Cheaper insurance recommendations

[Finnba]

Basically the insurance for my 10 year old very healthy dog has reached eye watering levels - over 2k for the next year. Can anyone recommend a cheaper alternative? Thanks

Probably not what you're thinking of but I actually decided it would be more price effective to cancel my dog's insurance once it got to just under £2000 a year, although, she was slightly older than your dog being 11 or 12 years old at the time, can't remember exactly how long ago it cancelled it.

My reasoning was that paying out £2000 a year before I even started on anything else felt ridiculous, the excess was massive, and then on top of that they took another 20% off the money I got back; the last claim I made was for over £400 and I got a payout from them of exactly half of it. It was so expensive because it involved the out of hours vet.

In addition to that most treatments my dog had didn't even reach the excess amount so couldn't be claimed for anyway.

In the event that she needed a course of very expensive treatment I have enough saving to cover that, which I think is a major consideration if cancelling insurance.

She's now 14 and so far the cost of any treatment she's had would not have reached the excess I had been paying.

I don't know how it is with insurance companies now but it used to be very difficult to change an older dog's insurer as a lot of companies have a cut off point, and those that do take older dog are going to probably charge a very high premium similar to your current insurer. And of course, any previous conditions that a dog has been treated for will be excluded.

I plan to drip feed invest in a fund for ten years or so, and call it "DDog's money" - and then if insurance becomes prohibitively expensive then there's the money from the stocks and shares. Obviously you have to go long for that so that's more puppy advice.

In terms of insurers it's all market competitive I guess so lower cost = lower cover.

It's a shame there isn't insurance brokerage for pet insurance - a broker going out to the market saying "well yes this dog is 11 y.o but has been raw fed all its life, never had processed dog biscuits, has been walked twice a day consistently its whole life, is up to date with wormers, low stress life etc etc.."

I was struck especially by your last paragraph, because this morning I spent time looking for a new insurer for our dog. What annoys me especially is that the quote parameters have no room for manoeuvre on things like how the dog has been reared/fed (as you suggest), nor for the fact that if you're in the vet's 'pet club', you're already paying and saving the insurer money because the pet club pays for all vet consultations.

"Have you ever taken your dog to the vet, even if it turned out to be nothing at all?" Answer "Yes" and no matter what it was, they'll find a way of excluding ANYTHING even vaguely related to the issue.

Yep agree. I also pay a monthly subscription to the vets for unlimited consultations.

My insurer asked me the same question: have you ever taken your dog to the vet even if it turned out to nothing at all?

Mate... I'm a first time clueless dog owner with unlimited consultations at a vets 5 minutes down the road... what do you think?? I'm down there every week asking "is this normal??"

Things I have taken her for that turned out to be nothing at all:

• She didn't eat for a day - (it was nothing. she's a fussy poodle mix what do you expect?)
• She yelped when she got her leg caught and I was worried she hurt it as she didn't put it down for a couple of minutes. She was running around the waiting room by the time we got called in. It was nothing.
• help to clean her ears because I didn't know how deep to go, forceful to be, and what a good clean looks like etc
• She was being weirdly lethargic and crying one night when she was in season and marked/peed a lot that week, and I worried it might be a urine infection. i took her down with a urine sample which they were happy to test. It was nothing.
• I thought she was in phantom pregnancy, so i took her down for the vets to check
• Another time she just wasn't herself, lethargic and somethign just felt "off" - I took her down for a check over - turned out to be nothing
• She scooted a lot as a puppy, just a quirk she did, turned out to be nothing.

It's like they want to penalise careful owners who prefer to get a professional's advice rather than asking google.

I think I’m just going to need to put the money in a bank account and let it build up in the event he needs it, and then if he doesn’t it’s not lost. It’s a bloody swindle though, to take my money for his ten healthy years and then put it up so high that it’s ridiculous to continue at 10. Which I guess is exactly why they do it

I'm sorry but this made me laugh. It reminded me of my first dearly departed treasured dog.

When he was a puppy I phoned the emergency vet in hysterics worried that he had broken his spine.

He was standing stock still but shaking like a leaf. I could only move him by carrying him, without him moving a muscle and still in the same rigid position.

I took him to the vet who gave him a stroke and a treat and he skipped out of the vets right as rain.

Diagnosis? Random lunacy 🤷🏼‍♂️

Ten years later the same vet and I were inspecting the same dog and discussing a genuine illness. He started the stock still but shaking routine.

The vet said to the dog 'hey buddy are you ok?' and looked to me. I said 'it's nothing, he just does that' and we carried on.

I'm querying the exact same question, my scruffy, scrappy ten year old jrt is 10½. He's had gingivitis so all dental work is excluded. I stay on top of teeth brushing but who knows. He has allergies which are excluded better part of £50pm on apoquel. £42pm on insurance, but for what? If he gets run over or cancer I will have him pts. Not because of cost obviously.

So what am I insuring against? Tummy bug or eating poison I guess? I don't know whether to save it his £42pm and make sure I have a credit card available.

It's a genuine question, what am I realistically insuring against? My old boy got cancer and only lasted 5 weeks with it but racked up about £3k in that time just with palliative meds.