How much does pet insurance increase with age?

[Loafline]

I've heard people say that insuring an older pet is massively expensive and not really worth it. We want to plan now for the increase and it would be useful to know how much is costs to insure an older dog, can you tell me how much your insurance increased over the years.

TIA

[WeAllHaveWings]

I worry about this too. We have a 2 year old lab who currently has PetPlan £7k life cover and we pay £30/month. Would be interested to hear what other labs with the same cover but >8 years old cost.

[EasyToEatTiger]

At the moment our dogs are quite young. With the first 2, insurance started gently enough, then aged 8, changing insurers wasn't possible, insurance shot up, and it carried on shooting up until the elder dog was about 15 at then it was about £80/dog/month. I decided to stop insuring them.

[Loafline]

Easy thanks for that, can You remember what you were paying intially for your 15 year old?

[PseudoBadger]

My 12 year old collie's last renewal quote was £120 - up from £98 the year before I didn't renew.

[EasyToEatTiger]

It started at about £15/month. Our 5 year old is about £18/month. I changed it somewhere along the line for lifetime cover which is more expensive. I stopped on the basis that a 15 year old dog is too old to undergo extensive explorations and treatments. She was with us for another 2.5 years. Until a few weeks ago.

[moosemama]

Just a cautionary tale. We stopped our dog insurance when the premiums started to rise a lot and we were going through a bad patch financially - bad decision.

Fast forward a few years and we were financially better off, but decided not to reinsure, as none of the dogs had been even ill in the mean time.

Unfortunately one of our dogs then developed osteosarcoma and between all the tests and medication she had (despite it only being a couple of weeks between diagnosis and losing her) we spent thousands of pounds that we ended up having to stick on a credit card and pay off slowly. I don't regret a penny of the money, but it made things tough financially again for over a year and I do regret stopping the insurance policy.

Needless to say, all of my dogs have been fully insured ever since. I've gone to PetPlan for mine, as between them and what was PetProtect (haven't a clue if they still exist) they didn't load the policy anywhere near as much with age.

Iirc, my Soft Coated Wheaten girl started off at about £30.00 pcm for their top policy and the premiums were around £50.00-£60.00 when we cancelled the policy, which was when she was about nine and a half and she'd been insured with Pet Plan from her breeder onwards, iyswim. That was a good few years ago now though.

[WeAllHaveWings]

£60/month when older I (hope I) can cope with, its the £120/month stories that worry me!

[cherryademania]

Right so premiums will increase year on year basically.

I've just been quoted by Petplan for our new puppy
Lifetime Classic is £19.79 ( up to £4K) or £22.59 (up to £7k)
Lifetime Ultimate £30.45 (up to £12K)

How do I choose??

[EasyToEatTiger]

I think I paid something over £10,000 for 2 dogs over their lifetimes. We claimed less than £1000. If you are self-insuring, make sure you have at least £5000 put away somewhere. Always with treatment is Quality of Life.

[moosemama]

Mine are 2 and 9 years old.

We reinstated insurance when the older one was just 8 and paid just over £40.00 for a joint policy on the Petplan £7k lifetime policy.

The increase this year wasn't that much, I know it's still a way off £50.00, which I think is actually pretty good, considering one dog will be 10 this year and they are both considered large breed. However they are both crossbreeds and that makes quite a difference in some cases.

I think they avoid massive premium increases by increasing the excess and making you pay a percentage of the treatment on top. From my experience though, we would still have been better off having had the insurance when my old girl had cancer.

[martikaskitchenaid]

I've got a medium/large breed pedigree dog who's ten today (happy birthday, DDog!). Her current monthly premium is an eye watering £120-ish. Since the life expectancy of the breed is an average 10-12 years, I'm paying it while she's still here, but did note on the policy that after 9, the owner has to pay a percentage of treatment costs, which didn't reduce the premium - it's just how it is...

[JohnCusacksWife]

I'm afraid I can't remember exact figures but we stopped insuring our dog (now 15 yr old crossbreed) when he was about 8. The premiums just became unaffordable and we'd been v lucky that, with the exception of a few cut pads, he'd never needed any expensive treatments. We took the view that we could absorb the costs of a (hopefully unlikely) serious illness from savings.

[stareatthetvscreen]

mine was just over 100 p month when my dog got into double figures

[TheMotherOfAllDilemmas]

I was just paying about £40 for a 15 year old small dog. Petplan is great but very expensive, there are other providers who charge much less (but won't cover regular treatments after a year or repeated illness).

The premiums will also go up in price the more often that you claim. So it may make sense to increase the excesses to reduce the premiums and not to claim for little things.

I have had 2 dogs insured throughout their lives, for one the insurance covered vet fees of about £8,000 during the life of the dog. My second's dog only insurance claim was when he was put to sleep. So I would say that, if you are good at not touching the money, it will make sense just to save everymonth the amount you would have needed tp pay in insurance premiums.

[orangeyellowgreen]

Get a policy which only pays vet costs, which is all you'll ever need and much cheaper. Mine for lifetime cover is £25 per month for 8 year old medium size dog.

[RosesandRugby]

My dogs insurance went up to £70pm on his 7th birthday from just £25pm. They also refused to cover him for an ever increasing list of illnesses and conditions commonly associated with his breed as he got older
My excess went up to £500 and no amount of comparing companies could bring it down.
In the end we decided to pay into an account £50 pm plus the equivalent excess of £500 pa. when we did eventually need veterinary treatment we had the money sat there in an account. I still have a few thousand in the account as my boy was put to sleep a few months back and I haven't got round to spending it yet, although I do have my eye on a pointer puppy

[tabulahrasa]

Petplan does cost more, but, they cover more, vets will often deal with them directly so you're not paying upfront and they don't increase premiums if you make claims.

So yes, upfront it is a bit more, but it can be worth going with them in the long run.

With older dogs as someone has already mentioned, you're probably not going to have a huge bill for invasive treatment, but diagnostics like scans are upwards of a thousand pounds...and ongoing medication can be really really expensive.

[anniebear71]

Pet protect was recommended to us, meant to be good and also cheaper than pet plan, maybe worth a look

[moosemama]

Pet Protect was who massively increased their premiums as my dog aged. She was a mixed breed dog with no major claims. I can't remember the exact amount it went up to, but I know we just couldn't afford it as a monthly outgoing anymore (unavoidable change in our financial circumstances).

Petplan, by comparison didn't excessively raise their premiums, whereas the dog we had with them was a pure breed with a couple of large claims against her policy.

I agree with tabulah they can seem more costly monthly, but in 25 + years of having dogs they've definitely been the best for not increasing premiums excessively and paying out on claims. Our vet deals direct with them too, which is another consideration.