What are your thoughts on pet insurance? Good to have or not so much? If so, which provider do you like?

We have VPI (Veterinary Pet Insurance) and love it. Depending on what plan of coverage you get, the insurance covers most, but can vary. Yeah, it's a bit pricey but if you pay the premium yearly it's not so bad - but most have a monthly payment plan. The plan that we have for Owen covers his annual exams and his monthly medications (heartworm & K9 Advantix). The only downside to pet insurance is that you have to pay out of pocket at the vet and then submit your claims. You get a check about 4-6 weeks later.

Last year, Owen had a growth on his mouth and we went to the vet to get it checked out. It was a form of k9 papilloma (pretty harmless - just doggie warts) and we had it removed. I paid for the procedure at the vet and then submitted my claim. VPI covered it at 90%. I pretty much got my all of my money back. It's unexpected things like that instance that make me glad I made the decision to get pet insurance.

Pet insurance can often be a BIG expense, but I recommend it if you can afford it. It would probably be a good idea to ask your vet which one he/she recommends, based on previous experience with other pet owners at that particular office.

Some pet insurances even offer a program to cover cancer, god forbid if it should ever happen. I currently don't have this coverage for my current dog, because he's a mixed breed (we think, he's a rescue - he could be anything!). In fact, VPI recommended to us not to get that particular coverage, because of that fact, but we can change our mind if we decide to get it in the future. Might be something that you would want to look into - especially if you have a purebred pet. My family had a 3 year old purebred Golden Retriever, who had a deadly form of cancer (but, we weren't aware until it was too late). He was the best dog in the whole wide world. We tired everything to help Bailey, costing us a good chunk of $$$. (Transfusions are expensive!) We didn't have insurance, so it was costly. While recovering the money spent trying to save Bailey's life won't bring him back, it would have been nice to have it. So, I learned my lesson the hard way.

I hope this answered your question.

I personally don't see how its beneficial. It spendy and only seems to cover regular checkups (once a year for most past puppy stage) and accidents. I have a purebred shiba inu. Unfortunately at 8 months old I found that he had patella luxation (genetic) and hip dysplacia and would need surgery. Pet insurance does not cover genetic abnormalities and pre-existing conditions. It would have been nice to have help with his $2400 surgery + rehab.

What are your thoughts on pet insurance? Good to have or not so much? If so, which provider do you like?

After doing LOTS and LOTS of research on pet health insurance, I chose PetPlan for my 11-month old coton de tulear puppy. For my research, I used a book on pet health insurance, and several excellent "independent" websites that review pet health insurance [including http://petinsurancere... and http://www.bestpetins..., and one that teaches a lot about how to choose the right insurance [http://www.pet-insura....

PetPlan continually gets top ratings from reviewers and consumers, along with another company called Embrace. I decided on Pet Plan because it's very inexpensive and does not have a complicated, restricted fee schedule like VPI. They pay based on whatever your veterinarian charges. You choose to have 20%, 10% or no copay for a general veterinarian, with $50, $100, or $200 deductible per "incident" (i.e. per disease or injury, not per visit to the vet), as well as a yearly maximum payout. Pet Plan keeps the cost of their plans low by having a 30% copay for specialists no matter what copay you choose for the general vet. All genetic diseases are included as long as they were not "pre-existing" (meaning you had previously seen a vet for the same condition before you signed up for the insurance). Medications, diagnostic tests, and cancer treatment are included. If you continually renew year to year, they will never drop you due to the cost of your claims or the age of your pet.

My husband and I can afford everyday bills, but we were concerned about unexpected costs in the thousands of dollars due to serious disease or injury. We decided that a $200 bill now and then would not be a big deal, so we got that as our deductible. (As the deductible gets lower, the insurance cost gets much higher.) This also meant that we would not have to submit claims every time we went to the vet for minor problems. There was not that much difference in the insurance cost with the different co-pays, so we chose no copay (i.e. they pay everything after $200, unless it is for a specialist).

Embrace is also a very good insurance plan, but it is more expensive for the coverage we got. It has some advantages over Pet Plan, but I decided that they were not worth the increased cost. Both plans were started by previous students at the Wharton School who had won a team competition on designing a business plan--which was for a pet health insurance company! Half the team stayed in Philadelphia and started the American affiliate of PetPlan, and the other half went to the midwest and formed Embrace.

You can get quotes from most of the insurance companies online.

One of the important things that I learned during my research is that you do not want to pay so much for pet health insurance that it ends up costing way more than what you would have paid if you just paid all your vet bills yourself. I purposefully chose a very healthy breed dog, and I take excellent care of her including giving her premium food and treats. I am hoping for the best regarding her health, but also preparing for the worst just in case.

Pet Plan was one of our Meetup sponsors (way back when) so I looked it up as a possibility for my guys. Turned out, Riley (who I think was 8 at the time) was too old to qualify for coverage. I can't remember if I checked for Cody (who was 4). But they do apparently have age cut-offs.

Otherwise, it sounded pretty good.
Thanks for sharing the fruits of your research with us!

I think that Mary is correct about the dog's age limit when STARTING PetPlan insurance. But once your dog is accepted into PetPlan, and you have continuous coverage, there is no age limit for the dog and it can be insured for life. So you should start getting insurance when your dog is younger, if you can. The annual price of PetPlan insurance does increase as the pet gets older, but supposedly not significantly. (Embrace has one price for the life of your pet, but that price is a lot higher to start.)

Wow, Gloria, thanks for so many great research links. I ended up going with PetPlan based on all that research and your recommendation. Thank you so much for sharing so much of that leg work! Truly helpful! If there is a way I can refer you for 'rewards' for PetPlan, let me know!

Mary--Thanks for your comments. I hope that PetPlan works out for you. I don't know if I get anything for referrals; I just emailed them to find out, and I'll let you know if it is the case.

FYI-- I emailed PetPlan and asked them about any referral rewards. This is what they told me: "The "refer-a-friend" allows you to obtain a $25 Amex Gift Card for EVERY person who mentions you when they sign up. The gift card will be mailed after that person's policy hits the 30 day mark." That's a nice extra. I may have read it somewhere, but I completely forgot about it. Thanks Mary, for asking me about this!