may be on group plans or have different personal circumstances than we have.

While that coverage sounds high it isn't that good if it is something serious.

I know the odds of a very serious accident or illness are very slight but a stay in intensive care can be very expensive. There was a kid in Oregon broke his back snow boarding and ICU care was $30,000 a day.

Full US heath cover is the better option if you can arrange it.

My husband just had to go to the ER for a kidney stone. A friend drove him to the ER, so no ambulance expense. He was in the ER about 5 hours. Total bill = close to $14,000 so far, and we haven't gotten the physican's bill yet. Thankfully we have insurance through my work, all we owe is a $100 copay. Just to let you know how expensive a small trip to the ER can be.

As others have said, that's not enough coverage. Our policy is for a lot more than that.

We got insurance through www.medibroker.com years ago, no idea if it's still any good. I never actually claimed on it.

I actually bought single tickets when we emigrated...