Travel
A2A Travel Agent Standard
Version: 0.1 (Draft for Comment)
Status: Working Draft. Not yet in production.
Steward: Marrow (onmarrow.com), on behalf of the Agent-to-Agent (A2A) working group
Line of business: UK travel insurance (single trip and annual multi-trip)
Published: June 2026
This is a draft request for comment. It defines how an autonomous AI agent should request, compare, and transact a UK travel insurance quote against a regulated carrier, safely, auditably, and carrier-agnostically, with particular care for medical screening and the regulatory duties that attach to it. Comments to standards@onmarrow.com.
Foundational dependency. This standard relies on the A2A Core Patterns Standard for all shared behavioural rules (grounding and no fabrication, assume-infer-confirm, the advice boundary, disclose-and-acknowledge, fair presentation, honest absence, data protection, vulnerability and Consumer Duty, handover machinery, and audit) and the canonical roles, and on the A2A Consent, Authority and Scopes Standard for authentication and transaction authority. Only the rules distinctive to travel are stated in full below. Travel is distinctive in the ways set out next.
What is distinctive about travel
Enrichment is near zero on the people and the trip. Travel insures a trip and a set of travellers, not a registered asset, so there is no MyLicence, CUE, UPRN, or microchip equivalent. Almost everything material (who is travelling, their ages, their health, the destination, the dates, the trip cost) comes from the customer. The only authoritative enrichment is at the destination level: the FCDO travel-advice status of the destination, region classification, and GHIC applicability. The standard is honest that the customer is the primary source and builds its safeguards around getting their declaration right rather than around verifying it against a database.
Medical screening is the line, and it carries explicit regulatory duties. The single most consequential interaction in travel is the pre-existing-medical-conditions screening. Getting it wrong voids the medical section, which is the section that matters most. UK regulation attaches a hard duty here: under the FCA signposting rules (PS20/3), where a customer with a pre-existing condition is declined, automatically excluded, or quoted a medical additional premium at or above the signposting threshold, the firm must signpost the customer to the MoneyHelper specialist directory. That threshold rose from £100 to £200 with effect from 1 January 2026. A conformant agent must implement this, and failing to is an FCA breach.
These two, medical screening and signposting, are the travel analogue of the home rebuild-cost rule and the pet policy-type rule: the thing the agent exists to get right.
Sources and provenance
- FCA PS20/3 and the signposting rules require signposting to a specialist directory when a pre-existing-condition customer is declined, auto-excluded, or quoted a medical additional premium at or above the threshold (£200 from 1 January 2026). This is a mandatory conformance requirement of this standard.
- The MoneyHelper travel directory (Money and Pensions Service), and the BIBA travel directory, are the FCA-recognised signposting destinations.
- FCDO travel advice (gov.uk) is the authoritative, free source of destination advice; travelling against FCDO advice typically voids cover, so the agent checks and flags it.
- GHIC (the UK Global Health Insurance Card, via the NHS and gov.uk) reduces state-provided medical costs in the EU and is a disclosure point, not a substitute for cover.
- UK aggregator and insurer question sets (Aviva, Post Office, Staysure, AllClear, Compare the Market and others) corroborate the trip, traveller, and medical-screening field set, including the two-year medical lookback and the heart-and-circulation ever-asked convention.
- Defaqto scores travel policies on features and provides the canonical cover-feature taxonomy for like-for-like comparison.
- ABI travel guidance corroborates the cover-section taxonomy.
Confidence statement
Locked: the trip and traveller field set, the medical-screening centrality, the signposting rule and its current threshold, the FCDO-advice rule, and the role of the sources above, corroborated across multiple insurers and the FCA.
Not yet locked: this line is not in production. The exact medical-screening question model (whether the agent uses a carrier's screening engine or a canonical screening), the activity and sports code list, and the cover-feature enumerations (against Defaqto) need a first carrier integration to lock. v0.2 follows that integration.
1. Design principles
The shared design principles (carrier-agnostic by construction; no fabrication; disclose-and-acknowledge; observable compliance) are defined in the A2A Core Patterns Standard and apply in full. The principles distinctive to travel:
The customer is the primary source; screen carefully. With almost nothing verifiable from data, the agent's safeguard is a careful, complete medical and activity screening and a clear account of the consequences of inaccuracy, not a database check.
Signposting is a duty, not an option. Where the signposting conditions are met, the agent signposts to the MoneyHelper directory. This cannot be skipped.
Check the destination. The agent checks FCDO advice for the destination and flags that travelling against it voids cover.
Live demo
The same protocol, walked through interactively. The left panel is the agent's conversation; the right is the canonical travel_quote_request building up, every value tagged with its provenance — enriched, attested, derived, or asked. Watch the medical screening at step 2 trip the mandatory MoneyHelper signpost; the Bind & pay action stays locked until all six conditions of the bind precondition invariant (defined in the New Business Standards) are met. Step through it:
2. Roles and terms
Roles and terms (Customer, Agent, Surface, Rail, Carrier, Material fact) are defined in the A2A Core Patterns Standard. Travel-specific terms: the Customer is the lead traveller arranging cover and declaring on behalf of the party; Travellers are all insured persons.
3. Canonical travel quote request
The agent assembles a travel_quote_request. Fields are marked enrichable (destination-level only), required, or conditional.
3.1 Trip
| Field | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
trip_type | required | Single trip or annual multi-trip. Structurally different products; not compared like-for-like. |
destination / region | required | Country or countries; full cruise itinerary where applicable. Keys FCDO and region enrichment. |
start_date / end_date | required | Single trip. |
trip_duration_per_trip | conditional | Maximum trip length for annual multi-trip. |
trip_cost | required | Per person where cancellation cover is required; the basis for cancellation adequacy. |
trip_purpose | conditional | Leisure, business, or study; affects appetite and cover. |
3.2 Travellers
| Field | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
travellers | required | Each with age (a primary rating factor) and relationship. |
group_basis | required | Individual, couple, family (commonly up to two adults and up to four children under 19), or group. |
uk_residency | required | UK residency and GP registration are standard eligibility conditions. |
3.3 Medical screening
| Field | Required | Basis / notes |
|---|---|---|
medical_screening | required | Per traveller. Conditions needing medication, advice, or treatment in the last two years, and heart, circulatory, and certain serious conditions ever. The agent must complete screening for every traveller, not just the lead. |
screening_outcome | derived | Per condition: covered, excluded, additional premium, or declined. Drives the signposting test. |
non_disclosure_acknowledged | required | The customer acknowledges that inaccurate medical declaration voids the medical section. |
3.4 Activities
| Field | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
declared_activities | required | Winter sports and hazardous activities (skiing, scuba, climbing, and similar) must be declared; undeclared activities are not covered. Canonical activity list. |
3.5 Cover requirements
| Field | Required | Notes |
|---|---|---|
cover_sections | required | Cancellation and curtailment, emergency medical and repatriation, baggage and personal possessions, personal money and documents, personal liability, missed departure, travel disruption. |
optional_sections | optional | Winter sports, cruise, business, gadget, golf. |
cover_level | required | Standard, superior, or premier tiers, varying by section limits. |
excess | required | |
ghic_held | optional | Disclosure point for EU travel; not a substitute for cover. |
4. Enrichment hooks
Destination-level only. Everything about people and trip is customer-supplied.
| Hook | Source | Populates / checks | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
fcdo_advice_check | FCDO travel advice (gov.uk) | Whether the destination is subject to FCDO advice against travel; flagged because it voids cover. | FCDO |
region_classification | Carrier region mapping | Maps destination to the carrier's region bands (e.g. Europe, worldwide excluding, worldwide including). | Carrier convention |
ghic_applicability | gov.uk / NHS | Whether GHIC applies to the destination. | GHIC |
There is deliberately no enrichment of traveller identity, age, or health; the standard does not imply one and relies on screening and attestation.
5. Agent behavioural rules (compliance semantics)
The general behavioural rules (no fabrication, information-not-advice, disclose-and-acknowledge, fair presentation, honest absence, PII minimisation) are defined in Core Patterns Section 2 and apply in full. Travel-specific rules:
- Screen every traveller completely. The agent completes medical screening for all travellers and does not abbreviate it; it explains that an inaccurate or incomplete declaration voids the medical section.
- Signpost when the conditions are met. Where any traveller is declined, automatically excluded, or quoted a medical additional premium at or above the FCA threshold (£200 from 1 January 2026), the agent signposts to the MoneyHelper directory. This is mandatory and recorded.
- Check and flag FCDO advice. The agent checks FCDO advice for the destination and tells the customer that travelling against it voids cover.
- Require activity declaration. The agent asks about winter sports and hazardous activities and explains that undeclared activities are not covered.
- Surface adequacy. The agent checks that the cancellation cover meets the declared trip cost and that the medical and repatriation limit is adequate, and flags shortfalls rather than defaulting to the cheapest tier.
- Do not compare trip types as like-for-like. Single-trip and annual multi-trip are different products; the agent makes the basis of any comparison explicit.
- Special-category medical data. Medical screening data is special-category; the rail protects it under the heightened data-protection rules and passes only what the carrier requires. Where no carrier quotes for a medical reason, honest absence is accompanied by a signpost.
6. Canonical travel quote response
The carrier (via the rail) returns a travel_quote_response with zero or more quote objects.
| Field | Notes |
|---|---|
carrier_quote_reference | Required for bind. |
trip_type / cover_level | Always present; drive the comparison rules. |
premium | As returned; the agent does not recompute. |
section_limits | Per section: cancellation, medical and repatriation, baggage, money, liability, missed departure. |
medical_additional_premium | Where a declared condition is loaded; compared against the signposting threshold. |
excess | Per section where applicable. |
cover_features | Structured against the canonical travel feature taxonomy (aligned to Defaqto). |
key_exclusions | Including medical exclusions, FCDO-advice exclusion, and undeclared-activity exclusion; surfaced under disclose-and-acknowledge. |
priced_optional_sections | Winter sports, cruise, and others priced separately. |
ipid_url | Insurance Product Information Document. |
validity_expires_at | |
appetite_status | quoted, declined, or referred. A medical decline triggers the signposting duty. |
7. Handover and signposting triggers
The shared handover machinery and common triggers are defined in Core Patterns Section 2.9, where signposting is the mandatory form of handover. Travel-specific: the agent signposts to the MoneyHelper directory whenever the medical signposting conditions are met (decline, automatic exclusion, or additional premium at or above threshold), regardless of whether the customer proceeds. Travel-specific handover triggers, additional to the common ones: a medical, activity, or destination profile outside the schema's capacity (for example a destination under FCDO advice against travel, or an undeclarable complex medical history). Signposting and handover are not mutually exclusive; a medical decline both signposts and may hand over.
medical additional premium ≥ £200?
8. Audit requirements
Audit requirements are defined in Core Patterns Section 2.10 and apply in full. Travel-specific evidentiary emphasis: the full medical screening for every traveller and its outcomes, every signpost made and its trigger, the FCDO check and any flag raised, the activity declaration, and the non-disclosure acknowledgement. Medical data is held as special-category data. This record is what demonstrates signposting compliance, which the FCA reviews directly.
9. Versioning and conformance
This standard is versioned (v0.1), is not yet in production, and relies on the A2A Core Patterns Standard and the A2A Consent, Authority and Scopes Standard; conformance requires conformance to those at a declared version. A conformant agent implements Sections 3 through 8 in full, including complete per-traveller screening and the signposting duty. A conformant carrier maps its travel product to the canonical request and response and exposes the medical-additional-premium figure needed to apply the signposting test. v0.2 follows the first carrier integration and Defaqto data access.
10. Open questions for comment
- The canonical medical-screening model: whether the standard mandates a single canonical screening or defers to each carrier's screening engine, and how outcomes are normalised for the signposting test.
- Locking the canonical activity and cover-feature code lists against Defaqto and carrier conventions.
- Whether the standard should require an explicit adequacy warning when cancellation cover is below declared trip cost or the medical limit looks low, mirroring the home underinsurance rule.
- How the agent should handle a destination placed under FCDO advice against travel after a policy is bound but before departure.
- Representation of advised sales and any demands-and-needs assessment.
Published as an open standard. Marrow stewards the drafting but does not assert proprietary control over the interface; the compliance, enrichment, and audit implementations behind it are separate. Carriers, agent platforms, and regulators are invited to adopt, critique, and co-author future versions.