I've just got my renewal notice for Morgan's M&S insurance. Unsurprisingly, because of everything I've read on here, there was a huge hike in the premium.
The premium has increased by £40 and gone from having a zero excess previously to a £70 excess.
The other three are on Direct Line and their last renewal premium went up by pence, I'll wait and see what happens this year.
With the M&S renewal was a fair bit of information including a booklet on changes to the policy. I'm having a read through and I'm staggered to read:
Veterinary Fees - Out of Hours Treatment - current policy no conditions - new policy
"Before you use an out of hours service offered by a vet you must call Marks and Spencer Pet Insurance out of hours number for advice".I am amazed and horrified by that.
When Andrew came bursting through the door carrying Sapphi at 6am who had been knocked down, hit on the head and blood everywhere the absolute last thing I would have wanted to/thought about was ringing the insurance company. We flew out to the emergency vets ringing them from the car to let them know we were on our way.
OK some people may use out of hours unnecessarily for things that would wait, just like people use A&E instead of seeing their GP but I don't think it should be down to an insurance advisor to say whether your animal needs to be seen or not having spoken to you on the phone and secondly should it be a real emergency where time is of the essence stopping to dig out your insurance documents then ringing them up could cause a delay in vital treatment. What happens if you forget to do ring them because of the situation, which I'm sure many of use could see ourselves doing?
So for those of you with M&S policies who will be getting their renewal notices make sure you read all the changes that they have made and think about whether you're prepared to ring an insurance advisor to see if your pet can go for emergency treatment.
You won't be surprised to hear that I haven't renewed the policy and have moved him to Halifax.