Sidestepping pet insurance

[Froghat]

We've had a terrible shock with our PetPlan insurance renewal for our 4-year old dog. The premium is set to go up to £167 per month. It's currently £109. We have £7000 per year on a life cover plan.

I got another quote today and it was in line with the above (slightly higher overall since the excess was considerably higher).

My question is: have you chosen to put money away instead of getting pet insurance? I'm thinking of going down that route.

This is my first dog and I'm nervous of what he needs he might have when he gets older (and whether I will regret not having insurance). But then if this is the premium level now, what on earth will it be when he's a senior?!

I'm looking for comfort that this isn't a barking idea (pun intended!) and any war stories.

No insurance advice, but I’ve just googled a Bassett Griffon and they are AMAZING!!! 😍😍😍😍

It is a gamble, and unfortunately you just never know how it will swing. I considered doing this in the early days with my cat… oh my god, I’m glad I didn’t. In just 5 months, she cost us our then £4k max, then in just 4 days, we had a 3k additional sum to pay out of our pockets. (Then she died 🫣)
she was healthy and young and then one day it just began to go horribly wrong with no answers.

I would never contemplate putting money away now, and I go for the higher payouts with my new cat. that’s easy for me to say though - you’re paying a lot more per month. Just be wary of what you would do if they cost you a couple of grand next week though - would you be able to cover it?

3rd party/public liability can be covered via Dogs Trust at £25 per year: https://www.dogstrust.org.uk/support-us/membership

We also put money aside as we faced a similar bill when my dog turned 3. I suspect its because he's a giant breed.

I'm on a vet plan for vaccines and check ups. When they turned 5 I paid extra for a blood test to just double check and I'll do that once a year from now on to just keep ahead of anything too sinister if possible.

Honestly it really depends on your dog, if they're calm, trained, on lead where they should be, not likely to snatch or scratch a child accidentally or too enthusiastically, not animal aggressive, not from a family with health issues, doesn't eat things they can't digest all the time, exercises mentally and physically, and you don't smoke around them then on balance it may be worth it. If I had a high energy, hard work dog, I'd probably still save but I might keep the insurance a bit longer until they'd fully matured. For me, my dog so rarely does anything daft and I'm with him all day, so the risk is minimal, if he were to get something very serious like cancer I don't know that I'd want to put him through treatment because he absolutely hates the vets and I think his quality of life would be badly affected. You don't know though so it's important to have access to the funds just in case.

Certainly makes me appreciate the NHS though 😂😭

I don't do insurance for mine. I feed and walk them very well, they're like my babies, and they rarely actually need vet treatment. My oldie did this year, but total cost (£1-2k) is far less than the insurance I'd have paid over the years and I doubt they'd have paid out anyway. After working for an insurance company when I was younger and seeing what a scam it is, I avoid insurance where putting money by would likely achieve the same.

You really don't need to spend out on public liability insurance if it's included with your home insurance (which it often is).

I've dealt with many dog claims being defended by a home insurer.

That does seem wildly expensive. We have a 6 year old lab cross, insured with PurelyPets and pay £28 per month for a £12k per year lifetime policy. We've had quite a few claims for him too, varying from £800 to £5k

Purely Pets just quoted me £44 per month for £8k lifetime cover for a 1 year old Labrador. Which seems dear!

This does seem quite high. We have a 10 year old with Animal Friends for £35 a month. It's not the top plan but the next one down. They paid out around £3,000 last year for her. I've always struggled with this question because we've paid for insurance her entire life and last year was the first time we claimed so I'm not sure if it's worth it. The cat is 14, always been insured and never claimed. It's worth looking at how you can decrease the cover (safely) to help reduce the cost.

ManyPets has really hiked ours this year

But we're over a barrel, as DDog has a known issue which might require an operation in later life, and a new policy would exclude. If he needs the operation, then we end up ahead. If not, then we've been a very profitable customer for them.

I used to go directly to the vets and built up a good sum of funds just by giving them money asking them to keep it in my account "just in case"
Over time it mounted up and as my pets got older it paid for everything I needed including pts at home and cremation.

I would never have insurance again after the issues I had with pet plan.

I did when I had a horse. Most of the time animals don't need the vet if you care for them properly.

There's some that are sickly in general, having problem after problem and it seems never ending. I'm not convinced of the ethics of keeping those ones going TBH, with repeated suffering in their life, so not being able to afford to wouldn't be an issue for me. Animals don't have the same concept of time as we do. They're not thinking oh I have a life expectancy of X years with modern medicine. Oh I'll be mostly recovered in a year and maybe it won't recur so I'll put up with the discomfort for now. They're only thinking ouch I'm in pain I'm miserable and I want it to stop.

The main thing is you need to have a think about what you would or wouldn't treat in advance of a time when you have to make a decision. It's not easy to make those sorts of decisions when you're in the thick of it emotionally. It helps if you've decided in advance what investigations or treatment are a definite no go. Your own lifestyle, health and ability to do after care, or pay someone else to, will factor in this decision too because some aftercare can be prolonged and you're basically nurse for a while.

You have more conversations with medical staff about why they want to run xyz test, what will it show or not show and will it significantly change the treatment. Because your savings are finite so you need to spend wisely. No point running up a £3k bill of investigations only to find you can't afford treatment. Sometimes it's best to go with an educated guess of what's likely to be wrong and a conservative approach to treatment instead of the bells and whistles gold standard type. Also considering prognosis. Because there's no point fixing something to be 75% better if ongoing treatment is then needed for life which you can't afford. If you accept that you can't afford everything and may at some point have to PTS for financial reasons, not having insurance can save you a lot of money and also stress, because you're making all the decisions. There's no insurance company to wait for permission to treat/PTS else they won't pay out. There's no rush to diagnose or treat before the insurance comes up for renewal or before the treatment window they'll pay for expires. There is a lot of freedom in that, to do what you believe is right and not have to do things because it's now or never.

Third party insurance usually only pays out if you're proved negligent. Some animals (I'm unsure if this applies to dogs) the owners are considered "automatically liable", that's the wrong words legally but that's what it amounts to. It means even if someone maliciously let your animal out you're still liable for any damages to people or property as a result of your animal being out.

Yes some people will sue. Imagine if someone crashed their car trying to avoid your dog or after hitting your dog and the car got damaged badly or person suffered life changing injuries, lost their job, ability to work at all or drive, needed a wheelchair or in chronic pain etc. Make no mistake your best friend is likely to sue under those circumstances because the money could be used to improve their quality of life. Now you could take a gamble if you have nothing, rent your home, earn minimum wage or on benefits, people can't get blood out of a stone whether they sue or not. But if you're a homeowner and you get sued you could have to sell up to pay it if you've no other way and don't want to be bankrupt eg if you work in finance you'd lose your job. Compensation for serious things can go into millions too so you could become bankrupt anyway if you can't pay. For most people 3rd party is a must and peace of mind for everyone.

But you don't need to buy it separately if it's included in your home insurance. Which it usually is.

Not everyone has home insurance Fluffy.

Which isn't sensible really. I'd be getting a quote for home insurance above buying standalone PL insurance for the dog.

Lots of examples on this thread-my insurance with Insurance Emporium has gone up about £30 per year-to £97 for a 4 year old giant breed. The other for a small brachycephalic breed, age 10, by £20.to £67. Both have pre-existing conditions so I can't change insurers. Both on Apoquel for allergies. It is the most expensive drug I've ever encountered. A 12 week supply for my (large) dog was recently coming in at around £400. He's on it for life. Then as it's a prescription medication, the vets make us go for a 3 monthly 'check up' (£56) in order to continue providing me with either the medication, or his prescription (£22) so I can get it online much cheaper. I was also told by a person working in the practice, that they don't really HAVE to be seen so often for repeats, but the big company that took over the practice (CVS) insist on this unnecessary racket as it's a profit making process. It incenses me. If either of my dogs had side effects being on any drug, I'd know and take him them the vet. But they don't. The pharmaceutical companies need regulating too-they just bleed pet owners dry. A dog has become a luxury item to own these days-gone are the days when a retired old lady would take in a couple of rescues, many can't afford dogs any more. And don't get me started in the Government adding 20% VAT onto vets bills. It's all emotional financial blackmail. If you want maximum bills. A Pug, French Bulldog, Boston, Peke, English Bulldog, will all keep you at the vets for ever more with breathing related issues. My vet once told me he could run his practice on those breeds alone without seeing any others. So sad.

As others have said, 3rd party is often included in home insurance. I have even known them to pay out

I'm very wary of taking out pet insurance as we treat a lot of stuff at home (cut pads etc). We also have very clear views on quality of life, so when one of our dogs suffered a major injury in old age, we chose to PTS as the vet's estimate of his recovery time - if he did recover, and there are no certainty of that - was about 6 months, and it just didn't feel fair to put him through it, even though we could have afforded it, as he might well not have lived long enough to reap the benefits and in any case had arthritis. For a younger dog, we would have paid, no question.

I reckon we have saved about 15-20k in our years of pet ownership (and that's just the dogs, never mind the cats). I'm sure one day a whopper of a bill is going to land, but I do have funds mentally earmarked for such an eventuality.

“Most of the time animals don’t need a vet if you care for them properly”

I actually think this is an extremely unfair comment, and to be honest, not true. Sometimes it’s down to luck of the draw. I’ve had some massive bills for the dogs- they are treated like kings and queens. One of the horses had a freak field accident when she was 14 years old. The bills for that ended up in 5 figures. She passed away aged 30 for a totally unrelated reason. Was that because I did not care for her? Should I not have put her in the field that day? Was she neglected/ not cared for properly? Absolutely not.

Agree @feelingalittlehorse
And ironically it's sometimes the opposite of lack of good care - because we care for our pets so well and veterinary treatments are so advanced, pets tend to live longer and develop some age related illnesses just as us humans do. For example, I had a cat who lived to 17 (or thereabouts, she was a rescue so hard to know exact age) and it was age 10+ she developed hyperthyroidism and then kidney disease. Both conditions were well managed with medication, diet and regular vet care. It was also in those years we used insurance the most.

Wow that’s a lot of money.

£263 seems hardly worth claiming for if your monthly premiums are half that.

our spaniel is 14. Never had insurance mainly because I knew I could buy any unforeseen accidents and for those that were more serious I would PTS. I know lots of people would disagree with me on that - but we are all different…

a couple of emergency visits, bee stings and itchy skin rash typically all very manageable. 3rd party covered with dogs trust.

I think it all depends on how risk averse you are

Exactly @fernz . I want all my animals to live happy, pain free lives. And if that necessitates large bills at times- then so be it.
They have no differing levels of care than my others who have had nothing more than routine appointments.

I, on the other hand, am at the bottom of the pile- just put here to attend to their every whim 🤣🤣🤣

That's crazy and I would not be paying it.

We have done it in the past with our Rottweiler. A hardy breed but expensive to insure. We had to pay £1000 once for a toe infection so it was the right decision in the end. We now have an Akita who are a weak bread subject to bloat, stomach issues, skin issues etc and he has just rocketed from £30 to £40 a month at 6 years old. We were unable to do a new customer quote with them (4 paws I think) as they no longer insure Akitas, just current policies allowed to remain. We could have got it cheaper elsewhere (£20+) but unsure if same type of cover.

I don't know about health issues with that breed but you're definitely in the area of putting money to the side.

Insurance is always a gamble. I’ve had 5 dogs and 4 horses insured over the years.

3 dogs and 2 horses- the insurance has ended up paying out markedly more than I ever paid them.
2 dogs and 2 horses- they have got their money worth out of me, as they’ve either had no claims or very low ball amounts.

I have insurance because I don't have thousands of pounds sitting in a bank account to cover an emergency vet bill, but I can afford to spend £50 a month on an insurance policy.

I could put the money in a savings account, but that's a gamble in itself, because after six months (for example) I'd only have £250 aside which won't go very far if the dog needs abdominal surgery or breaks a leg.

If you have thousands of pounds that you can access whenever you need it, then insurance is probably a bit of a waste of money, but many people don't have that luxury so insurance is an essential.

We insured our lab with pet plan over the 10 years we had him. Premiums increased every year with age as is normal with pet plan and other insurers. Pet plan does not increase with claims. They never questioned any claim and paid directly to the vets.

We counted up the cost of insurance vs claims and over 10 years we claimed more than the premiums we paid.

£4k - luxatting patella treatment/surgery
£3k - investigations including a mri for an eye issue
£4k - investigations/treatment for gastro issues which turned out to be stomach cancer (untreatable, we had to PTS)

Plus 3 gastro issues probably from scavaging during walks with overnight stays (£200-£500), kennel cough (even though vaccinated), a torn ear that needed stitching.

Insurance is expensive but so are vet bills. We wanted the freedom to not worry about cost if he needed treatment, but there are other options of using savings, loans or even PTS as alternatives.