Lifetime insurance for the moggy now hitting £30 a month, time to downgrade?

[KetchupOnRoastDinner]

I’ve got an indoor rescue moggy, somewhere between 11 and 14 years old, with no preexisting conditions.

I went with Petplan Lifetime when we first got her, but next year’s renewal has just landed at £360 and considering the only claim we’ve had to make for her in 6 years was for a self inflicted UTI, I’m wondering if a less comprehensive policy would be better, or if the self insuring route might be even better (we have savings)?

I’d be interested to hear how other people handle insurance. I think as an indoor cat she’s most at risk of developing problems associated with older cats, no risk of accidents or infection?

I actually went with Petplan because of recommendations from this forum about how easy and inclusive their claims process was, but maybe there are other good providers?

I would stay with a lifetime insurance, as the older they get the more likely they are to develop the kind of conditions you will need it for e.g. epilepsy, diabetes, thyroid problems etc.

Per plan does go up with age not claims ours is nearly £40 a month now. But downgrading will mean and obliging condition wouldn’t be covered. Cats are more likely to need ongoing care as they get older rather than big one off costs. So I still pay it.

I know I'm in a minority on MN but I don't have insurance for my cats and never have had.
They have the odd mishap which can be pricy (one of mine had a bad abscess earlier this year over a bank holiday weekend - but over the years I've saved on every cat individually by self funding and saved massively across all of my cats.

Depends how much you feel comfortable taking out of your savings.

House cats still develop cancer and many other expensive health conditions. My cautionary tale is a figure of around £13000 in the space of 18 months for a house cat with cancer.

It’s easy to say you wouldn’t ‘put them through’ treatment but actually if a specialist is suggesting they can be cured and live a good life afterwards you may feel very differently at the time.

I went with argos...started off at £8.....By this year it was £53 ..she was about same age as yours (rescue).

I felt the same as my old boy cat’s premiums rose every year, but his end of life care last year, which was sudden and unexpected, cost over £3,000. Petplan paid direct to my vet without a problem and it meant I could afford to do everything I felt was fair and proper for him.

My brother switched provider for his middle aged dog and the new insurers wriggled out of covering anything relating to his arthritis which started a couple of years later, thousands of pounds of care over several years.

Saturday morning’s obviously a good time to post, thanks for the quick replies!

Yes, it’s the cost of things like cancer that have been difficult to benchmark online, so that £13K example is useful. Savings would tolerate up to £4K a year, so I think sticking with lifetime is prudent.

Has anyone had a good experience with claiming on lifetime policies other than Petplan’s? I’m going to run comparisons, but If it comes to a choice of costs vs hassle, I’d rather stick with Petplan.

I stopped insuring my 16 year old cat last year - it was hitting nearly 900 a year with Pet Plan and given that I’d insured her from birth and never claimed I felt it was steep. We looked at the maximum pay outs and figured we should cut our losses and hope that she continues to be well . Having said that we can afford to pay if she needs anything, if we couldn’t then I would still be insuring her. I don’t think I’d insure a cat again though - I naively assumes that it would only go up a bit year on year with me insuring her from the start with the same company, in reality I don’t think it has made a difference to the premiums.

I have been acquired by a semi feral orphaned kitten. Can somebody explain what lifetime cover is please.

I would be inclined to stick too. It may be hard to get lifetime cover with another provider at her age.
Ours is 3 and because we live in London it's twice the price than if I put in the same details using my parents address in the north east (I was curious to see).
I agree it depends how much you have in savings to cover vet bills. The age of your cat is when they may develop longer term conditions which is when the insurance really helps out.

Insurance is about mitigating risk - it's easy to point out the cases where it pays off (Toddler on this board has had £20k of treatment for example) but for the vast majority insurance will cost more than it returns.

And my latest 'kittens' are uninsurable for heart problems for life due to heart murmurs when I got them from Battersea anyway. The Battersea vet who told me the news was visibly relieved when I said I wasn't worried because we didn't bother with insurance.

Yes, and I’m risk averse by nature, the Uncertainty of the self-insuring strategy makes me feel uncomfortable, so it sounds like costs aren’t unreasonable, but it’s worth a call to Petplan to increase excesses and to see if some negotiation is possible.

Will report on any price reductions in case they’re of interest!

Obligatory photo of the moggy in question...

@Bwlch

I have been acquired by a semi feral orphaned kitten. Can somebody explain what lifetime cover is please.

Other types of policies only allow you to make a single claim for a condition. They then classify this as pre existing, and stop you from claiming again.

Lifetime policies don’t have this exemption so you can make multiple claims for treatments or surgeries needed for say, thyroid problems. Obviously the detail is in the fine print and different providers have caveats attached. And lifetime policies still have a cap on the amount you can claim per year.

Best advice is stick with petplan. I work in vets and they are easiest and quickest to deal with. We find cheaper policies wriggle out of paying up. My policy is now £130 per month for 2 cross breed dogs only 7yrs old each. The did however pay out £1900 very quickly when one of them injured their leg.

We pay £35 a month for Harry with Petplan. They've paid out thousands over the last few years without quibbling.

Yikes. I pay £12 per month for vaccinations, dental checks and 2 health checks per year. We are firm believers in letting them go rather than weeks/months/years of painful, confusing veterinary care which will never give an elderly cat back the health of their youth. You wouldn't want it for a human. £900 pa for a cat for 5 years - do you have £4500 in savings to pay for vet care? We pay for extras as the come up, but we've set a limit before we have to make the toughest decision.

My cautionary tale is a figure of around £13000 in the space of 18 months for a house cat with cancer.

Sorry, kitty lover that I am, that's 1/5 of my outstanding mortgage. No animal should have to endure that kind of treatment plan so that we don't have to grieve them.

@Ffsffsffsffsffs I agree in some cases but not all.

My cat had a broken jaw and needed 12 teeth removed, should I have had him put to sleep rather than treating him (he was 11 at the time)? Should I have had him put to sleep when we were told he had heart failure rather than having him tested and scanned? It's a good job we didn't as he doesn't have heart failure, he has a grade 1 murmur.

Not long term illness I worry about but that accident waiting to happen. Broken leg or road traffic accident!

Wish mine was only £30
A month. It's £125 now! And if I claim this year it may double. I will have to claim!

I've had £21k of claims though. My darling felines have been a nightmare!

I would definitely keep it, too.
For me insurance has always allowed me the complete peace of mind that I don't even have to think about the cost of treatment, I can just say to the vet "yes, of course go ahead with this and that test if you think it's important".

Obviously like any other insurance policy you hope you'll never need to use it... However I think the reality is that the vast majority of senior cats will develop some illness such as hyperthyroidism, kidney disease or diabetes. For my now departed senior cat the highest cost was always the tests, not just the treatment itself.

It's also things like out of hours emergency treatment that can be very expensive. Indoor cats can have accidents at home just like us humans can, and infections are possible too.

The issues my cats have had were all treatable, so PTS wasn't an option.

@Toddlerteaplease

Is that £125 each??

No for both. Though Cheddar's share of that is only £33. The rest is Madam Snorg! Good job she's the most gorgeous cat on this planet

She's gorgeous and worth every penny 💖