Insurance Center Publish

In the UK 1 in 2 of every household has a pet, but less than 1 in 5 have taken out pet insurance to cover veterinary fees and other potential costs.If you are one of the uninsured pet owners, consider this: vets’ fees, which account for 90 per cent of all insurance claims, are rising at around 15 per cent a year. Could now be the time to protect yourself against a hefty bill?

There are more than 200 insurers offering cover for dogs and cats, ranging from market leader PetPlan to familiar brands such as Direct Line, Marks and Spencers, Argos and Churchill. If you have a rabbit, guinea pig or chinchilla you can get cover through Pet Protect. But if your tastes are more exotic, Exotic Direct offers individually-priced insurance for creatures ranging from Vietnamese pot-bellied pigs, spiders to snakes and vultures. Almost anything!

When you insure your pet, the cost will depend on the type of pet, its age and pedigree, the level of cover, your postcode and the insurer. As a guide, pedigree breeds are usually more expensive to insure than ordinary or mongrel animals. That is because pedigree breeds tend to be less healthy and have shorter lives.

And if you live in a town or city you will probably pay more. Cover costs more in London and the south-east, where vets’ fees are above the national average. Nevertheless, premiums can still be reasonable, starting at as little as 6 pounds a month for a dog and 4 pounds 35 pence a month for a cat.

But do not be fooled by ridiculously cheap premiums. The levels of cover vary widely between policies and basically you pay for what you get. So shop around and carefully examine the levels of cover provided before you buy.

Vets fees are the most important part of the cover. So ideally you should buy a policy that covers you for several thousand pounds worth of vets’ fees each year. This cover should include treatment, surgery and hospitalisation following illness or accident.

If you own a dog also look for plans which offer third-party liability cover. Some plans provide 1 million pounds cover and some go up to 2 million pounds. This covers damage or injury or damage your dog may inflict on property or people. Remember, you are legally liable if, say, your dog bites a postman. Cat owners can rest easy when it comes to third party liability because they are not legally responsible for their cats’ actions.

An insurance policy will not normally cover your pet during its first eight weeks of life, or when they get older. Most, but not all, polices refuse to accept dogs older than eight or nine years and cats older than 10. But if you already have cover, when your pet reaches that age, your insurer should continue to offer protection, but expect your premiums to increase significantly. With most policies, you will have to pay an excess of around 50 pounds per claim. But with some plans this increases for older pets.

Every pet plan will exclude any medical problem that already exists when you first take a policy out. But some will also limit the payment of a ongoing claim to one year. Therefore, if your pet requires lengthy treatment for diabetes, eczema or arthritis, for example, after the first year you will have to foot the bill entirely yourself. There are some plans that will meet ongoing claims, so look out for those but their premiums will be higher.

Also remember that it is important to keep your pets vaccinations up to date. Your insurance would not payout for an illness that could have been avoided by vaccination.

So is pet insurance worth the money? We think so.You may be lucky and have a pet that remains fit nd healthy up and till the last, but that is very unusual. On average each year there is a claim on a third of all plans. And the vets’ bills can run into thousands. You pay your money and you avoid the risk!Take out Life Insurance and protect your family. Cheap Term Life Insurance Quotes can offer great deals on Life Insurance get a quote to-day. Take a look at the Cheap Term Life Insurance Quotes web site, we offer quotes for Mortgages Mortgage Protection Insurance, Income Protection and Mortgage Life Insurance, plus much more.