Pet Insurance Cost Cutting System/MoneySavingExpert.com Discussion

heavenly_2

Why is this so hard????

Finding cover for my dog must be one of the hardest things ever.

1. He's 7 years old (seems to put all insurance up straight away)
2. He's a Sharpei (Tesco, AXA, Sainsburys dont insure them)
3. He has a current condition ( NFU wont insure a dog who has had any treatment in the last year)

Seems like Petplan is the best rate, and quite frankly Im so bored of calling and searching the internet filling out on line forms.

Bromley86

If you are still looking, try HSBC and Halifax. Looks like you've covered all the other good lifetime policies. Also read the conditions to determine whether you'll need to pay a % of excess when he's a year or so older.

Bromley86

Assuming it's the same as with dogs, the following have proper lifetime policies:

PetPlan
NFU
AXA
Halifax
HSBC

Healthy Pets limits its payouts to a total amount per condition. So when you hit the £5k? with Healthy Pets then that's it, whereas the others you can claim the limit each year.

Argos is, IIRC, underwritten by E&L who are apparently !!!!!!!s to get money out of. Again IIRC their policies are limited to the 12 months after diagnosis - after that you're on your own.

emmaroids

its just a case of `what if?` i would rather pay 10 quid a month then risk a big bill if anything happens.

heavenly_2

Bromley86 wrote: »

If you are still looking, try HSBC and Halifax. Looks like you've covered all the other good lifetime policies. Also read the conditions to determine whether you'll need to pay a % of excess when he's a year or so older.

Now I think I may stay with my current Argos - who are actually underwritten by AXA, even though they dont insure my breed of dog. (strange)

I may ring them to see if they will offer me the 5% discount which they offer when you buy on-line, worth a try.

cocoluvsmummy

I'm with sainsburys, they also cover per condition for life. £11.86 a month atm.
So far has more than paid for itself, have a dog that was the one in a million (or whatever) that may become incontinent from being spayed.. has to have medication to stop her piddling all over the place 3 times a day for life. Has also had ruptured crucient ligmants in both hind knees at £2300 a leg. With out the insurance i would be seriously struggling to have her treated (so much for my "free" to a good home dog)

Charlie1986

I'm with petplan, my dog has been insured since we got him at 8 weeks old. Before we had him we had never bothered with insurance for our other animals. I am so glad I got him insured as he now has epilepsy and although is not on medication it is getting worse and he eventually will be. It was only this Monday he had to be rushed to the emergency vet which would have cost me £170 without insurance :eek:

Bromley86

Fair enough, but Argos aren't (or weren't last time I looked) a "good" lifetime policy. That is, IIRC, their best policy is for a lifetime-amount rather than a lifetime-amount-per-year. Still it was pretty high, so is probably enough.

As an aside, we've just today been to see the hip specialist for our puppy. I was a *little* surprised to hear that, if it was necessary/wanted, the op would cost £5k per hip! I think we'll try to get the ops to span two insurance periods!

pboae

Sounds about right Bromley86, we were quoted £4,500 per hip, not including aftercare. The specialist actually asked us when our renewal date was so they could try and do it over two years, but in the end we didn't go ahead with the op anyway.

sooty&sweep

Hi

We're looking for pet insurance for our three cats which we got just after christmas. They're all under one year old and no illnesses or injuries.

Halifax have given us the best quote in terms of price and what it covers i.e. life time cover if they develop an ongoing illness.
The cat sanctuary we got them from had them covered through Petplan who are twice the price of Halifax at £25 per month for all three.

In Martin's article he suggests haggling. Has anyone had any success haggling with Petplan ?

Any thoughts or recommendations greatly appreciated.