Via InsuranceOnline.my

Mistake 1: Did not contact the Insurer during an emergency

Let’s face it, we all panic during an emergency. That’s why it’s called an emergency, a state for us to justify our panic-driven behavior. And it is during such a time that a calm and collected mind would provide the best solution to get us out of the emergency, with the most minimal damage or loss.

And so it is when you are traveling out there in a foreign land. Mistake number one is of course, not having any proper travel insurance coverage. I’m not saying you should pay through your nose for travel insurance, but unlike traveling domestically, getting stranded in an emergency while traveling overseas can really complicate things. So getting some basic coverage can at least minimize the psychological burden, while it buys you some time to analyze the situation.

However, one of the most common mistake for people who are covered with travel insurance is that they often did not notify their insurer immediately. They do not realize that the travel insurance also comes with advice on how to get the most effective treatment or solution for their emergency. Also, by contacting the Travel Insurer immediately, you can also get the necessary information on what paperwork you must obtain from the relevant authorities to ensure a speedy claim when you are back to your home country. Most people just assume that by filling up a claim form provided by the Travel Insurer, they will get their reimbursement. This is definitely not the case- all claims must be backed by authentic and relevant documents.

Yes, it’s also true that the travel insurance do not cover every emergencies, but one should utilize the facility provided by the Travel Insurer where you can ask for the best course of action.

Mistake 2: Did not submit original documents when making a claim

Most if not all Travel Insurer only accepts original receipts for claim submission. Yes, if you have lost your original receipts, you will have some problem verifying the authenticity of your claim. The alternative is to probably request for a copy of receipt from the relevant party and have them verified by either the party involved. Some Travel Insurer might also allow you to use your original credit card statement, verified by the card issuing bank.

However, by not providing the original bills or receipts for the payments you have made, you are just putting yourself in between a rock and a hard place. Don’t take it as an insult on your character when the Travel Insurer says that they will not reimburse you until you show up with the original documents. No one is saying your dishonest, it’s just that, to proceed with the claim, photocopy of your payment documents are not going to make it through the Claims Department, period.

There is a reason why Travel Insurers insist on original documents, in fact, it is the practice of all Insurer that all monetary claims that is to be reimbursed to the policyholder must be furnished with original and authentic payment receipts. This is to ensure that policyholders do not claim the bills from other Insurers and try to profit from the claim.

So, no matter what policy is being practiced by the country you have traveled to, you must insist on the original copy of all the payments you have made. Do not settle for photocopy or carbon-copy. You have the right to receive original receipts as proof of your payments.

Mistake 3: Did not submit the claim within the stipulated time period

Most people would think that as long as they have the proper documentations in place, they can submit their claim anytime. Nonetheless, it’s a good idea to check the details of your travel insurance policy before making any assumptions on the time given for you to submit your claims. A ‘Notice of Claim‘ clause in a standard Travel Insurance policy might look like this:

NOTICE OF CLAIM: Notice of claim must be given to the Company within thirty (30) days after the Date of Loss/Accident. The Policyholder and/or Insured Person hereunder shall produce for the Company?? examination pertinent documents at such reasonable times and shall co-operate with the Company in all matters pertaining to any loss and/or claims. Failure to comply with this condition may prejudice the claim. Notice of claim given by or on behalf of the Policyholder and/or Insured Person to the Company, or to any authorized official of the Company providing information sufficient to identify the Policyholder and/or Insured Person shall be deemed notice to the Company.

In some cases, it might not be feasible to send in or fax a written notification to the Travel Insurer. Hence, it’s a good idea to always keep the Travel Insurer’s 24 hours emergency assistance hotline number and your travel insurance policy number when you are traveling. Check out this link for a list of Malaysia Travel Insurance Provider’s emergency hotline numbers.

For example, let’s say that you’ve lost your passport the moment you’ve arrived in your destination. Under most travel insurance, the loss of travel documents entitles you for a claim. And it would be another 2 months before you are heading back to Malaysia. Under this circumstance, it would be wise for you to call up the Travel Insurer and inform them about the loss and then have them advise you on the steps you need to take to ensure a speedy claim. If you wait till you come back to Malaysia, which is more than 30 days after your loss, you might need to furnish all the reasons of you not being able to notify the company and all the unnecessary ping-pongs with the Travel Insurer’s Claim Department.

So, to make your life easy, always contact your Travel Insurer whenever you have an emergency, regardless of whether you are entitled for a claim or not.

Kepada semua pembaca muslimin muslimat sekalian- Selamat Menyambut Hari Raya Eidulfitri 1430 Hijrah!

After failing miserably on my first attempt (Project Popeye), another project was unexpectedly showing pretty good results. In less than 3 weeks, it has grown about 2 feet.

These are the chili plants when they are about 3 weeks old. They need all the sunlight they can get in the day.

After about 6 weeks, the labor finally bore the first fruit.

Spotted the first chili from amongst the 6 plants I've planted.

And here’s the same chili fruit after about 6 days it was first spotted.

Looking really healthy for the harvest.

Due to the fact that these chilies are grown in a rather ‘high’ altitude, it’s quite difficult for natural agents, such as bees or ladybirds to pollinate them. Hence, lots of the initials flowering withered without bearing any fruits. After doing some research, I realized that you can actually ‘self-pollinate’ them simply using an art brush.

Self-pollination is done either using your fingers to rub on these flowers or by using a small art brush.

And here’s an interesting picture that shows how the flower transforms into a baby chili.

It's amazing to see how nature transform. From what looks like an attractive flower a few days ago, the chili starts to form its way out from the very same place.

Finally, after about 8 weeks since the germination, I harvested my first chili fruit.

You reap what you sow! But honestly, I remembered taking the seeds out from a red chili fruit. Hmm...someone hasn't been faithful...

Well, I can’t say it’s 100% organic, since the level of pollution in Petaling Jaya is not exactly at a very healthy level. But if compared to the chilies I get from the supermarket, this ‘home-made’ chilies definitely beats them hands down!

And who says you can’t start a farm in a high-rise apartment ;-)

If you have been getting your vegetable supplies from the supermarkets, you would have probably notice the surge of organic produce on the shelves of major supermarkets. You can find them in a special section, where I suppose the term special was reserved for the ‘price tag’. These so-called organic produce usually cost almost 2-3 times more expensive than their non-organic counterparts.

There’s generally no easy way to tell whether if you are really getting the real deal, since not everyone has the same definition of organic. Even if we can agree with what makes a produce organic, most of the products that I have seen so far on the shelves are not certified by the Organic Alliance Malaysia (OAM). I think OAM has to take a more active stance on protecting the consumers of organic produce by spreading the awareness on how to tell if the produce that we are paying 2-3 times more than the market price is truly organic.

If you are into growing things, you can also start your little farming project as an alternative to buying organic produce. Of course, unless you have a huge piece of land, don’t expect your hobby to be able to sustain your consumption. And if you are like me who lives in a high rise apartment, your available land for cultivation is even more restricted. However, if you really enjoy seeing seedlings sprouting into edible produce, these restrictions should not hold you back.

And here are some pictures from the first farming project: Project Popeye.

Overcrowded spinach sprouts.

These spinach sprouts definitely looks very promising in the beginning...

You can literally see life in these little seedlings.

Unfortunately for these cute little spinach sprouts, the funding for the project was stalled and all these baby sprouts was exterminated. Just kidding.

Under the hands of an inexperienced farmer like myself, these little spinach sprouts will eventually meet their doom in the next couple of days.

Actually, the real cause of crop failure was very likely due to insufficient sunlight and soil issues…

In the next post, I will be showing you another project which I have managed to harvest just after 2 months.

Been cleaning and battling the irritating IFRAME virus on a few blogs for the past few days. If you have been trying to access Meshio.com and was warned by your anti-virus program that Meshio.com is trying to infect your computer with a virus, the bad news is that it’s a valid threat, but rest assure that I am once again being sucked into the role of a system administrator doing my best to get rid of the virus.

Photo by Hello Naomi

For the record, I have cleaned the virus for the 2nd time on Meshio.com and for other blogs I’m running, up to as many as 5 times. So, do not be surprise to find Meshio.com compromised again. Sigh…the more doors you have, the higher the risk. Just when I thought I have closed up all the ‘doors’, the malware programs seems to be able to discover a new one and start creating a mess in the system once again. From the discussion with other webmasters, it seems that the most attractive entry points were the FTP client, a tool which is used to transfer files from your computer into the hosting server. If you think that your site has been compromised, here are some very relevant advice from Adrian on how you can up your defense against these malwares.

Change all FTP pwd immediately.

Download the whole site to hdd. do a scan using a special written files, remove it all infected files. replace it.

Do another scan on your website using this:… Read More

http://unmaskparasites.com/

Make sure all those who has FTP access to it, they are equipped with antivirus and updated virus db. Then only give them the new FTP pwd.

PS: if want the file i can ask my team engineer to email to you, we write in php.

And here’s another short anti-malware guide from Pin…

You might also like to take the following preventive measures to protect your website from malware:

1. Upgrade your Adobe Reader to the latest version
2. Install anti-virus software like Malwarebytes and Comodo
3. Use SFTP instead of FTP
4. Remove all malicious coding from your website
5. Upgrade to latest WordPress if you have a self-hosted Blog
6. Change your FTP password

I just cannot think of a really good reason why would anyone spend their leisure time engineering malicious programs to cut down the productivity of people they don’t even know, except for some boost to their ego.

Maybe there is really something sinister going on behind all these virus attacks after all.

There’s just so much similarity between these online viruses and the real-life ones (e.g. H1N1), all the anti-viral companies makes a huge profits from these ‘engineered’ outbreaks! The fear that was created by real-life viral pandemics would have easily justified policymakers all around the world to start mass vaccination on their citizens, in the name of containing the spread of the disease. Similarly, in the virtual world, anti-virus companies are laughing their ways to the banks each time an effective virus was set loose and infected millions of people’s computers worldwide.

Just think about it, why do the car manufacturers continue to churn out automobiles fueled by cartel-controlled petrol? There are already so many other alternatives available to replace petrol. Also, look at the disaster created by corporations that provided genetically-modified crops to Indian farmers, where the farmers are resorting to suicide due to their failing crops and their inability to pay the debts owing to these corporations which promised them lucrative yields. It’s a vicious and very profitable business model, a prevalent feature in any capitalistic economies.

I am all for businesses that are out to make profit. That’s the whole reason businesses are for anyway, but a business should never make profit by taking advantage of others.

Title of Course: Wealth Destruction and Rehabilitation ??Helping Malaysian Retirement Clients Thrive

Speaker: Mr. Rajen Devadason

Date: 3 OCT 2009 / Saturday [ full day ]

Venue: Dewan Berjaya, Bukit Kiara Equestrian & Country Resort Jalan Bukit Kiara, Off Jalan Damansara , 60000 Kuala Lumpur

Registration Time: 8.30 am ??9.00 am

Time: 9.00 am ??5.00 pm

Fee: Early Bird Special ??RM250 ( FPAM Member) , RM300 (Public)

Normal ??RM300 ( FPAM Member) , RM350 (Public)

Fee includes seminar materials, buffet lunch and refreshments.