Do you pay for insurance?

[Jasmineinthegarden]

I never have before but have started to pay for insurance in the past year for my seven year old cat. It’s so expensive! Do you have insurance for yours and has it been worth it?

My sister's cat had an accident which cost thousands (fortunately insured too) So yes, my kitten has insurance! Same for the dog. If the worst happens I want to know I can get the treatment they need.

I have, for my 12 yo but it feels like a waste of time. £16 a month, £150 excess plus 20% of the rest. My cat (as much as I love her) is getting to the age when if she had a bad accident PTS may be the best option.

My thoughts are to see what the renewal price is and take it from there. I cancelled my other cat's insurance when they hiked the premium by over 50%. She was 17 so logic was she would probably be PTS anyway if it was cancer/accident. She actually was PTS a week after we cancelled!

I have a 16 old cat never had insurance. Never needed any expensive treatment. Had 2 other cats in the past both lived to 17 neither of them needed treatment either. Maybe I was just lucky.

We don't insure our cats but I recognise we are in a minority here.
When I first had a cat nearly 40 years ago pet insurance just wasn't a thing.
We have had a couple of expensive issues in the last 5 years , a very bad abscess on one cat and a urinary problem on one of the others, but we could afford to pay them and having looked at insurance quotes we are still better off not having had insurance.
It's all about risk assessment, only you can decide that.
I do think that the availability of insurance has meant that some vets (mainly those owned by large chains) really take the piss with extra tests and increased costs, and also some may push for treatment that isn't actually in the animal's best interests.

Don't be afraid to question your vet about what they are recommending and to get a second opinion if you aren't sure

I used to. Never had to use it. Now he is 15 we stopped it as anything like that we wouldn’t put him through it as he already is showing bad signs of aging.

Our younger two are insured as they're more adventurous and more likely to get into trouble, but we cancelled it for our eldest as it just wasn't worth what we were paying.

We can afford to cover medication if he needs it but any major issues and we likely would get him PTS anyway as he struggles at the vets and it just wouldn't be fair on him to do anything that required a prolonged recovery time.

We do.

For older cat, it's been well worth it as the has a long-term medical condition that requires monthly vet treatment.

For younger cat - well, the vet always sounds surprised that we have more than one cat. I think she's only seen them for vaccinations. I keep up the insurance because she's adventurous and reckless.

On balance, the insurers will always come out on top, or they wouldn't have a business.

My late girls ran up bills of £25k. One of my current felines has also had a lot of bills. So worth every penny for me.

I have for my three for now anyway. My eldest one is 7, and the other two are 2 and 3. They're indoors so probably at less risk.

I might end up cancelling it when they get older and the premium/excess goes way up. I had two insured years back. One of them had a large bill for a UTI (which the vet failed to diagnose for ages) but the other one was over 17 before she needed to go to the vet, and she had a tumour in her stomach. I cancelled their insurance when they were around 10.

Yes. It's expensive but worth it. We had pay outs for our old cat without issue.
Current overlord ran up £3k a few years ago and about £2k end of last year/early this year.
Some of the really basic, cheap insurances aren't worth it as they tend not to pay out.
Always get lifetime cover otherwise you won't be covered for anything which recurs or anything which require ongoing treatment/vet visits.
If you have decent savings, then you can avoid insurance but for me, it's not worth the risk as we don't have that money available.

No I don’t but I have a pet insurance savings account into which I pay a monthly amount.

We had insurance for the dog for years and it ended up being £120 a month! The last claim we made £1200 we ended up getting only £570 back. I cancelled it this year, she was PTS a month ago.

One of my cats needs dental work costing £1500, I am very glad to have insurance! I think my excess is around £80.
It is one of those things - we could self insure by making sure you put enough money away, but then something really bad could happen with enormous bills, so you might not have enough.
A responsible pet owner should really make sure they have insurance.

I have accident insurance with Tesco. I never used to get insurance as we had a good amount of savings for if needed, good jobs etc. Then my husband was made redundant and our new kitten got in a terrible fight with another animal. She limped home, after hours vet cost and ongoing treatment was going to be thousands which we couldn’t afford with no income coming in and 2 kids, mortgage, etc. The vets found a charity to cover costs and rehome her. Since then we’ve always had accident insurance and have a savings account for pet expenses.

I had a 2k bill for my cat when they caught a parasite from drinking out of the bird bath!

I think insurance depends on your circumstances really. If you have thousands in the bank then obviously you don't need to worry about an unexpected vets bill.
If you are living pretty much hand to mouth with little spare cash then it's worth it, or at get very least save a bit each month into a saving account just in case

I definitely wouldn't be sailing close to the wind hoping nothing happens and doing none of the above.

Yes. Was just starting to moan about it then the frog ran up a bill of nearly £2k in 48 hours.

DOG 😆

Yes. My tiny black panther was hit by a car. vet bill of over £4,500. The following year he had another vet bill of over £1,000

His monthly premium is now £15 something.

I worked out that for his first claim and the premium at the time we'd need to save for 37 years to pay the bill!

😂Hope the frog didn't croak it!

You gave me a laugh!!😂

Yes, I have insurance for both the cats although I cancelled the dog as it was becoming very expensive and I wouldn’t put him through anything major now he’s older.

At the moment the cats aren’t covered for a huge amount but I’m paying around £18 each for their pet-plans . Next year I’m planning to cancel the pet plans and up their insurance to include dental. They are indoor cats so probably at less risk of injury than outside cats (I wonder if any insurance companies consider this?) although anything can happen.

@Threeboysadogacatandakitten I have a friend with indoor cats. I advised her to get cat insurance. She refused on the basis they were indoor cats and thus less likely to be involved in accidents.

One cost her thousands due to that urine thingy cats get, the other cost her thousands due to an indoor related accident.

So I'm not sure indoor cats are necessarily cheaper and the accidents of other indoor cats will influence your premium costs.

@TheDefiant Yes, you are right. My 3 year old is a quiet sensible girl but my little one is fairly wild and could easily hurt herself. She got stuck on the curtain rail recently. Luckily we were in the room and could rescue her. She’s definitely an accident waiting to happen.