to not insure my pets?

[Chevrotains]

Does anyone here just put away savings each month for their pets? I'm aware there is definitely a risk to this as well, but just tired of the amount going up each renewal.

I don't have insurance, but have savings aside for any medical issues that might arise. I keep weighing up the pros and cons of getting insurance and not being able to decide! I only have indoor cats, so no public liability issues to consider.

I don't insure my pets but only because I have enough money to pay anything that might crop up .

My two dogs and two cats are. Always had the dogs insured but only insured the cats again more recently as they're house cats and so pretty low risk for accidents/poisoning/eating weird stuff outside etc. Good job I did as it allowed me to have the freedom to see specialists with two of my cats - investigative procedures themselves can rack up to thousands very quickly, and without them it's just guesswork. One of my dogs is a great dane cross with hip problems and skin problems that both require expensive and regular medication, so it has been very worthwhile.

Our cat has recently cost £4k at the vet and we only had £2k of cover for £10 a month. I wouldn't have saved that much in a year so for us insurance is best. I've upped it to 7k for £25 a month recently and it's given me peace of mind

I don’t, but have multiple horses, cats, and previously had dogs too. Just third party for the horses. It isn’t just that I can afford to treat anything, with that many it actually works out cheaper not to insure. Plus I’ve had scenarios where an insurance company would have dictated certain treatment that as an owner I don’t believe is in the animals best interests.
I’ve had quite a few eye watering bills over the years, but still cheaper than insurance for all of them. The truly hair raising vets bills/ expensive long term conditions have all been for elderly or otherwise excluded conditions anyway so wouldn’t make any difference.

I’ve always had indoor cats and never insured them because I really don’t think they’re that at risk of anything it’s never seemed worth it to me!
however my last cat had diabetes and a cancer in his foot meaning he had to have his leg removed which was all quite expensive out of pocket. But when we did the calculations of how much insurance would have cost us over the years it was actually cheaper paying upfront like we did! I think you can set up payment plans with the vets as well to gradually pay any bills

This is my take on it. I love my cat but I adopted him from somebody who had neglected him and he was only insurable with a huge premium. He's had a lovely life with me, he's currently healthy, but if anything went wrong it would be PTS. I feel the same way about humans but that's illegal currently. I don't see the point of putting an old cat through anything when he can have a peaceful end after some very happy and loving twilight years.

We insure with Petplan. Dog currently costs £90 per month to insure but I claim £165 per month of medication, so well worth it.

My first dog was a sturdy breed and we did this. He had one issue his whole life which was an infected nail. It cost a fair bit for ooh appointments and in hours. Then he needed an opp for £1k which we paid. I'm not sure if we were lucky. He got bone cancer before his 10th birthday which meant we had to put him to sleep a few weeks later. There was talk of chemo and amputating his front leg but even if we had insurance to cover this, it wasn't the right move so we didn't do it. We didn't even ask how much it was. It would have extended his life by around 6 months but it would have been a very tough 6 months with little quality of life. The insurance was £50 a month as a pup.

Our new dog is a weak breed who seem to have a lot of troubles with allergies, skin issues and bloat so we got insurance. Oddly, despite being well known for a bad attitude in the wrong hands, not being neutered and these health issues he was less than £20 a month and now after 6 years of auto renewal is still only £30 odd. Who knows how they calculate it.

First dog was a sweet angel Rottweiler and second is a grumpy American Akita/very large cat.

I don't have insurance on my cats

I just ran up at £30k+ legal bill defending a third party claim against my dog. Because I am insured, it cost me £150.

You can get third party liability through dogs trust for £20.

That's quite terrifying. Can I please ask why there was a claim against your dog?

Our last dog but one cost Petplan 7k more than we'd paid them one year, for a range of things including very costly eye surgery.

We insure our dog. Putting £50 a month into an account won't help if there's a vet emergency in the first few years.

We've had two cats with FIP. Spent several thousands, even with insurance. We've got the best insurance we can with our latest rescue.

£90 a month for about 12 years is about £13k. It’s basically like laying a £13000 bet that your dog might have a £30000 bill against it.

I had a young dog bust a knee and require 2 expensive surgeries. I agree money isn’t love but he lived a long, healthy life after. Treating whatever the cost was love for this. Apart from arthritis in old age, he lived a happy long life.

This is our first dog so maybe we are 'panickers' but we pay to insure him. He is a large dog.
We have good savings but 4 days before Xmas he NEEDED an op and treatment . That cost £1400. We could have paid that out of savings but what if you couldn't/didn't have help from others etc. You never know whats round the corner financially and I could never forgive myself if our pup suffered or had to be pts because I hadn't taken insurance out.
Yes it's expensive and maybe if you can't afford ut then there is no choice, but while the choice is there I'd personally pay x

My dog died last year at 16. I totted up all the major vets bills ( teeth extractions, treatment for an injury etc…) I don’t take a dog to a vet for small stuff., treat it myself. Using just the cheapest quote for pet insurance, reducing it back for several years and not adding yearly increases, I’d have paid out far more in insurance than I’ve ever paid the vet.
But if you have multiple pets I suppose there’s a higher risk of sickness or injury.

The same breed or different? Sounds very unlucky.

I didn't used to but £4.5k upfront for a cat leg removal changed my mind. She got her paw trapped in a gate and the removal and after care cost £4.5k and they demanded it upfront because my vet could not provide it so it was outsourced or they would have terminated her.

Got 2 kittens in lockdown.. told dh not to insure them as what can go wrong with a kitten?

Luckily he ignored me and went for the highest level with Petplan. The following week one of them was diagnosed with feline peritonitis. 12k to cure him and Petplan coughed up the lot.

If you can't afford it than obviously don't, but if you can it's just one less thing to worry about. We all get attached to them!

@Ibizafun I view it the other way round. If you can’t afford it, then you do need to get insurance. If you can afford it, you can take the gamble of not paying thousands over their lifetime to avoid a potentially larger vet bill that may or may not happen while that condition is still covered.
And tbh I don’t think anyone should own an animal unless they can afford vet bills, whether upfront or via insurance. Different if there’s an unforeseen change of circumstances, or you take in an animal that would be otherwise destroyed and you have the money for everyday upkeep and euthanasia if it was expensive treatment.

I agree with @ComtesseDeSpair and @TheFormidableMrsC. My cat has had a good life, and so did our elderly one. I have always bought high quality cat food, and paid for regular injections, flea and worm treatments. If they were going to cost a silly amount of money then I'd have to pts.

There are two huge reasons, from my own experience, to get insurance.

Reason #1 - one of our dogs fell down the stairs and broke her neck. Result: £10k in vet bills. Sadly, she died a year later from seizures (unrelated), but we gladly paid it...we didn't have insurance at the time, nor a huge amount coming in. Took about 3 years to pay off the resulting credit card bill.

Reason #2 - another of our dogs had complications after being spayed, basically meaning she couldn't completely control her bladder when very relaxed or sleeping. The result of that is that she'd need medication for life, which completely fixed the problem with no side-effects. We'd learned our lesson, so we had insurance with whole-life cover (rather than annual), which means that the insurance company picks up the tab for her entire life. It costs them about £80/month, whereas our premium is £35/month.

So...yeah, insurance is definitely a good thing. On top of the insurance for all three of our dogs, we have a £50/month standing order to the vet which just builds up - think of it as a savings plan we can only spend there (we're never going to be without dogs). That means that, no matter what needs doing - whether it's worth troubling the insurance company or not - we never have to worry about the bill at what's usually a very stressful time.

When it gets over £800 or so, we normally tell the vet to take half of it and pay the bill for someone in need of help. We've been in desperate need before, and others have helped...so it feels like the right thing to do now that we're in a position to help others.

This for me too