As noted in a recent post, I adopted a dog recently from a shelter. My last dog died of spinal cancer after some very expensive treatment, which extended his life but was ultimately not able to cure him. I've been considering pet insurance for my new dog, but every plan is different, and every review I've read ranges from wonderful to "this is crap and they won't pay claims" - does anyone have pet insurance? Consumer Reports noted
Overall, we found that the pet policies we analyzed were not worth the cost for a generally healthy animal. In healthy Roxy's case, we found that none of the nine policies would have paid out more than the projected premiums over a 10-year period. If you're unlucky enough to have a pet with a costly chronic condition or illness, or a young animal in need of major care, we found you could get a positive payout from pet insuranceif your pet develops the condition while covered.
I found a plan that is about $250/year if I pay annually (they mostly run $20/month up to as much as $100+/month depending on the level of coverage) - I didn't get pet insurance for my last dog because instead of buying insurance I put the amount of the premium in savings instead - but it wouldn't have been enough for his treatment (I still owe a family member for some of his vet bills). Also, most of the insurance companies don't cover pre-existing conditions - and having adopted a 4 year-old dog with a spotty medical history available, I'm concerned that any insurance policy I get will refuse coverage for non-accident claims (and, based on some of the reviews, for some accident claims as well) because a condition could be pre-existing and there's no way to prove it wasn't. I did ask the vet, but the vet's office gave me some brochures and couldn't recommend any particular company, nor could the specialty vet office that treated my last dog. I also looked through quite a few reviews on http://petinsurancereview.com/. Any personal experiences with pet insurance, or specific information about claims with a particular company, would be greatly appreciated.
