Do you insure your dogs? Im weighing up the benefits of insurance as opposed to putting money away each month towards vet bills. I have 6 dogs. What do you guys do?

There are two active posts around about insurance. Might be worth looking at them as there are some lengthy replies :)

I insure, but only have one dog. I weighed up the £16 month lifetime cover over the whole dogs life and even if I put that in the bank it wouldn't cover a vets bill. Also wanted the third party insurance now that you can be sued for almost anything! (But you can get that through the dogs trust without normal insurance) x

Here is a link to the afore mentioned topics http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/board/topic/144173.html#fp
& here is another http://www.champdogsforum.co.uk/board/topic/144198.html#fp

If you have more than two dogs of a normally healthy breed then your probably will find it more cost effective to put the Insurance premiums into an account, which is what I do.

No way could I afford to Insure all 6, especially the veterans.

In 25 years of dog ownership I have never had to spend on reclaimable vets fees more than the premiums for one dog.

It is of course useful to have a line of Credit in ADDITION just in case.

I do have Dogs Trust membership for third party cover.

Every one of my 7 dogs is insured, and I would not have it any other way.  Yes, it is expensive, yes, I have to shop around a bit but IME it is just not worth not doing.

Granted, until July I've had purebred dobermanns which are not a healthy breed; however it's actually been two of my crossbreeds who have cost the most in about a 12 month period.  Healthier than purebreds they are not!  One was diagnosed with HD and arthritis, spent 4 months at hydrotherapy to no avail so then had to go and have an MRI which revealed a slipped disc; she then had months of acupuncture and physio.  Over £2k for that lot (which wasn't bad, really).  The other has had a wonky walk for over a year now; x-ray found nothing apart from a deformed femur which happened as a pup; again she needed two MRIs and a CT scan and again a slipped disc was found, along with spondylosis under it.  She also went on to have acupuncture and physio, and her bill for the last policy year went over her £2k limit.  This all happened right after the first dog ran out of cover (both have £2k per year) so without the insurance, I'd have had a £4k+ bill within 12 months.  The second dog also has hypothyroidism and occult DCM.

And on top of them, my old boy also slipped a disc, more acutely; no diagnostics for him as it was obvious and he was old and wonky, but he also had to go and have acupuncture to the tune of £420.  At the same time as the second dog was having hers.

I have often thought about just putting the premiums aside, but after all the above, it would be massively depleted and if something were to happen to one of them, I'd be screwed!  It would take an age to get back up to a decent amount for emergencies, and they can cost a lot of money VERY quickly.  One accident is enough - a friend of mine a couple of years ago was playing ball with her lab, he chased it and somehow managed to catch his muzzle on the ground, flipped over and popped a disc very badly.  Paralyzed.  After a lot of rehab and hydro he can walk again, in his own way; but it cost her a fortune.  Totally freak accident and that is primarily why I have insurance - with the healthiest dog in the world, these things can still happen.

I am with Nikita on this one. I have 3 dogs and 2 cats premiums are £ 120 pm approx. but after having bills up ro £6k for one dog I know if anything went wrong I haven't the money to pay
The only thing I have done is reduce the cover to not cover my cats previously broken leg. This saved quite a lot and as he is fine Iam taking a chance there will be no problems as he ages or that I can afford meds. I did cancel an elderly cats insurance and put the money away . In that case vets bills turned out to be almost the same as the insurance premiums would have been up until he died.