Navigating the unexpected: Concentric’s GEAR membership hits the U.S. travel trade: Travel Weekly

Global security consulting company Concentric has opened its Global Emergency Assistance and Response (GEAR) emergency travel membership to all international travelers and wants to forge relationships with the trade in the United States.

Mark Davidson, chief growth and strategy officer, said Concentric largely serves ultrahigh-net-worth families as well as corporate clients. It provides emergency evacuation and security support as well as medical resources and evacuation.

GEAR came to Concentric as part of an acquisition. It is a travel assistance membership, not insurance, designed to give its users support if an emergency occurs during their travels.

Users access GEAR via the GEAR Tech smart app, which offers one-button access to the global operations center. Its annual membership is $3,000 and covers all travel outside of a traveler’s country of origin. The app also offers location-specific alerts and information useful to travelers.

“We’ve had a lot of interest from different populations that we didn’t expect, like young professionals that are traveling,” Davidson said.

Concentric wants to bring GEAR to the trade in the U.S., specifically to agencies and advisors who have clients who travel internationally more than a few times a year, or who take extended vacations.

It’s particularly valuable “in areas where foreign language, different medical systems and things like that would be needed to navigate,” Davidson said.

Davidson said advisors are working with the kind of clients Concentric believes are right for GEAR. Commission paid to advisors depends on volume and location, but it’s generally around 10%, he said.

A added layer of assurance

Sarah Murdoch is the founder and director of Adventures with Sarah, a boutique tour company that also offers travel advising services. Murdoch has been a tour guide and travel journalist for 25 years, spending several years with Rick Steves as a tour guide and writer. She founded her own operation in 2018.

Murdoch offers GEAR to her clients.

Many of them travel with her frequently, she said. A lot are in their 60s and 70s. A product that offers assistance without some of the inconveniences of travel insurance is attractive, Murdoch said.

For instance, last year, two of her longtime guests in their 70s and 80s were traveling with her on a Rome tour. They purchased travel insurance.

But before they even arrived, one of the travelers had a medical emergency on the flight. They were checked into a private hospital in Rome where the wife was able to get the specialized surgery she needed to save her life. Before they checked out, though, the hospitals wanted more than $115,000 in cash. The woman’s husband spent quite a bit of time moving money around to pay the fee.

Travel insurance did reimburse them, Murdoch said, but “it was just such a mess.”

“When I heard about this GEAR thing, I was like, OK, well, that seems like that could be a solution to offer to our guests as something that they can book in conjunction with a tour, particularly guests who do more than one tour a year,” she said.

She likes GEAR’s concept of simply touching one button on an app if something goes wrong.

Murdoch started working with Concentric in August, and she’s had a good response from clients, especially as she’s spread the news about the product via social media and her blog.

She does still offer traditional travel insurance as an option to clients but plans to continue to offer GEAR.

“It’s interesting to have something that’s a little bit different product out there, which is why we decided to go with this,” she said.