Dealing with emergencies

If you require urgent medical assistance or hospitalisation, help with replacing a lost or stolen passport and/or assistance with arranging an evacuation following a natural disaster, please contact AHI Assist, a 24/7 travel assistance company and emergency hotline.

Phone: by reverse charge + 61 2 9978 6666

Email: ahiassist@dynamiq.com.au

To ensure immediate assistance, please provide the following details to AHI Assist:

• Policy number: 19096
• Your contact details
• Name of the organisation, department or agency that you are travelling on behalf of
• Description of the assistance you require.

For all non-emergency travel claims, you can complete a claim form and submit upon return to Australia.

Your first priority is to take immediate steps to safeguard employees and the public. Remove them from the affected area before you attempt to secure the property and premises.

Before starting any repair work, take care to ensure premises are safe to access. Safety measures include:

• allow water to run off before starting any clean up
• arrange to disconnect power to the damaged premises
• ensure that any overhead hazards such as fallen trees, loose or broken roof tiles and sheeting are isolated and removed.

Emergency repairs, to make premises safe and secure, should be carried out as a priority. Repair costs will be met under the terms of your policy.

If you engage contractors to carry out emergency repairs, ensure they are appropriately qualified, accredited or registered. This is important, particularly where work involves gas and electrical fittings or fixtures, or any work at heights, requiring falls protection.

Yes. In addition to meeting the cost of reinstating or replacing flood, fire or storm damaged property under the terms of the policy; we will also indemnify related costs. These include necessary and reasonable costs, such as those from:

• preventing or diminishing imminent damage to property from flood, storm or fire damage
• temporary protection and safety of property pending repair or replacement

temporary repairs, removal and disposal of debris and other matter

• accurate records need to be kept in relation to any such costs.

You should notify VMIA of damage to insured property as soon as possible. Please complete the Incident Notification Form and email it to claims@vmia.vic.gov.au to advise us.

For significant and extensive damage, we’ll work with you to help assess the damage, and co-ordinate repair works, if required.
In cases where personal injury has been suffered, what process should be followed?

You should immediately ensure that police, emergency and other services are engaged to treat injured people, and to mitigate any risks of additional harm to the public.

For after-hours advice for a significant event that has involved personal injury, you can phone VMIA on (03) 9270 6888.

The Large Loss Response Program is to help our clients who have experienced large losses as a result of catastrophic events.
If you’re affected by large floods or bushfires, you should notify us as soon as possible, so we can work with you to agree on and implement a claims management plan.

We can also provide resources to assist your immediate needs, where early intervention may reduce your losses.

As the flood waters or fires start to recede, you need to ensure that premises are made safe before commencing any clean-up work. Please, do not hesitate to contact us for help with this process.

Your first priority is to protect patient safety and to eliminate any threat to the general public and health service employees.

Clinical emergencies, particularly involving patient safety, should be managed under your health service’s internal guidelines for critical incident management. This includes obtaining specialist clinical, ethical or legal (including OH&S) advice, as appropriate to the health service.

You should notify us as early as possible of any event that might give rise to a claim under an insurance policy.
In emergency situations, this advice can in almost all cases be given on the next business day following the incident. Please complete the Incident Notification Form and email it to miclaims@vmia.vic.gov.au to advise us.

For situations that cannot otherwise be managed under a Health Service’s guidelines for critical incident management, we can provide emergency after-hours assistance and guidance. VMIA staff cannot, however, provide medical or legal advice.