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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to think pet insurance for a cat is unnecessary?

80 replies

livinginhope · 09/10/2010 13:37

I'm thinking if getting a cat. We always had one when I was growing up and it seemed a straightforward and not too expensive pet to have (and we loved them too). But now it seems you have to buy pet insurance at £100 plus per year, as well as paying for their annual jabs and for neutering.

Is this insurance really necessary? Do cats regularly get diseases requiring £££££ of vet fees, and if they do, don't people have them (ahem) "pit down" anymore. Surely that's what happens with rabbits and guinea pigs and so on?

AIBU or is it OK to have a cat and nopet insurance?

OP posts:
QueenGigantaurofMnet · 09/10/2010 16:52

i am astounded that people think animals should be treated as cars and just "written off"

CommonSenseSuze · 09/10/2010 16:53

Me too, QueenGigantaur. Shocking and disgraceful.

mole1 · 09/10/2010 16:53

The insurance often doesn't cover dental issues - our cat had to have nearly all her teeth out and it wasn't covered. Cost over £400. At least we won't have the same issue again now!!

Check the terms and conditions for exclusions and excesses. I am still insuring her as it would be typical that the day after you stop, the cat has an accident! I could never have my cat pts if she could be cured.

Psammead · 09/10/2010 16:54

Didn't occur to us to get insurance for our cat. Within a few months he had cost us thousands due to all his bloody allergies.

MaMoTTaT · 09/10/2010 16:58

I've told my DS's that we don't have a pet yet because they cost time and money to look after. I wouldn't want to give them the message that "well we don't really have the money to make them well when they've fallen ill so we just put them to sleep".

Mind they've got a bit of a compromise. Exh has taken on his GF's staffie as she's moved into a rented house where she can't keep him. (and even if they split she still can't have the dog while living in the house she's only just moved into)

I met the dog last week and it's gorgeous, DS1 and 2 love him to bits (DS2 I swear could be the next "horse whisperer" in the dog world), DS3 not quite so keen, but think he'll get used to him.

I think it's rather sweet actually - exH leaves for work early in the morning as a delivery/courier driver - and takes the dog with him Grin

pointydog · 09/10/2010 17:04

Allergy Cat! What a nightmare, psam.

We got ours insured because my neighbour's cat had a v bad broken leg and the vet's bill ran to over £1k.

A friend of mine said I was daft and that if the cat was that poorly, have it put down.

I couldn't do that. We really love the daft cat.

simpson · 09/10/2010 17:16

I have got two 5mth old kitties and have not got insurance yet for them but tbh they don't really go out much yet so its on my to do list Grin

I had a quote from tescos which seemed reasonable so I will probably use them.

They are bookd in to be spayed next week, which is going to cost me a small fortune

pointydog · 09/10/2010 17:18

I pay tesco £4-something a month.

Lizcat · 09/10/2010 17:24

They don't need to go out to get hurt. We are treating a 4 month old cat at the moment who fell down the back of the radiator, broken leg bill for amputation of leg ( as they couldn't afford orthopaedic surgery) £500.

mumeeee · 09/10/2010 18:48

YABU. We had a cat but never got insurance. She was a stray who adopted us. Anyway she coast us a lot of money at the end of her life and it would have ben much better f we had got round to getting insurance. Wehn and if we get another cat we will definatly insure her.

Janos · 09/10/2010 19:09

YABU. Deffo worth it.

I insured my cat. Wondered if it was worth it, then 6 months afterwards he got cystitis and I had to get him emergency vet treatment. It cost £200 - most of which I got back via insurance.

Vet treatment can be very, very expensive.

ilovehens · 09/10/2010 19:11

I pay £9 a month for my kitty insurance and I feel that it's worth it.

If you can't afford a pet and would intend to just have it "put down" the moment it fell sick, then you shouldn't be even considering getting one. You wouldn't have your kids put down if they fell ill.

Buy a pot plant instead.

phipps · 09/10/2010 19:13

YABU.

Our cat is 16 and for 11 years of that we couldn't claim then 5 years ago she needed treatment costing £2500. I was very happy and relieved we had insurance then.

fortyplus · 09/10/2010 19:17

I don't have insurance for my 2 cats and so far I'm quids in - I've never had to pick up a vet's bill for more than £150. BUT if they needed treatment costing thousands I can afford to pay and would do so - I wouldn't have them put down just because they needed expensive treatment.

penguin73 · 09/10/2010 19:18

Ours have never been ill but have had a few accidents requiring stitches, minor ops etc (causes normally unknown, they've just come home feeling sorry for themselves after being out). Unless you are going to have them as indoor cats that's something you always have to take into consideration, you cannot control them and keep them out of harms way in the same way you can with a dog.

MakingAMess · 09/10/2010 19:23

we used to insure our cats but as they got on (7 yrs plus i recall), the excess went up and up so that, in order to claim, you had to pay the first £80 of the bill - then £90 etc. in the end, i never claimed because the bills were always just a few quid over the excess.

so what we do now is put £30 a month into an account at the vet's (which is what it was costing to insure the 3 cats a month), and we use that money to pay for vets bills. obviously if one of them gets a hideous illness and needs ongoing treatment, that money won't cover it for long. but it feels a little bit less like money down the drain...

roomonthebroom · 09/10/2010 19:27

YABU, although I suppose it depends on your financial circumstances ie can you afford to spend loads on vet bills should the cat have an accident.

I had two cats when I first moved into my own place and although I had a teaching job, money was really tight and I couldn't afford any unexpected bills so the £6 a month it cost was worth it for peace of mind and was invaluable when my cat had to get surgery which I could never have afforded.

I then inherited a crazy cat who used to come home with various fight injuries- despite being neutered, goodness knows what he would have been like if he had still had his danglies- which would get infected as he wouldn't let me clean them. The insurance meant I didn't hesitate to take him to the vet if I was worried.

Contrast this with my friend who can't really afford to take her cat to the vet so puts it off, which is totally unfair on the cat.

For me it took the worry out of having pets and made it a much more enjoyable experience.

Eddas · 09/10/2010 19:38

I'm glad my cat ws insured when she came in looking like an extra from night of the living dead! We're not exactly sure what happened, she either got run over or maybe kicked by a horse, it was a saturday night so we had to go to the out of hours vet, that costs about £100 an hour to just look at her. She had a collapsed lung and various other things, all in all it cost over £1,000 Shock

She was very lucky and if it weren't for the insurance she wouldn't be here. That was 3 1/2 years ago now and she's been fine ever since so for us the insurance was worth paying for.

We didn't have pet insurance until we had children. Although i'm not sure even bc (before children) I would've been able to pay out £1,000 to make her better

phipps · 09/10/2010 19:41

OP - you really seem to have no inclination to pay for insurance and I get the feeling you wouldn't pay for treatment either so it is best you don't get a cat, or a pet of any sort really. You are being very sneery about people who do chose insurance as well.

PavlovtheCat · 09/10/2010 19:44

we got pet insurance as soon as our cats turned 6 months old, and two months later my 8 month old kitten swallowed a bit of computer cable, the telephone bit that plugs the modem into the back of the computer. God knows how/why she did it, but she then had to bite through the whole thing to 'swallow' it as there was no-one around. we were at work and did not know, she started to be sick, vets thought bug of some kind, then a day later she went limp. She was very very very poorly and almost died, was in vet hospital for over a week, had two operations and lots of medication. It cost £600 in insurance, and we paid £40 excess. It was just a relief to know that we could say 'do whatever it takes' without thinking 'do whatever it takes but how we will afford it?''. It cost us £10 per month and she is a happy, well cat aged 6.

I expect we would still be paying the credit card bill now if we had no insurance.

blametheparents · 09/10/2010 19:46

Our cat's insurance has just gone up to £40 a month Shock
We are with Tesco, it is purely because of her age (18) because we have never actually claimed anything so can't be for any other reason.
We have cancelled the insurance, in just one year we will have saved £480, and if she needs treatment it will hopefully be less than that.

Tokyotwist · 09/10/2010 19:58

YABU. We don't have a cat anymore, but when we did £6 a month Tesco insurance paid out £500 twice. Once when he got into a fight and came off very badly and the other when he jumped into a bag of sand that a neighbour left in their back garden which (intentionally or not, we were never sure) had huge nails in it. Ripped a massive hole through his jaw.

Vet bills are very very expensive.

pjmama · 09/10/2010 20:02

A cat of mine turned out to have a heart murmour and her diagnostics and treatment would have cost us around £2000 if we hadn't been insured. She died anyway unfortunately.

Unless you can afford to take a big financial hit if you get unlucky, then I'd recommend insurance. Veterinary fees can get expensive very quickly and surely nobody wants to have to have their cat put to sleep simply because they can't afford the cost of treating its illness/accident.

smokinaces · 09/10/2010 20:08

I dont have pet insurance for my cat because I am eligible for PDSA treatment as I receive part housing benefit to top up my income.

However, once I am working full time again (when DS2 starts school hopefully) I wont be eligible for PDSA so will pay for insurance.

But I am a stickler for things like insurance - have never ever been without car insurance, contents insurance or some kind of pension/life insurance.

Ingles2 · 09/10/2010 20:12

All my animals are insured now, including my 2 cats....
When my dog was a puppy she contracted some form of non specific bacterial meningitis...the vet bill was thousands and I didn't have insurance...
Won't make that mistake again.

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