Pet insurance is probably one of the most polarising topics for pet owners, probably because there’s no clear cut answer or ‘one sized fits all’ solution. I’m going to share my financial experience of pet insurance to hopefully allow you to make more informed decisions.

Summarising my three years and three months of dog ownership:

• Vet bills: $4718.54
• Total amount reimbursed by pet insurance: $3542.68
• Total gap (bills – reimbursement): $1,175.86
• Total amount spent on premium: $4031.04
• Total out of pocket expenses (gap + premium): $5,206.90

Therefore, if I only saved my premiums instead of paying the insurance, I’d be out of pocket by $686.96 (vet bills – total spent on premium) and would have nothing in my ‘Jayce medical bills saving account’. Whereas, with my pet insurance, they will cover up to $20,000 per year in expenses.

This means, no matter the amount in savings, I know that I’ve got a ‘fall back’ of $20,000 as long as I pay my premium. For me, this is a key factor in deciding to get (and keep) pet insurance.

But also, because of the vet bills, I have gotten 88 cents back per dollar I’ve spent on pet insurance (total amount reimbursed/ total spent on premium) – that’s a pretty good return, particularly when you factor in the $20,000 fall back.

If you’re looking at getting pet insurance here are the factors I’d consider:

• if you’ve got a rescue dog (therefore unknown medical history) how will the insurer treat or consider this, especially with pre-existing conditions. With our insurer, because we took insurance out at the same time as adopting Jayce, treated him like a blank slate (no pre-existing conditions).
• on the topic of pre-existing conditions, what does the fine print say? Sometimes, if a condition is constant for a set period of time, then the insurance will start covering it, other times not. Read the fine print and if you’re not sure, ask the insurer and get an answer in writing.
• do you have breed-specific considerations? For example, luxating patellas in border collies or IVDD in dachshunds. How does the prospective insurer cover those conditions? Some insurers will have sublimits, others may not or will have higher or lower sublimits for the same conditions. This is why insurance is not a one size fits all solution.
• What is the:
  • premium amount (what you pay)?
  • excess (what the claim doesn’t cover)?
  • percentage that the insurer covers?

Given the amount we’ve claimed so far and the $20,000 cushion, I can’t see myself cancelling our pet insurance and would probably get it for any other pets I have too (unless I win the lottery in the meantime).

I’d love to hear about your pet insurance experiences and thoughts, good and bad in the comments below, particularly whether there are any considerations I missed!