Pet health insurance is an affordable way to help cover veterinary expenses when your beloved pet gets ill or gets injured. Most pet health insurance policies are paid for on a month to month basis and cost about a couple of hundred dollars annually. By paying a regular premium, you’ll receive most major medical expenses reimbursed (including treatment for cancer, heart disease, orthopedic injuries, surgery, and trauma) plus a percentage of vet fees. However, some pet health insurance policies offer benefits that are completely separate from those listed above. For example, there are policies that pay your pet cash in the case of an accident, which is significantly more helpful than simply paying a deductible and covering costs like x-rays and prescriptions.
Most pet health insurance policies will cover preventative care, or wellness care, such as vaccinations and regular checkups. The benefits given will depend on your pet’s age, breed, overall health, and vaccination history. In order to be eligible, your pet must be getting all of its required vaccinations on a regular schedule. Also, if your pet is unplanned, i.e., has to go out of its home to get medical attention, then certain illnesses and accidents are excluded from coverage.
Some plans also offer coverage for pet illness that happens “accidentally” while your pet is outside your home, such as a lawn mower mishap. The benefit of this accidental illness policy will be paid for per incident. So, if your dog accidentally eats a bug in the grass, the company will pay you for the bug’s expenses minus any deductible you may have paid for your pet’s illness. This accidental illness coverage differs slightly from the “all-occurrence” policy, which covers all illnesses and accidents regardless of whether your pet is “attended” to or not. Most importantly, having this type of pet insurance will allow you to be compensated without worrying about how you will pay for medical care of your beloved pet.
Pet insurance has helped many pet owners avoid bankruptcy due to huge veterinary bills. Insurers will offer you a policy that pays up to the highest amount of deductible you choose, up to the point that you can afford the monthly premiums. You can tailor your deductible according to how much you want to pay on any given monthly basis. The idea is to keep the monthly cost of medical bills at an affordable level so that you do not lose sleep over the bills. Many insurers also offer financial assistance to pet owners who embrace their furry friends in a foster home or adopt them through the Humane Society.
Smaller insurers may offer policies that cover only two or three types of pre-existing conditions. However, most large insurers offer more comprehensive coverage to cover any potential conditions your pet might have. Also, insurers sometimes have incentives for adopting unwanted dogs or cats by providing a percentage reduction on the cost of coverage. Lastly, there are some insurers that do not require you to embrace your pet if it has a condition and then they will cover it medically in the case it is diagnosed.
There are some basic steps that you can take to ensure that you get the best prices on pet health insurance. To begin with, you should develop a pet plan that you can afford and one that will cover all the basics. Next, be sure to carefully read all terms and conditions of coverage so that you understand what your policy actually does and how it works. Finally, look around online and request quotes from multiple insurers so that you can compare costs and other benefits of different coverage packages before making a final decision.