Please get pet insurance

andreac

galway23 wrote: »

Sorry, didnt even realise i was using it

No worries:D

Let us know how you get on with the insurance company. I wouldnt let this one lie and keep on at them about it. They are probably chancing their arm hoping you wouldnt put up much of a fight so then they get away with not paying out.

Chris_Heilong

Discodog wrote: »

Chris is right in that the insurance companies make huge profits because the majority of claims are well below the amounts paid as premiums.

Thats what I was talking about, the companies just cant be trusted. Insurance is also the reason that those who choose not to use insurance will always have to pay a premium as the service price is taylored to the fact that they can over charge the insurance companies a little. Same for any kind of insurance.

Discodog

I am certain that insurance is one reason for the increase in Vet practices & it does put an onus on Vets to not load the policies.

But it could be short lived if the premiums keep rising especially in a recession. For every person that has found their insurance to be a life saver there will be ten others who have paid out a fortune & never claimed.

€20 per month may not sound a lot but it amount to €3500 over the average life of a dog & with increases that figure will be much higher. Given that routine expenditure is not covered many owners will of paid out & got nothing.

Bettyboop

Have my 4 dogs and a cat insured costs me best part of $800 p.a. had a dog who had a heart scan which cost over 600 another had an eye removed almost 1000 in vet fees.However the downside is that they wont insure anymore eye complaints on that dog.Once dog is over 10yrs premium and excess go up a lot this is when you really need insurance my excess is 75% on my 13yr old shih-tzu
Another problem is having to pay out on the vet bills at the start and wait for insurance to compensate you.Wish the vets would wait for insurance cheque as it would help.Had emergencies with 2 elder dogs I had and 1 had to be admitted to UCD for 3 days cost was shocking and had to beg borrow and almost steal:D to get money together.But at end of the day insurance is worth it an MRI scan can cost 1000 and you never know whats around the corner:)

watna

I swear by pet insurance. Our cat got hit by a car last month and needed three surgeries. $2000 later, he is on the mend but thank god we had insurance. We pay $17 a month and we've had the insurance for 18 months - so that's $306 we've paid. The vet was very relieved we had the insurance, she said she tells all her clients to do it and has it herself for her pets. We would have been able to pay if we really had to if was just a huge pressure taken off at a time that is already extremely upsetting.

I can't understand why you wouldn't, tbh. A number of our friends bought it after our experience.

Bullseye1

Remy my previous dog had a heart condition for the last two and a half years of his life and was on heavy medication which ensured he had a comfortable life but he did have two visits to UCDs facility. Between medication and vets bills we spend close to €5,000. If only we had maintained his insurance.

And our current girl had a floating patela which required an operation AR a cost of €1,000. You can be sure we have her insured.

CruiseH

I've got Pet Assure. (I'm in America.) It's a lifesaver! It's 25% off every vet bill. I don't know how I would care for my pets otherwise.

JustAThought

Can't believe you re in the US!! That's mad!! 25% off sounds good; nothing like that here; thou when you think about it we pay the excess; e50 or e70 and the insurance pays the rest so that's a pretty good deal if God Forbid the bill is high or the problem is a serious or ongoing one. Was in the states last year At Halloween and had great time looking in the pet shops; real fun stuff there!!!

The Sweeper

Out of hours gastro emergency: $276. (had to go in in case of blockage or pancreatitis). With pet insurance, $176 of that is coming back to me.

Chris_Heilong

The Sweeper wrote: »

Out of hours gastro emergency: $276. (had to go in in case of blockage or pancreatitis). With pet insurance, $176 of that is coming back to me.

What...you mean the insurance does not cover the whole thing. Thats Mad. Sorry for late post, In China at the moment and getting online can be a...problem. At least Boards.ie is not blocked yet.

The Sweeper

No, as with virtually all insurance policies there is an excess. Mine is $100 per condition (not per visit, so if we go multiple times for a condition I only lose the excess once.)

andreac

Chris_Heilong wrote: »

What...you mean the insurance does not cover the whole thing. Thats Mad. Sorry for late post, In China at the moment and getting online can be a...problem. At least Boards.ie is not blocked yet.

All insurance companies, car, home pet etc all have a an excess on it, so your insurance will never cover all of it.

willjc

Tesco have just launched Pet insurance now too. I got a pretty good quote of them this morning so check them too http://www.tesco.ie/finance/pet-insurance/

carwash_2006

I actually canceled my pet insurance there recently after 6 years of having my dogs insured. I got my renewal notice and on reading it discovered that not only had the premium gone up by about €60, but the excess is now €100 and I have to pay 35% of every claim anyway!

I could count on one hand the amount of vets visits over the years bar one of them last year having auto immune hemolytic anemia triggered by the vaccination ironically enough, which I did claim some money back for. However the amount I got back came to less than 2 years premiums, so ultimately the insurance company have made a huge profit off me already. Now thankfully they are not a breed that are likely to develop much in the way of hip problems or anything, so I have taken a chance and instead of paying the money to the insurance people I will save it towards potential vets bills.

boomerang

I'm going to cancel my insurance for my dog, too, Carwash. It costs €18 a month. The excess on any claim has gone up to €100 and now that she's turned eight I have to pay a third of the remaining cost on any claim myself. I just don't think it's worth it anymore. That said, she did benefit from it up to now, but they really make you pay for it as your dog gets older.

watna

I thnk our pet insurance only goes up to when the pet is seven - or like the posts above we'd have to pay 35% of the claim. Still, that's a while off.

We just got all the money back for our cats surgeries yesterday - minus the $100 excess. It was very happily received!

Cookie_Monster

piperh wrote: »

As my title suggests i would urge everyone to get pet insurance.

cat and dog insurance you mean...

I think it's false advertising that they are even allowed call it pet insurance when they only cover cat and dogs and some do rabbits also. It's disgraceful that other animals are not covered

Dyr

I have pet insurance and tbh I'd be better off cancelling, its a scam. Take the money you spend on the insurance and save it into a warchest for the animal should you ever need it.

At least you know that you'll have it when you need it :mad:

JustAThought

My dog got hit by a car : as I was carrying her to the car to drive to the vets all I was thinking was thank God she's insured I don't have to worry about cost

watna

Bambi wrote: »

I have pet insurance and tbh I'd be better off cancelling, its a scam. Take the money you spend on the insurance and save it into a warchest for the animal should you ever need it.

At least you know that you'll have it when you need it :mad:

How is it a scam? It's the same as any kind of insurance. Would you make the same argument about car insurance? As I've said here, our cat got hit by a car, insurance paid for everything except the $100 excess. How were we scammed?

Lucyx

carwash_2006 wrote: »

I actually canceled my pet insurance there recently after 6 years of having my dogs insured. I got my renewal notice and on reading it discovered that not only had the premium gone up by about €60, but the excess is now €100 and I have to pay 35% of every claim anyway!

I could count on one hand the amount of vets visits over the years bar one of them last year having auto immune hemolytic anemia triggered by the vaccination ironically enough, which I did claim some money back for. However the amount I got back came to less than 2 years premiums, so ultimately the insurance company have made a huge profit off me already. Now thankfully they are not a breed that are likely to develop much in the way of hip problems or anything, so I have taken a chance and instead of paying the money to the insurance people I will save it towards potential vets bills.

I've only renewed my dogs insurance recently and shes turning 9 this year and the same applies to her policy as detailed above. I didn't even read the feckin policy properly until I read this thread My monthly payments were €13.88 last year and €18.65 this year !! it didn't even dawn on me that there was such a massive jump.

I'd probably think about cancelling it next year but I would be nervous JUST IN CASE something serious did happen. I've only claimed once in 7 years and that was only for €200.

I must say I would never let my dog get put down cos of money. I'd get it from somewhere. I'd never forgive myself for letting money dictate whether she lived or died

Whispered

Andrea - who are you insured with? (Or any other RB owner for that matter)

star-pants

Lucyx wrote: »

I must say I would never let my dog get put down cos of money. I'd get it from somewhere. I'd never forgive myself for letting money dictate whether she lived or died

+1

We never renewed our policy, as it went up to something like €650 or more a year from just under €500 after we made one claim when they caught fox mange.
If you work that out it's just over €54 a month, or €27 a month per dog.
I can't imagine what it would jump up to if they hit the 'old age' bracket.

In saying that I very much agree with Lucyx -- we'd find the money somewhere if it was needed, I'd never ever let them suffer or have them put down purely because of lack of insurance.

If people can get decent insurance that's great, but we just felt it was too much to be paying out when like that we had one claim in 3 years, whereas if we just save that money and put it away we'd have a little fund *should* anything happen. But that's just us, and that's not always for everyone, I'd still recommend getting insurance if you're getting a pup/kitten because those early years are when things can crop up or accidents are more likely to happen and at least you'd not get caught for 'pre-existing conditions'

andreac

Whispered wrote: »

Andrea - who are you insured with? (Or any other RB owner for that matter)

Im with Petinsure.ie at the moment.

I was with Allianz but the premiums were just too much. Flo was insured from the start with them but Cooper was changed from Allianz to them so any pre-exisiting conditions wont be covered but he really only had Hot Spots pre-exisiting so i should be ok if he gets sick.

Both Flo and Cooper have been relatively well since i changed to Petinsure so i havent had to claim off them yet. With Cooper i know what triggers his hot spots and touch wood we havent had any in a long time, phew:)

I wouldnt be without the insurance though, its a piece of mind if anything.

Lucyx

A lot of you guys here have said that you cancelled your pets insurance policies out of principal (over-priced, made very few claims or just one etc) and you're saving the money towards any future pet medical costs.

I've only just renewed my dogs policy and I've no savings at all so I need that policy as I wouldn't have easy access to hundreds of euro or whatever amount but I'm just wondering how much would you need in a doggy savings account to cover most eventualities? My dog only had one op (thank God) and I think that was around €350 so would most op's cost that amount or would you need to have a couple of grand saved?

Hope this isn't going off topic but this is actually valuable info for me at this point as this thread has really made me aware of stuff that I should have been more on the ball about . (flippin Allianz with their €100 excess and then paying 35% of the remainder cos my girl is 9 yrs old now :mad:)

Fluorescence

I can't insure my dog :mad:. Her previous owners had no insurance for her, and because she's so old now (about 10) no insurance company is willing to take her on. it's so frustrating!

TooManyDogs

Lucyx wrote: »

I've only just renewed my dogs policy and I've no savings at all so I need that policy as I wouldn't have easy access to hundreds of euro

That's one of the reasons I cancelled my policy anyway, apart from not claiming and renewal being overpriced, was that any vet I asked wanted to be paid up front anyway and you claim the money back from the insurance afterwards, you'd still have to find the hundreds of euro whether you have insurance or not.

I'm saving €50 a month because I was insuring 5 dogs so it didn't take long to build up a bit, with a bit of praying that I didn't have a big vet bill for a little while. Since I cancelled my insurance I've had 3 vet bills of less than €300 each and have always had the money in my account so haven't had any regrets about cancelling.

Taltos

Have 2 cats and 2 dogs.
Cats are rescue cats, dogs are not.

Within a few weeks of getting each - and luckily having insurance found the following.
1 Tom Cat - 6 yrs - has a genetic issue with his bladder. One late night call to UCD was not far off 1000 Euro. The ongoing cost of treatment is a number I don't want to look at. Food for 1st 3 months of treatment covered by the policy.

2. Dogs - both dogs are large breed - and while seemed fine we took the opportunity of getting an x-ray during spaying to be 100% sure there were no joint issues as their breed is liable.
> Both have severe hip dysplaysia in one side - mild on other. Again numerous vet visits, anti-inflamatories. Again to a large extent covered.
Treatment will be ongoing with these and we know that in a few years both will need a hip replacement - if not sooner.

To be honest without the insurance I am not sure how we would have coped. As it was it was a difficult few months as it seemed that every week we were going to our vets for one or both sets of animals. Not kidding here - instead of taking the dogs for walks - it seemed everytime we were putting them in the car we were off to the vets.

Anyone choosing not to get insurance - well it is your choice - but I hope that should something happen that you won't take the less costly choice and put down your animal. You may never need to use the insurance - but that is why you pay it - a gamble that one day you might, not that you definitely will need it but that you might just need it...

TooManyDogs

Taltos wrote: »

but I hope that should something happen that you won't take the less costly choice and put down your animal.

That's a lovely assumption to make.
Considering most vets want to be paid up front and you claim back off the insurance it still leaves most people in the position at looking at the cost of treatment options. Just because someone chooses not to pay for insurance doesn't mean they consider their pets expendible and to be put down for cost/convience sake

Taltos

TooManyDogs wrote: »

That's a lovely assumption to make.
Considering most vets want to be paid up front and you claim back off the insurance it still leaves most people in the position at looking at the cost of treatment options. Just because someone chooses not to pay for insurance doesn't mean they consider their pets expendible and to be put down for cost/convience sake

UCD - I had to pay when I was leaving.
My vet though does not insist on being paid up front... Showing you have insurance helps.

Not having insurance for some people has traditionally meant
> not being able to afford major & costly treatments
so what choices do they have?
a) let the animal suffer
b) put the animal down
c) beg/borrow/steal or do without necessities to pay for the treatment.

I am not saying those without insurance automatically decide to kill their pets - what I am saying is that you don't know what is coming around the corner. Your bill might be only a couple of hundred - or if your pet needs a lifetime of care it can be considerably more.
For the sake of a tenner a month (depending on who you are with) - at least you can have peace of mind that you can take care of your pet to the best of your ability without stressing about those choices later...