Specialist insurance for dogs
Specialist insurance for dogs
The truth is most dogs' pre-existing medical conditions are now insurable. We aim to beat your renewal quote AND include any pre-existing conditions under a new lifetime policy with us.
You’ll only pay the premium relevant to your dog’s medical history which, for the vast majority, should provide an attractive alternative to your renewal quote. Maintaining cover for your dog's pre-existing medical conditions gives complete peace of mind - isn't that what insurance is for?
If you’re comparing our quote with other insurers remember that most will exclude pre-existing medical conditions, but if they can cover pre-ex look out for time stipulations, sub-limits or low cover levels which don't offer the protection their headline suggests.
K9 COVER will specify how much of the premium relates to the medical condition and will give you the option to include or exclude*. You'll also be able to choose your vet fee limit and your excess.
*Subject to our maximum underwriting boundaries
According to the ABI (Association Of British Insurers) there are four types of pet insurance cover: -
Of the above, only lifetime cover is designed to provide continuous ongoing protection in the event you need to claim more than once for the same condition. So instead of having a fixed value per condition (Maximum Benefit), or a fixed time period in which to claim (Time Limited), your vet fee limit reinstates each year. It's the most commonly sold policy in the UK and it's the only type of cover that we offer.
Most insurers wait until you make a claim before checking your dog's medical history. Our screening tool allows us to assess your dog's health at the outset and we find that our customers enjoy the added peace of mind.
Provided you renew with us each year your dog will always be covered up to the annual policy limit, irrespective of age.
Moving your dog's lifetime policy to K9 Cover gives you the opportunity to continue insuring pre-existing medical conditions. It's quite unique and can also cover ongoing (chronic) conditions.
If dog owners are taking the trouble of arranging insurance then surely pre-existing conditions have to be one of the biggest priorities? As your dog gets older you'll find that many illnesses are common to the breed and may need further treatment, therefore wouldn’t you want to be covered for any condition irrespective of whether your dog has had a similar previous claim?
As consumers we're told to obtain renewal quotes from more than one provider but in the past it's been unwise to do this because most insurers exclude pre-existing medical conditions. The insurer knows this and has been able to increase your premium each year without restraint. However with the introduction of our medical assessment this is no longer the case. If you're currently insured elsewhere we encourage you to get a quote and see if we can save you money, safe in the knowledge that pre-existing conditions can still be covered.
Whatever type of policy you have, or even if this is your first dog insurance policy we encourage you to at least get a quote. Our simple online screening tool lets us provide a quote relevant to your dog's health and can give you an insight into how insurers assess risk.
When studying our competitors we found a number of them offered very high vet fee limits, and used this as a method of promoting superiority of cover. We decided to look at the data in 2021 to understand the likelihood of a very high claim, and obtained an anonymous sample of 21,255 recent claims. From this we identified: -
To draw your attention to the flipside, this means more than 98% of claims in our sample would have fallen within a £4,000 vet fee limit. So why the high limits? We think it's all about perceived benefit.
Although a pet insurance policy has other benefits, the main risk to insurers comes from medical treatment. If they provide a vet fee limit of £15,000 and charge you the client £80 per month (i.e. £960 per annum) then potentially they're covering more than 15 times your outlay. Likewise, if their limit is £8,000 then it's more than 8 times your outlay. Sounds attractive? The reality is that the average claim is under £1,000 (or £782 in our data sample).
K9's default limit of £4,000 should therefore be sufficient to take care of several average claims, or maybe one high claim. If insurance for your breed is expensive one option is to increase the policy excess from £100 up to a maximum of £500. We also let you choose your vet fee limit between £1,000 and £8,000.
If you're aware that your dog's pre-existing medical condition may one day require expensive treatment then please consider the cost of an operation or treatment versus the cost of the extra insurance. You may have had an expensive claim in the past and have a rough idea of the limit you require, or you may wish to look at the conditions which are most common to your breed and then decide. Visit our dog breed page for more information or simply get a quote now.
