How To Choose Pet Insurance

Posted on April 21st, 2009 by Carmelia

(No Ratings Yet)

Loading ...

No Comments (Post Comment)

Republish

A pet owner must look to the future health and state of his or her pets, and it’s more practical to get a pet insurance for them. Here’s how to choose the correct pet insurance. Get ready with your pen, paper, telephone and internet access to compare different pet insurance options for you and your pet.

How Pet Insurance Works

Pet insurance works on the indemnity principle. Meaning, with pet insurance, you pay the veterinarian first and then you file out a claim form or a reimbursement form afterward. The pet insurance company will then reimburse part of your expenditures paid to the vet.

What to Look For

Pet insurance policies have the similarities with human insurance policies when it comes to deductibles, co-pays, benefits covered, caps and annual premiums. If you have already encountered these with your own insurance policy, then you’ll be pretty familiar with these terms.

However, good pet insurance policies should include the following:

Surgeries
Routine care
Tests
Emergencies
Treatments
Hospitalizations
Prescriptions
Cancer Treatments
MRI, CAT Scans and X-rays
Lab tests and other diagnostics

Keep in mind that not all pet insurance policies can guarantee all of these. It’s really up to you to decide what inclusions there should be for your pet, and what you will use more often.

Pet Insurance Policy Considerations

It’s not uncommon for pet insurance policies to have some conditions that you have to meet before enrolling your pet in one. They include:

Breeder-specific exclusions. Some breeds cannot be included in some pet insurance policies.
Pre-existing conditions. The pre-existing conditions vary with different pet insurance policy, but usually they are age exclusions or an age cut-off. Specific hereditary conditions as exclusions are also common in most policies.
Coverage. Of course, the pet insurance policy’s coverage is very important. Look at “What to Look For” to see what a good coverage should include.
Amount of coverage after the deductible. The amount of the coverage that you will get after charges, taxes and other deductibles have been taken away.
Maximum incident benefit. The maximum amount that you can use per incident you charge on the pet insurance policy.
Maximum yearly benefit. The set amount limit that you will receive after totaling your incident benefits for a year.

Get Feedback

Your veterinarian is usually a good source of information on what the best pet insurance policies around.

Calling the insurance company is also a good way to gauge how friendly they are to their clients. If you get bad service from the get-go, that insurance company my be hard to deal with in the future.

Ask fellow pet-owners, friends and community member for recommendations as well.