I spoke to Rosie's breeder last night to tell her what the cardiologist said and she is genuinely really upset about what has happened. Virtually her first words were 'we will give you some money back because this isn't fair'. She now wishes she had had them vet checked but says she has never had a problem before and thought the puppies were fine. As far as she knows all Rosie's siblings have now had their first vaccination with no problems reported.
Rosie's mother has had a previous litter with Rosie's father and her litter sister has also had 2 litters with Rosie's father, so it looks like what happened to Rosie is a one off.
She offered without question to take Rosie back, but knows how much I love her so understands I won't part with her. I told her my main worry now is insurance. We were told that Rosie came with 4 weeks free insurance with Petplan, who I have always used, and also 4 weeks with Buddies who I have never heard of. I also received notice through the post from the kennel club of 5 weeks insurance from them.
Before I spoke to her I had rung Petplan who denied that any insurance for Rosie had been activated. I was bit upset about this as I have always been with Petplan and have never had any problems with them and not having the initial insurance means I have no chance of covering Rosie for her heart. Her breeder was a bit upset about this as Rosie should have this insurance as she has an actual policy number for her which she gave me. We left it that I would find out how I stand with insurance and go back to her.
I rang Petplan again today and spoke to two different people, both of who deny Rosie has any cover with them, even with quoting the policy number. I decided to ask them for a quote anyway, having just done an online quote from them which I thought was very high.
I explained about the heart murmur, which of course they said would be an exclusion and they would not cover anything to do with her heart. However, they did say that if the murmur did disappear and I could produce written evidence of this from 2 different vets, then they would remove the exclusion. I thought that was quite fair of them actually. However both the online quote, without them knowing anything about her heart, and the verbal one was 55.22 per month for 12,000 pounds vets fees per year, which I thought was high as I was only paying 67 pounds something for Ellie and she was nearly 12.
So I then rang the kennel club and explained the situation and they immediately said that as
her heart condition only came to be known about 3 days after the free insurance was activated, if I continued to insure Rosie with them I could have cover for life pollicy which would completely cover any heart condition with 15,000 pounds vets fees per year. I was also able cover what I wanted and to not have the bits I never wanted with Petplan such as overseas cover, boarding kennel fees, a reward if she goes missing etc. ( I would put a reward up if necessary). It always annoyed me with Petplan that I had to pay for things I didn't need and they wouldn't let me just have what I wanted. All I ever wanted were vets fees and third party liability.
Anyway, by paying 40 pounds per condition excess above the Petplan excess, the kennel club quoted me 30.57 per month with cover for everything including her heart. So I snapped it up. I have no idea how good the kennel club are as opposed to Petplan but thought any cover for her heart is better than none.
The breeder was going to be out tonight so hopefully I will speak to her over the weekend. To be honest if she just pays the excess on the claim for the heart scan so I am not out of pocket I will settle for that. No amount of money could compensate for the week of stress I have been through. But at end of the day little Rosie is staying here, she appears very healthy and hopefully her heart murmer will disappear, and I have got full insurance for her, so I am a happy bunny now and can't ask for more.
Thanks again to everyone for your concern for Rosie. I am going to practice with photographs so you can all actually see her! There is a baby picture of her in Puppies though. Thanks again everyone, your support really helped me.
Gaynor xx
