The Quick Guide to Buying Pet Insurance Online

Not so very long ago, the idea of insuring a pet was almost laughable. It was the sort of thing reserved for those who owned posh pooches, the crème de la crème of the pet world. It made sense to insure pedigreed pups and their feline companions when they cost so much. Things have taken a turn, though. Rising vet fees and publicity about the expenses of owning and caring for a pet have prompted many people to invest in insurance for their pets.

Of course, the trick is to find the right pet insurance policy - the one that offers the best cover for your pet at the lowest price for you. The internet makes the process of comparing and choosing the best pet insurance policy far easier and quicker, and allows you to purchase and pay for your choice instantly online. Here are some tips to help you find and choose the best pet insurance.

Evaluate your insurance needs and prioritize...

This is always a good first step, but especially so for pet insurance which covers so many different options. Do you need a policy that will cover a lifelong condition like diabetes? Do you have a pedigree pet? Is your pet a breed that has a higher chance of snapping or biting others? In each case, you'll want to be sure that the insurance you choose covers specific claims. So know what you need before you start searching.

Search for "pet insurance reviews" in your favorite search engine...

A search for "pet insurance" will bring up lots of individual insurers. That's helpful, but it's not much better than calling around to each insurer. By searching for reviews, you'll come up with a list of internet sites that allow you to check out and compare many different insurers at once. Some may even compare policies side by side for cost and benefits, and many include reviews from people who have used the firm's insurance. Some of the criteria you might use for comparison are:

• Premiums - how much does the policy cost per month?

• Voluntary Excess - do you pay an excess for each condition, or an overall excess per annum?

• Benefit Caps - how much will the policy reimburse in total? Is that per condition, per incident or overall?


Other benefits - policies offer a wide variety of other benefits from discounts on pet care products to paying kennel fees if the owner is hospitalized overnight. They may include reimbursement for expenses to find a lost pet or for canceled holiday tickets if your pet becomes ill and you return home early.

Next, there will probably be pet life insurance policies!

Would they be based on the 10 year or 12 year mortality tables?

I thought with cats and dogs, it was 7 years. :) (Ba-dump-dump!)

If you believe that, then buy term and invest the rest in a 401(k-9). Get it?

OK, I just need to stop right there. Sorry folks.

Haven't really considered insurance, but I am caring for a sick pet and have had the bills pass $4K at this point. It's not that funny.

Sorry about my poor choice of words, Blix. I know I read some materials regarding pet insurance at a vet's office when we had my dog, but he never really got sick. A lot of spots on the carpet, yes, but nothing major healthwise.

No problem. We've had tons of vet services with our many dogs over years. 2 different dogs had an ACL replacement, a spinal surgery, a pin in the leg for a broken bone, parvo, and now a neurological disorder that required an MRI and a spinal tap and medication for as long as she has left. I always figured pet insurance was not a particularly good deal, but who knows?

In your cases, it sounds like it might have been the best route and might be worth investigating.

It is good that you take great care of your pets. We have had some nightmare stories in the Dallas area about animal cruelty recently.

Just wanted to add something. My car insurance is with Progressive, and they sent me a little notice that now my dog is covered in the event of an accident. It's free, wrapped in the Collision part of your insurance with Progressive. It's up to $500 coverage.

Not bad! -- especially for free.

As to health insurance -- I tend to roll the dice on that one. Our last dog cost us about $3000 in her final year, but we would have spent more, if she could have been cured. She had bone cancer.

That's interesting about you car insurance. Never heard of anything like it. Sorry for your loss, I empathize with you on what we would do for our dogs.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/five-ways-save-your-pets/story.aspx?guid=%7BAD0F8105%2D447A%2D42A9%2D8A35%2DF1BA734B285F%7D

Article on how to save $ on pet care.

Have both a rescued mutt and have raised purebreds for over 25 yrs. Have to say, when health problems strike, it doesn't make a bit of difference. Haven't found well bred pure breds to be any less expensive to care for.

Regular check-ups. Do it. Doesn't make a difference. They get sick or injured suddenly. You have to care for them.

As for comparing vet costs, I guess. There are ways to cheapen up stuff like vaccinations. When I breed, I get it bulk and give the pups the shots myself. Our vet's office has a low cost vacc. walk-in clinic on Saturdays. I usually schedule an office visit anyway as part of the regular annual check-up. Have tried different vets over the years and really trust and appreciate the excellent one I have. Wouldn't switch out over a cheaper office visit fee.

Do get meds over the internet where possible. The mark up at the vet's office is steep. Our vet understands and even helps out with suggestions.

Pet insurance sees scamish to me, don't have it, don't want it.

Frankly, as much as I love animals and have always had dogs, I'm seriously considering giving up on it after these gals that I have pass on. The emotional cost is so high. It's more that than the $. Maybe a tortoise that would outlive me would work.

Has anyone ever actually purchased health insurance for their pet and been happy with it? I guess I can see the idea behind it, but I can't see that it would ever be smart from a financial standpoint. Is there ever a costly enough medical situation that would warrant paying years of health insurance premiums to cover it?

Is there ever a costly enough medical situation that would warrant paying years of health insurance premiums to cover it?

It really depends.

If you're the kind of person who sees pets as disposable property, then it will never be worth it. When your dog gets sick, you just put it down -- or just drive it down a lonely dirt road and shove it out the door, then speed off as fast as you can.

But if you feel your pet is a part of the family, if you believe that we humans have a responsibility to the creatures entrusted to our care, then it might be worth it.

And I say that as someone who has never bought pet insurance, even though I would have mortgaged the house, if it would have saved my last dog, Riki, from bone cancer.

There is a lot of debate in many dog breeding communities about pet insurance. Many of us who follow a breed (Golden Retrievers, in my case) have noticed that there is a vast difference between a top quality dog, and a "backyard breeder" animal, and it's all about when you end up having to pay out large sums of money for health care. The "Frankenpup" of a casual or backyard breeding will cost a lot up front, but not much at the end (because the chances of that dog reaching a long life are slim anyway). Well bred dogs tend to need little more than vaccinations and annual physicals, until the end of life, when all of a sudden, ailments seem to crash upon you. That's how it was with Riki, who was a top-quality Golden -- she cost me nothing in extreme medical services until the last year of her life. One year it was a surgery to remove non-cancerous lumps that were pressing on her intestines, then the next year (age 16, an EXTRAORDINARY age for a Golden) she had bone cancer. Even though we did not try exhaustive measures for the cancer, considering her age, we did take three days to say goodbye to her, during which time she needed prescription injections for pain relief. Those last two events, a year apart, cost us nearly $2000, mainly because we had to leave our country vet and go to a university vet school three hours away to get definitive diagnoses.

If we could have cured her of bone cancer, without hacking off one of her legs and most of her chest, we could have taken out a loan on the home equity to do it, or put it on a credit card. She was worth it, a pearl of great price.

We love our new Golden, Niki, but she is clearly the result of a backyard breeding -- crooked teeth, white patches in unacceptable places (according to the breed standard), and she's two inches too short. We got her from a breed rescue which is usually excellent, but they missed a tooth infection that meant we had to have two molars removed ($400 -- they reimbursed us). She's only four. She's an example of the kind of dog who will probably cost us so much "up front", and she likely won't live as long as Riki. And yet we still don't have insurance on her -- we just pay as we go, full of hope that she won't end up with hip dysplasia, or chronic ear infections, or whatever.

Having had Golden's I can understand what it's like to love a pet and want to keep them around just as you would any other member of the family. It's so interesting how our view of animals has changed so much over time. In the book Microtrends, Mark J. Penn has a chapter entitled "Pet Parents" and he mentions that "as the number of households without children has risen, the number of pampered pets has risen as well." People really value their pets and "In 2006 Americans spent almost $40 billion on their pets compared to $17 billion in the early 1990s."

I have to agree with Billy Boy, as well as some of the others in this thread. Years ago, if peoples pets got sick, they usually just disposed of them. Now days, you would be considered crazy to do that.

The value in pet insurance is really up to the individual owner. The first thing the owner has to decide is if they are the type that will do "whatever it takes" to help their pet. The next question is, do they have the financial means (read: $1,500+) to do so? If not, then pet insurance is probably something to strongly consider... if so, might not be necessary.

Some people mention just using their credit card to pay off the vet bills. One would have to be careful here, they could end up paying a ton in interest.

Also, another consideration... insurance is never a good deal. Honestly as the policy holder you don't want to make a claim -- it usually means something bad happened! Ironically, we pay for lots of types of insurance (ie: life, health, renters, homeowners, car, etc.) and may never have a payout. In fact for most of those, we really hope we don't. However, if we do need that payout we are covered.

Sorry for the long-winded post, I just had to throw my 2 cents in.

Good luck to all in shopping around.