Dog Insurance: a personal story
It’s the Spring Equinox here in Scotland (and in the rest of the Northern Hemisphere, of course).
I’m ready for the days to be longer than the nights, and for the temperatures to rise. I’m ready for there to be a long enough gap in the Glasgow rain that I can spend some time repairing our tiny shared lawn from the regular wear and tear of the dog using it every day.
It is the Spring Equinox, and I’ve just paid too much for my dog insurance.
She’s an older girl, my dog. Thirteen next month, which is a good age for her breed. And if there’s one thing that is certain (well, as well as death and taxes) it is that dog insurance gets pricier each year. I remember that when my dog came home from the Rescue, aged four, that her insurance was somewhere just over £30 per month, and I remember getting fed up when it went over £40.
Little did I know what was in store.
Now, the current rate of exchange for Pounds and Dollars and Euros isn’t too far away from one-to-one right now, so no matter where you are in the world as you read this, I reckon you can sympathise when I tell you that this year, the monthly cost almost doubled from what it had increased to over the intervening years… to flippin’ £197 per month. I know!
I talked to the insurance company, and to one of the vets at our local surgery, and I’ve gone for a reduced amount of coverage for £123 per month. (The coverage is £7,000 max each year, with a 20% co-pay, for the interested pet owners out there). I’ve got a Category in YNAB for £1,000 that just sits there, as a Mini-Emergency/Co-Pay Dog Fund, which is the final part of the equation.
The reason that I’m saying that I’ve overpaid, is that the vet was really clear with me that given my wonderful dog’s age, that what she would be doing if it was her dog is putting the money away every month into a separate account, but not paying it to the insurance company.
But money isn’t just about the maths. It is about a whole heap of things, and in this case I’ve got some previous experience to draw on, and a memory that I just can’t let go of. You see, my dog went into the emergency vets a few years ago with what turned out to be a stomach ulcer from her arthritis medicine. But that weekend, she was misdiagnosed by an on-call vet as having ‘a mass across three of her organs'. And I’ll never forget that phonecall, late on a Saturday night, where I was told she had cancer, and that it would be possible to transfer her to her to Oncology at the University Vet School, but that it would probably cost around £3,000. And there was the pause while she listened for my response, the pause of wondering whether I could afford treatment or whether we’d be looking at putting my little dudette to sleep. And I’ll never forget that feeling of knowing that there was insurance, and a fully funded Category, and that I could make the best choice for her, regardless of money.
Those were a horrific two days. I remember driving her across to the Vet Hospital on Sunday morning, with my listless dog still unable to eat, and I think she’d stopped drinking, too. I remember updates on her being comfortable on Sunday, and then finally that incredible phonecall from the Consultant Vet on Monday lunchtime, after two hours of ultrasound, to say that the first vet had misread the way my dog’s liver looked on the Saturday evening x-ray and that there was literally no cancer.
My dog was an old girl even then, and if I learnt anything from that experience it is that every day with her is a gift. I had made her a promise nine years ago on the way home from Battersea Dog’s Home: that she was safe now, and that she wouldn’t have to worry any more. I know that she lives in the moment, and that she’s not got an understanding of how long she’ll live, but simply a requirement that she gets to be happy every day that she does so.
It is the Spring Equinox, and I’ve just paid too much for my dog insurance. I count myself lucky to have done so.