Dog Insurance

So the annual renewal has come through for the pooch – 9 year old Sprocker with zero medical conditions. Everyone still thinks he is a puppy looking at him.

Petplan are wanting a ridiculous £950, up from £800 last year, which was also up from £700 the previous year. It seems they can do what they want, spouting the usual we are the best in the business etc etc.

Now I appreciate he is getting older and prices won’t be low, but has anyone left Petplan and gone with someone else in a dogs older years? If so, any recommendations? He’s currently got Covered for Life which Petplan say all they can do is remove this to reduce premiums.

Any advice greatly appreciated

I change pet insurance every year for our 2cats and dog. I go through Quidco for cash back and usually go through a price comparison for the best deal. Petplan increased all of the renewals recently. One of my cats (who has had issues) now costs more to insure than both our cars on her own.

£150 for last year’s 8year old sprocker sounds incredibly cheap though – our dog is also 8 and is more like £400.

Similar situation here with our 8year old Karelian Bear Dog, we were at break even point as he cracked an upper front tooth/fang and had expensive root canal reconstructive surgery on it a few years ago.
Otherwise they are solid healthy primitive breed dogs and I’m tempted to ‘self insure’ but I wouldn’t want to be in a position that something expensive happened and I was weighing up between financial cost and his life.

I don’t insure my dog now. I just put £60 into a savings account each month to cover future bills.

I started doing this when my last dogs insurance started to hike up when she got to 10. She died at 15 a rich dog. I am doing the same for my current dog who is coming up to 2 years old and has £1300 in her savings account.

What frustrated me about my last dog is that I had never claimed, but the insurance still doubled when she got to 10 years old.

We don’t insure ours either and, interestingly, I’ve had a number of conversations with different people who work in vets practices (two clinical directors and one practice manager who used to be a head nurse) who say that they don’t either, they just put some money to one side.

We have just had to fork out about £4k for stuff for the dog, and although that’s a lot we’ve had him three years and it pretty much breaks even at what the insurance premiums would have been for him to this point.

Our dog passed in December, but make sure you read the small print carefully for any policy – we went with M&S for ~£700p/y for a 12yr old sprocker. with a headline figure for £x,000 covered per year. Looked a good deal via a comparison site.

When she got cancer we discovered she only had £1k per illness per year, not the multiple thousands we thought we had cover for.

We ended up paying around £3k out of pocket to manage her last year over and above paying for insurance. Insurance was cancelled the day after they paid out to the Vet’s though.

At best we got 1/3rd of the amount paid into insurance, back out again to cover treatments with what we had. If and when we get our next 4legs, we will self insure by putting £60 a month aside into a completely separate “Insurance” account and self fund any care.

I don’t insure my dog now. I just put £60 into a savings account each month to cover future bills.

That’s fine unless you’ve only saved a few hundred and are suddenly faced with a bill for thousands.

OP – I think you are stuck with it I’m afraid. Very few insurers will take on a 9yr old dog without wanting a big premium.

Pet plan are good, but expensive. Three of our cats are insured with them, and one can’t be insured as he had a pre-existing condition that can cause all sorts of illnesses – except he’s butcher’s dog fit, and has been for 5 years.

We paid for years for a previous cat, needed nothing until she was older and suddenly developed breathing difficulties. Trip to vets, you need to get to animal hospital. An overnight etc, phoned pet plan as hospital wanted a grand out of us there and then, they covered it. Must have cost a couple of k just for 48 hours in pet hospital.

Two other previous cats did use the policy, one for various injuries they caused themselves, and the other had gingivitis which needed lots of dental work.

You just don’t know, but it’s a tricky one. We pay about £60 a month – £45 for three of them, and the rescue has a ‘checkup/vaccination/flea/worming plan’ that’s £15. The other three cats got £100 vaccination for life plans when they were kittens (pays back by year 2).

I’m with manypets for my lab, £41pm for for their middle ground coverage. Very tempted to be one of these people that just puts 50 aside every month. They hiked it up £10 a month at renewal.

It is expensive whatever the dog. Currently our dog’s insurance is not significantly less than both our cars and the house insurance combined.

That’s fine unless you’ve only saved a few hundred and are suddenly faced with a bill for thousands.

Fair point. In theory I should have carried over the £3k my old dog had saved up to my new dog, but I spent it on a bike, its what she would have wanted for me isnt it?

I have a very simple rule of never taking out insurance for anything I could afford to cover, which basically means we only have car and house insurance. Insurance companies aren’t charities. They make quite healthy profits. So, on average, over your whole life, you will nearly always lose out on insurance. Of course for any one thing it can seem attractive. But as long as you apply the rule to enough things (including extended warranties) you should come out on top overall. So, we’ve never insured our dogs. Our 12 year old Collie will probably rack up some bills soon, but we’ve saved 12 years of premiums.

Also, when I last looked at pet insurance (admittedly many years ago) they seemed to have a cap on what they would pay out anyway, which was the opposite of what I wanted.

Roverpig – there is of course plenty of sense in what you say … but it does rely on you being sufficiently cash rich (or perhaps credit worthy) to be able to put your hands on significant sums at short notice.

does nobody offer a fixed price “for life” deal like you can get with human life insurance?  Probably more expensive in the early years than annual policies but might appeal to those who really understand the total cost of ownership of a pet.

@IHN – people who work in vets have an advantage over the average punter though.  They likely have access to mates rates / staff discount and general advice for free and perhaps have a different perspective on “trying everything” to save their dog etc.  they are also usually in relatively secure jobs with stable and reasonable income.  For some people insurance will be the right way to manage risk.

Within 5 weeks of arrival (post insurance) my ‘healthy’ rescue mutt blew through her insurance allowance for the year. Then more, then ate a tennis ball that needed removing, 2 months into the next years policy she ate another one.

We’ve paid out about £600 in premiums and they’ve covered £10k in bills so far. We have also had to top up though as she has a lifetime illness that leaves us tied to the same insurer for herlife span.

If I’d had a healthy dog for 12 years that was getting expensive to insure I’d probably wonder if it was worthwhile, but luckly she does seem to be the sort who wants to/will live all that long, although she will be 3 in a few weeks which was something we never expected to see after her first few months.

We’re getting a cocker puppy in a couple of weeks time and currently trying to decide what to do about insurance.
The favoured option at the moment is to insure him for the first couple of years then self insure from there onwards.

Roverpig – there is of course plenty of sense in what you say … but it does rely on you being sufficiently cash rich (or perhaps credit worthy) to be able to put your hands on significant sums at short notice.

Peter and Paul, isn’t it. If you’re paying (say) a £700 annual premium for ten years, that’s seven grand you should have if you hadn’t paid for insurance. That then isn’t a reliance on being cash-rich, it’s a reliance on forward planning.

I’ve always self-insured. I’m almost wavering on the side of this being a mistake, but my thinking is that my “premium” then covers the cats, the bikes, the washing machine, the Xbox… without fear of any smallprint loophole twattery. Ten quid a month here, fifty there, £2.99 for the extended warranty on the toaster, it all rapidly adds up and it’s just giving away free money if you never claim against it. I justify this to myself going “well, if I was presented with a ten grand bill for the cat I’d just get another cat” but… well, that’s a bold statement and the reality is that I just don’t know. The furry little bastards get under your skin somewhat.

The favoured option at the moment is to insure him for the first couple of years then self insure from there onwards.

I “did the math” when we got the kittens. With vaccinations, spaying discounts etc Petplan worked out very cost-effective for the first 12 months. After that, not so much. I cancelled it after two years because (as above, twattery) the vets insisted that I couldn’t cancel mid-year as I was seemingly in the middle of a second annual contract. I rather suspect that this was a lie but it was like two months short of the year so 🤷‍♂️ it wasn’t a fight I could be arsed with.

Our previous dog reached 7 having no issues then needed veterinary care and soon racked up 10k of bills, Petplan were amazing and quickly paid out, we certainly had our moneys worth from the insurance.

Our second dog was insured with bought by many, the policy was cheaper and they have been ridiculously slow at dealing with claims but have still paid out over 7k in total including refund the cost of purchasing him once he passed.

We’re with PetPlan. 11 year old large dog, ~£150/month now.
And that just pays out 80% of the bills after the excess.

NONETHELESS I reckon we’ve broken even over his lifetime, more or less. “Thanks to” (!) the last year :/

We did – at one time – take the “self insurance” route. Then came a year where vet bills would have paid for a reliable second hand hatchback and only one of the dogs we had then survived.

We now pay for good quality insurance, to divorce the pain of losing the money from the pain and worry of dog being ill. That’s our decision but YMMV.

Dog has had 2 major surgeries in a year (to remove 2 different tumours), plus supporting scans and tests (lots), and is currently going through chemo. £££ and I think we’re going to hit the 22-23 limit. Thank god the insurance year rolls over in a week or two.

Thing is – the treatment has kept him happy and well. He goes on his walks, he sleeps, he shakes us down for treats, he barks at the postie, he’s living his life. If we hadn’t treated, we would have had to put him to sleep, he was not a happy lad at all.

We didn’t want to be in the position where dog has something entirely treatable (if dear) and we dither because it’s £6k.

Prices have gone up and vets are thinner on the ground as well. Thanks to Brexit and the pandemic :/

One of our rescues we had for barely 3 years, the last year was spent on reassuringly expensive drugs and referral centre visits for heart failure. The insurance company made no money from us on that dog. Similarly 2 years at £50 a month wouldn’t have covered 3 months of the illness year.

Op at 8 you’re stuck with Petplan as most other places will charge more for less.

Our second dog was insured with bought by many, the policy was cheaper and they have been ridiculously slow at dealing with claims

We’re with them too and so far (touches wood) payouts have been next day using electronic bill submissions.

We stopped paying insurance premiums after dogs 1 and 2 in 2004. We’re now on dog number 6 and have over £10k in savings set aside to cover such eventualities.

we were in the self funding camp until mid way through last year, whe we decided to take out insurance with Co-Op. upper limit of £10k for the year.

quite glad we did as our 5 year old Kokoni has had an op for bloat just after christmas, and then about 2 weeks later spinal surgery for a prolapsed disc.

it’s been a pretty stressful time, but at least we know we’ll stand a chance of recouping the £6k bill and have a dog that’s alive.

I can’t tell you how glad I am
That I insured both my dogs with petplan when they were puppies!!

One of them in particular.

We’ve claimed tens of thousands for her in the last 10 years (and continue to do so for medication and ongoing related issues). Petplan have been really good throughout.

Second dog bust a disc in her spine, 7k all in and all we paid out was the excess £80. Never had to pay upfront and claim back.
Even with us now paying £100 a month we are thousands of £‘s in pocket.

Without it I genuinely don’t know what we’d have done

Two dogs both insured with Animal Friends. 1 13yr old Whippet £ 645p/y, one 3yr old Lurcher nutbag £265p/y. It is a tough call, the old boy hasn’t been any trouble and we’ve barely claimed a penny over his lifetime so we could have been quid’s in if we hadn’t been paying for it. The lurcher however has been back and forth to the vets so many times in her short life, to the tune of circa £8k.

We did move to Animal Friends later in the old lads life and we didn’t get stung too much for an older dog so they may be worth a look, however i do think we do get a bit of a discount for the two dogs together. Still a rip but on balance i’d rather have it just in case. Neither I nor my better half could find the cash at short notice for some of the big bills that we’ve seen for the youngster. Saved a couple of very difficult decisions.

Roverpig – there is of course plenty of sense in what you say … but it does rely on you being sufficiently cash rich (or perhaps credit worthy) to be able to put your hands on significant sums at short notice.

It’s a fair point. We are all different, I am probably more fortunate than most and I wouldn’t want to judge anybody else’s choices. It’s part of an overall philosophy though. I don’t have a pot that is earmarked for the dog. But at the same time I wouldn’t feel at all comfortable (and wouldn’t even contemplate getting a pet let alone having kids) if I didn’t have at least a few months worth of salary in the bank “in case of emergencies”. I’ve always been that way though, even when I didn’t have a pot to piss in and I’m aware that most people can live quite happily without any sort of safety net. In which case having insurance probably does make sense.

I wonder if there are some regional differences in vets too. I thought of posting this earlier but can’t think how to phrase it without risking causing offence. But I wonder if the vets up here (who deal a lot with farm dogs and even farm animals) have a different attitude (or maybe are just more used to dealing with customers with a different attitude) to how much is reasonable to spend on a pet.

I’m on my 2nd dog now..my 1st hardly had any problems and she lived to 16.
My new dog is the same breed , so I suggested why not put the money in a account instead of getting insurance…no no no my wife said, so we took out insurance on her…4 months later my dog got a bug that 98% can beat…she was in the 2% ….3 days in intensive care plus 5 days at the vets…we actually maxed out the insurance …about £4k…the total bill was £5200…was I glad I listened to my wife..always a gamble with insurance…after my experience , I won’t be gambling no more

One thing insurance companies are rubbish/devious about is cover for pre existing conditions. They don’t ask for a full history and then give you a breakdown of things they won’t cover when you take the policy out.

All very well to swap company every year but is a new policy and essentially anything that has happened to the dog before won’t be covered.

Lameness on the right hind two year ago may mean they won’t cover the cruciate surgery that has now been diagnosed in the same leg as you weren’t insured with them then. Only find out when you send them the full history as they request at the time of you making a claim. Seen a lot of people caught out with such things.

We have been with direct Line for a few years now. 6yr old dog, claimed on some dentist work once, and I think it is around 5-600. I won’t change because they dealt with our one claim really well, and they don’t increase massively each year. In comparison to Pet Plan and KC the cost was significantly more palatable for the same cover. The only gripe is that they don’t run the pet insurance online, your docs still come in paper form.

Our mutt is insured with Pet Plan. We’ve had him for 4 years and monthly premiums are now 2.5 times the first year. However, he’s got a couple of allergies plus a heart murmur so is on permanent medication and 3 echo cardiograms per year.

All told, if we’d self-insured, we’d probably be a few hundred a year better off paying for his existing treatment so the way I look at is, those few hundred a year is pretty damn cheap insurance should any major surgery be needed or new illnesses occur…

knew i could rely on stw to have a thread already so i dont need to start another.

my wifes upset with herself as she misunderstood the ‘annual’ policy we took out on our jack russell with argos.  we’re now faced with paying for ongoing treatment for his heart now the years up.

hes now 13, got a heart murmer, a narrowing windpipe that makes him cough, and just discovered dental problems.

i suppose its pointless asking whether theres any insurance company thatd take him on a ‘lifetime’ policy now that these conditions are present, cos as has already been mentioned, theyre not charities, they want to make money from you.

what i would like a bit of advice on please is cost of prescriptions/medication.  we just picked up some ‘vetmedin’ heart tablets for him at £100 for 2 months.  ouch.  i think you can get them on the internet which would save some money, but you still have to pay the vet for a prescription, but still probably the cost effective way of doing it?

and can you just chop and change vets for treatment?  you know, ask around for who would do such and such treatment for the best price?

we’ve been told that he needs a load of teeth out, but due to dodgy heart and windpipe, and being 13, its not 100% that he’d come out of a general anaesthetic, so he’d need a heart scan and bloods first.  our current vets charged £600 for a scan last year (paid by insurance, but next one will be on us) whereas we see that other vets nearby charge £250.  so can you shop around?  do they all want your custom or do you have to stick with the one youve got once a condition is known?

we’re thinking that the teeth out/general anaesthetic is our last chance saloon, so only put him through all that if hes in pain with his mouth through abcesses, ulcers etc, and consider whether he’d have a decent life afterwards.  if he can just keep going on heart tablets and no painful mouth abcesses for now, and still enjoys a good walk, then why take the chance with having his teeth out.

think we may have some difficult times ahead :-/

thanks

So sorry to read this. What a headache! I can’t offer much advice on the insurance, although we are paying a stupid amount a month with a pet plan now our pooch is 12. However, we have found asking the vet for a paper prescription and then either buying it online (we use pet drugs online) or from the pharmacy if it’s licenced for humans, our local pharmacy dispenses for us – is much cheaper, £ 7/month vs over £100 from the vets. The vet still charges us £11 to write the prescription, but it’s still miles cheaper.

We started this when they tried to charge us £16 for a single paracetamol. I do hope your dog is okay.

I do hope your dog is okay.

thank you.  yeah, its the worst part of having pets isnt it, when they start to get a bit older and you have to start thinking about things youd rather not think about.  hes cost us nowt over the first 10 years so never had to scrutinise the policy, just press ‘ok’ to renew 🙂

but, as we pay £50 p/m currently, my wifes now upset that she didnt initially understand the policy, she really intended one that paid out for the lifetime of any condition.  its our error tho.

we said that any decision we make for him wont be financial, itll be purely on his quality of life, whether hes in pain, whether to put him through a traumatic ordeal.  would we want to go though it and come out of it the other side if it was us, that sort of thing.  i think we’re kinder to animals in that way than we are to humans really.

thanks

I’ve had a number of conversations with different people who work in vets practices (two clinical directors and one practice manager who used to be a head nurse) who say that they don’t either, they just put some money to one side.

well of course they do, they will get whatever treatment they need at cost, which will be considerably less than us.

Not a great example but our dog had painkillers recently. £80 from vet, but could buy the drug itself for £10

Our 5 yr old dog has just had ACL surgery. £4.5k. The other one needs doing at some point too. No way would I be without insurance

and can you just chop and change vets for treatment? you know, ask around for who would do such and such treatment for the best price?

Lola adores all the vets, goes in happily, has a sniff round, knows she is about to get a digit up the arse is a bit nervous and looks at the door then me. Deed done the tail is wagging she is getting treats and is off to visit behind reception for more attention.

Proper old school indie vet.

Its worth quite a lot for her to feel secure and confident to go in. No stress no drama.

Our dog (rescue terrier) is just coming up to 10

Apart from the first year, I’ve always taken the ‘self insured’ approach and fortunately (pure luck really) we haven’t had a single big vet bill. We’ve literally only paid for his jabs and annual checkup. no pre existing conditions.

So as things stand we’re quids in, and I’m wondering whether now might be the time to pay for insurance again before he turns 10

He’s fit and healthy so hopefully will keep going for a few more years

What does the hive mind think?

So as things stand we’re quids in, and I’m wondering whether now might be the time to pay for insurance again before he turns 10

Get a quote and weight it up. At 10 years old it is obviously going to cost a lot more than at 1 year old but no previous conditions is very helpful as anything he gets will be new and covered in theory.

Our vet was quite happy to write a prescription which I then filled using an online vet supplier. It was all relatively painless, I did let the receptionist know that the appt was to get a prescription as this is cheaper than a consultation for a problem.

Our dog is not insured currently but we are considering it.In the interim, we have a Herbert fund which is funded by our premium bonds winnings…..

I really need the insurance cover to include him being looked after by friends while we’re on holiday but I am struggling to find out in the plans I have looked at. Does anyone have an knowledge/experience of this niche area?

We pay £45 a month insurance for our 18mth old pup. I too considering the self-insurance route.

My thinking is that anything life limiting, and likely long term operation/medicine, then I would have the dog put to sleep; I am very much about quality of life over quantity.

So as things stand we’re quids in, and I’m wondering whether now might be the time to pay for insurance again before he turns 10

From previous research most companies weren’t taking new business where the dog is over 7. If they are now that’s a significant improvement but expect to pay rather a lot for the policy.

Edit. further up thread I said Bought by Many were quick at settling claims. They are for small amounts for the recent nose surgery they were right on the 6 week target limit for repayment. There was also an attempt to wriggle out of payment by requesting full history for the dog from the vet. This was for £1300 of surgery, I hope there is nothing more expensive in Bodie’s future

Everyone saying “I had PetPlan and they have paid out £10k on Rover and I only paid £1k in premiums”. Yeah that is how insurance works. Some ‘win’ and most ‘loose’ and the insurance company makes a profit margin if they get their sums right.

Pet insurance industry is in the shit at the moment though. High loss ratios, huge increase in vet costs.

I’m also not convinced that the ‘try anything at all costs’ approaches to pets is great. Arguably I kept my pet alive longer than I would have if I had been paying out of pocket. She was on three different medications, frequent vet trips, getting increasingly more breathless. You don’t notice the decline so much when you see your pet every day, the meds were only ever going to be able to buy more time, not cure. Probably would have had her PTS several months earlier if I had had a the cost/benefit on my mind and it wouldn’t have been a bad thing for her really.  At the time you think “well the vets are offering this treatment so it must be the right thing to do” but she couldn’t tell me if she was comfortable or not.