What's the first thing you pack when you are going on holiday? Your phone and charger, a photo of the farm dug, or are you tucking Tetley tea-bags into your socks?

Research* into the Scottish attitudes to holidays has found electronic devices such as mobile phones, tablets and e-readers are considered Scotland’s most important holiday essentials, with 69% saying they’re high up on their packing list. But a leading travel insurance provider says that this could leave holidaymakers without adequate cover should those devices be lost or stolen.

Priorities:
Electronic devices 69%
Headache tables 47%
Diarrhoea tablets 29%
Straighteners 13%
Condoms/Contraception 11%
Toilet roll 6%
Photos of family/children 6%
Religious text 3%
Photographs of pets 2%


Chris Rolland, AllClear CEO says travel insurance policies usually have a limit on the number and value of gadgets that can be claimed within baggage cover: “Many people may well be going over this limit and might want to consider additional gadget cover.”

Within the survey, respondents put forward ‘other’ items also important to them for a happy holiday and supporting the tea-obsessed stereotype, teabags came up regularly. Other essentials taken on holiday were surprisingly celery, masking tape and “husband”.

Toilet paper features at number six in the table with 6% of Scots considering it a holiday essential – on equal footing with family photos (6%). Unsurprisingly, parents (8%) tend to take toilet roll on holiday more than non-parents (6%), but oddly this spikes significantly for parents of children aged between 17 and 18 years with more than one in six (17%) considering it a holiday essential.

Cautious practicality wins out with headache and diarrhoea tablets taking the second and third spots for Scottish holiday essentials, at 47% and 29% respectively.

Chris concludes that with so many Brits off on their holidays this summer, his advice as always is to ensure you have full comprehensive travel insurance in place: “Baggage and gadget cover is certainly useful when something goes wrong, but the more common and bigger claims arise from cancellation and medical bills abroad. The latter can reach hundreds of thousands of pounds and so it is essential to be properly covered this summer.”