Healthy Pets Dog Insurance

[Claire]

I'm with M&S and because I live In London it's much more than if I didn't - it works out at roughly £209 annually or £17.50 a month.  This figure is with no excess though, and I think it's nearly £7 per month cheaper if you don't live in London.
I went with M&S because it was recommended on here, but was a bit surprised it was so much more cos of where I lived.

Our vets are trained to sell Pet Plan that looks at specific London post codes, not just the general area.  Goodness me, then did I think M&S was a bargain.  For the platinum standard which provides up to £8000 cover per year (as opposed to M&S's £7000) but does have an excess where mine doesn't, it was FIFTY POUNDS SOMETHING A MONTH!!!  They rather generously deduct £3 off if you insure an additional pet (i.e. dog 1 = £50 per month, dog 2 = £47).

The vet's assistant which goes through the insurance, said she had only been trained on Pet Plan therefore was only legally allowed to promote pet plan.

I told her I was actually planning on getting M&S, and she took her name badge off, put it in her pocket, and said 'as a pet owner I would highly recommend them.'

I think Axa is behind both M&S and Healthy Pets though.

[hamfam]

I'm with M&S and because I live In London it's much more than if I didn't - it works out at roughly £209 annually or £17.50 a month.  This figure is with no excess though, and I think it's nearly £7 per month cheaper if you don't live in London.

I'm in Kent and it would be £14.39 with no excess or £13.85 with a £60 excess.
If Lucy was 8 yrs old it would be £29.73 a month with a £60 mandatory excess and a further liability for 15% of the total claim.

Healthy pets is £5.82  with £50 excess rising to £11.85 at age 10 with a £50 excess and no further liability.

The main difference seems to be that HP insure up to £5000 for each and every condition so each condition is covered for life or until the bill for that condition reaches £5000 whereas M&S insure up to £7000 per year total claims so each condition is covered provided the total for all claims in the year is less than £7000.
M&S has a £750 limit for complementry treatment (included in the £7000 limit) wereas HP does not differentiate between complimentry care and so the £5000 limit applies.

The big question is how much cover is actually required for chronic illness - i.e. diabetes or arthritus per year

Looking again at the figures i wonder if it might be better to go M&S excess free for the first 5 - 7 years then switch to HP?

[Maria]

I'm with M&S and because I live In London it's much more than if I didn't - it works out at roughly £209 annually or £17.50 a month.  This figure is with no excess though, and I think it's nearly £7 per month cheaper if you don't live in London.

I'm in Kent and it would be £14.39 with no excess or £13.85 with a £60 excess.
If Lucy was 8 yrs old it would be £29.73 a month with a £60 mandatory excess and a further liability for 15% of the total claim.

Healthy pets is £5.82  with £50 excess rising to £11.85 at age 10 with a £50 excess and no further liability.

The main difference seems to be that HP insure up to £5000 for each and every condition so each condition is covered for life or until the bill for that condition reaches £5000 whereas M&S insure up to £7000 per year total claims so each condition is covered provided the total for all claims in the year is less than £7000.
M&S has a £750 limit for complementry treatment (included in the £7000 limit) wereas HP does not differentiate between complimentry care and so the £5000 limit applies.

The big question is how much cover is actually required for chronic illness - i.e. diabetes or arthritus per year

Looking again at the figures i wonder if it might be better to go M&S excess free for the first 5 - 7 years then switch to HP?

But HP also has an annual limit of vets fees of £5000 regardless of the per condition limit? Which is £2000 less than M&S? The £750 complimentary meds for M&S is in addition to the £7000 limit, as is the £250 for behavourial etc

[hamfam]

Sorry Maria but i've just looked it up on the web.

All reasonable costs for
Treatment of Your Pet by a
Vet or Complementary
Treatment carried out under
their direction up to the
Maximum Benefit of £7,000
per Policy per Period of
Insurance, including:
1. Complementary Treatment
carried out by a Vet or carried
out by a member of a
professional organisation
under the direction of a Vet
up to the Maximum Benefit
of £750 per Policy per Period
of Insurance.
2. Costs of Treatment

goes on to cover the behavior cover etc , The £7000 is the max they will pay in a year and is inclusive of everything

[Maria]

Sorry Maria but i've just looked it up on the web.

All reasonable costs for
Treatment of Your Pet by a
Vet or Complementary
Treatment carried out under
their direction up to the
Maximum Benefit of £7,000
per Policy per Period of
Insurance, including:
1. Complementary Treatment
carried out by a Vet or carried
out by a member of a
professional organisation
under the direction of a Vet
up to the Maximum Benefit
of £750 per Policy per Period
of Insurance.
2. Costs of Treatment

goes on to cover the behavior cover etc , The £7000 is the max they will pay in a year and is inclusive of everything

Yes you are right! (misread my policy- oops), but if you deduct the bits 'included', such as behavoural etc, this would still leave £5700 for other vets bills pa. The way I read the HP policy, is that you can only claim up to a max of £5000 pa in total, regardless of the per condition limit.
Anyway, as I said earlier, insurance is a personal choice - I'm happy with the policy I have (for reasons stated earlier), and you're happy with yours, so that's fine......

[hamfam]

Thats the whole point though Maria,

I'm not sure i have made the right decision, i was rather hoping that there would be lots of replies saying either HP were the best thing since sliced bread or avoid them at all costs then i would either rest easy or change to M&S in a couple of months time.

Failing that i was hoping that i might get a better feel for the likelyhood or cost of chronic illnesses in dogs and then make a judement based on that.

I'm not sold on HP by any means, i can see benifits in both policys i just need a bit more information to make my decision

[Nicola]

I'm not sure if I've got this right  as I'm not familiar with HP but what I've understood is that HP will cover for any condition up to £5000 for the entire life of the pet whereas M&S will cover for any condition up to £7000 per year.... I'm with M&S and I chose them because the prior year's claims are not accumulated so you have a clean sheet every year. Unfortunately some conditions can be very expensive to treat and although it's fairly rare, some dogs can develop them at a young age so if your 2 year old dog, say, were to develop a chronic life-long condition I'm sure it's more than possible that the vets bills could easily total more than £5000 by the time they were 10 or 12 years old...

I suppose it depends if you want to take a risk on your dog not developing any long-term illnesses at a young age, because of course if they did and you then decided you wanted to change your insurance because you were only covered for £5000 you would have problems with getting new insurance because they now have a pre-existing condition... It was too much of a chance for me so I went for M&S, I'd rather pay a bit more now just in case (although it's still only £11/month)...

I don't know if this will help, or if I've just confused you more! 

[jann]

I think it's important to get it right first time, as who knows what could happen to your dog at any given time.
 Once you've made a claim whoever it is with, that would still be considered a pre existing condition by the company you want to change to  

[jann]

meant to add there is a period when you can change your mind about accepting HP's offer, not sure how long and I don't know when you did it? 

[suki1964]

I dont know where you are but I was paying £25 to see the vet in London and maybe a course of antibiotics would be £15 or ear drops a couple of pound - always under the excess of pet plan and in this case HP. Now where I live seeing the vet is only £12 - brings the bills down even further so paying for ensurance with a big excess to me is a complete waste of money. M+S - no excess

The other thing i notice about the policy is they wont pay for behaviour therapy unless as a direct result of an injury or illness, nor any dietry foods after four weeks which if your dog gets colitus could work out very expensive.

[shonajoy]

The most important thing is lifetime cover, which will carry on foir the life of the pet, rather than th 12 months some cover only.

In my experince, diabetes, arthritis, and allergies are probably the most common complaints that require long term care. Speical diets are extortionate, so are some arthritis treatmnts, even glucosamine is quite expensive to buy _ I just bought OH some and it was £15 for 2 weeks supply.

[luckydogs]

We are with more than,£ 11.99 a month and £ 10.99 for Lucky that is £ 6000 a year per condition. with the amout of  Mishaps Ally has had and the Anal gland operation for Lucky we have had" more than" our moneys worth, no problems either and they now pay the vets direct

[hamfam]

Well i looked at More Than and it is much the same as HP but for me it is alot more expensive, there is a £7000 limit per claim which is £2000 more than HP but the excess is much higher as is the premium

More Than insurance for Lucy would be £13.69 for £7000 per illness with £70 excess on claims below £500 and 15% for claims above £500
For a 9 yr old cocker the premium is £32.29 with £95 excess on claims below £500 and 20% for claims above £500.

Healthy pets is £5.82  with £50 excess rising to £11.85 at age 10 with a £50 excess and no further liability.

The premiums for pet insurance vary depending on the postcode so you may find 'more than' more economic depending where you live

[Deb H]

I was with E & L not great i have to say and quite expensive compared to the quote i have had from M & S which i have now taken up thanks to the positive comments on here. I must admit i got quite a shock i thought they would be really steep but they are much cheaper than i thought. Thanks guys you have saved me money and given my boys much better cover.

[hamfam]

I think on balance of the responses so far i will be changing policys to M&S in a few months in order to benefit from the no excess, i'm not convinced that the £5000 per condition cover of healthy pets is insufficient to cover most if not all aillments but given all the recent posts regarding grass seeds, runny poos, burnt paws etc found elswere on this site ,most of which will be less than the Healthy pets £50 excess, i can see i would be better off after 2 claims with the M&S no excess policy.

I think there is a breakpoint in terms of dog age when the Health Pets plan is distinctly superior to the M&S plan, certainly when the dog reaches 8 years with M&S the £60 excess becomes mandatory and could go as high as £1050 if the claim was for £7000 (15% of 7000), on top of this the premiums are 3x healthy pets.