Dog and cat insurance

Unfortunately, in the life of dog owners, even unpleasant situations occur, which aren’t only an intervention in the life of your dog partner, but also affect your wallet. For example, if the dog gets hit by a car or it is otherwise injured and the injury requires a more complex surgery, without an insurance, you won’t have another option than to rake up a considerable amount of money.

Most insurance for pets that are offered today on the market worldwide, applies to conditions requiring immediate veterinary treatment resulting from an injury or disease. Most people think, that insurance for pets is a version of classical health insurance. What pet insurance usually doesn’t cover, is preventive care such as vaccination and voluntary interventions such as neutering. However, this doesn’t apply to dental interventions, those are granted by some insurance companies for free even to our animal partners.  

Regarding the treatment of chronic or long-term diseases, the insurances offered worldwide differ significantly. In Western countries such as the United States, Great Britain or in Scandinavian states, some insurances pay even the costs of pharmaceuticals and the care connected with health issues due to hereditary disease or innate defect.

When does such pet insurance pay off then? It’s necessary to know the conditions of the offered products well. In insurance terms and conditions, it’s usually stated that at the time of conclusion of the agreement, the animal must be healthy, it has to receive the necessary care and must be duly vaccinated against rabies. In some countries, the so-called “protective period” applies, that is several days or weeks from the signing of the agreement, when the insurance still can’t be used. The insurance companies are using at least this to protect themselves from financial performance in already ill animals.

Another insurance condition sometimes is a permanent identification of the animal with a microchip or with a tattoo. It usually is enough to include an identification code of the microchip or tattoo number in the agreement. The limiting factor for animal insurance sometimes is the age and particularly in dogs the weight category. It generally applies, that the larger the dog breed, the shorter the time, for which the insurance company offers the insurance. Cats are often viewed similarly as smaller dog breeds. The chance, that your dog would get to die naturally at the time, when it was still insured, therefore significantly decreases in the case of these insurances. But again, it depends on the local market, in the States, where pet insurance has a history of more than a hundred years, they will insure even these cases. Most insurances then usually apply to death of the dog or cat resulting from an infection, infectious disease, non-infectious acquired disease, injury, surgery, labour injuries or acute poisoning. In some insurance companies, however, you won’t be able to arrange the insurance without a proof of origin.

A more frequently used type of insurance is insurance for damage caused by the animal to a third person. For instance, you can choose insurance against liability of citizens, which applies even to damage caused by animals. If you rent with your animal, then you don’t have to be so afraid of it scratching the parquets, gnaws at the chair and the like :). An insured event means the occurrence of the obligation of the insured to make good suffered damaged caused by the insured dog or cat to another person by injury or by different damage to health, by damage or destruction of a thing.

Do you belong among those who have insured their pets?