Surgeries Offering Small Animal Services
StoneEccleshall Road
Walton
Stone
Staffordshire
ST15 0HJ
Tel: 01785 813955
Fax: 01785 817311Hanley92 Bucknall New Road
Hanley
Stoke-on-Trent
Staffordshire
ST1 2BE
Tel: 01782 214683EccleshallStone Road
Eccleshall
Staffordshire
ST21 6DL
Tel: 01785 850218Gnosall2A Newport Road
Gnosall
Staffordshire
ST20 0BL
Tel: 01785 823713LoggerheadsEccleshall Road
Loggerheads
Shropshire
TF94NX
Tel: 01630 673568 |
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Shires Veterinary Practice
Insuring Your Pet. Why It's Worth It
At Shires Veterinary Practice we want to help you to provide the best available care for your pet. We hope that your pet is always healthy and regular health assessments and keeping up to date with annual vaccinations are the best ways to encourage that, however, if your pet were to become unwell or have an accident, having pet insurance in place will take away the worry of the costs that can be associated with long term illness and accidents.
It’s not that veterinary treatment is expensive, but it is sometimes a surprise if you haven’t examined the true costs of human medicine i.e. seen a bill for private healthcare. Because of the NHS, we are completely unaware of the true costs that we would incur if we required any treatment, and it would be an interesting exercise to find the cost of a human anaesthetic, x-ray or ultrasound for example – and quite a shock! Veterinary treatment is relatively in-expensive, but if not budgeted for, the best treatment for your pet could be restricted and cause further distress at an already unpleasant time.
Here are some tips when looking for a policy:
- Pet Insurance should be taken out when the pet is new to you and has a clean bill of health. No insurance company will cover any pre-existing illness.
- Most companies will not allow a claim for illness within 14 days of a policy inception – some will allow a claim for an accident during this time.
- A “Lifetime” policy would be the best option – this should cover the pet for the whole of it’s life without ever adding any exclusions – be warned however, check the small print to see if there is a limit on any condition or claim - £4,000 or £6,000 may sound a lot of money, but if a young pet has a serious illness, it could soon use up this amount, and then it’s down to you to find the rest. A Lifetime policy with a renewable amount each year would be a better option and cover for the worse scenarios.
- Annual policies – (don’t be confused, all policies need renewing each year), but annual policies, (usually with the cheaper premiums) will exclude any condition that has been claimed for during the previous policy year, so if your pet has a lifetime condition – then you only get to claim for a year of that, it then becomes an exclusion, and no other insurance company will cover your pet for that condition.
Most companies charge an excess per claim – if you make a second claim for a different condition during a policy year, you will be charged a second excess – find out how much this is. Don’t forget to factor this in when comparing premiums. The premiums are usually reflective of the cover – you get what you pay for!
Check out these tips before committing to a policy.
Don’t leave buying insurance until your pet is unwell – you may regret it! |
