Horse insurance thoughts - please ponder with me...

[Shilasdair]

I have three horses, all of them are insured with the same company, two of them have exclusion clauses.
I am considering putting a lump sum equivalent to the max. payable for vet fees, into a savings account, then adding to it monthly, thus 'self insuring', rather than using a company.
Any thoughts/advice?
S

PS There is no question of my horses not receiving vet attention when needed, whatever I decide.

 

[Nats_uk]

My horse has his right fore currently excluded. I always say if for any reason he has another leg excluded then I will do exactly what you are planning.

 

[The Bouncing Bog Trotter]

What about third party liability or rider insurance? Make sure you still have cover for this either by separate policy or by BHS membership or similar.

 

[Shilasdair]

[ QUOTE ]
What about third party liability or rider insurance? Make sure you still have cover for this either by separate policy or by BHS membership or similar.

[/ QUOTE ]

Good point, rubyredshoes, thank you.
S

 

[*hic*]

I'm sure you have the demonic determination to keep your claws off the money and indeed add to it each month. However many people who think it a good idea actually spend the money elsewhere IME.


*edited to remove extraneous apostrophes*

 

[Passtheshampoo]

I'm in a similar situation with 3 horses, all insured for less than their true value for loss of horse and vets fees (£120 excess) I often wonder whether to take the risk of not renewing my insurance and putting cash aside for emergencies. I have third party liability cover with the BHS and would never go without that type of cover as I don't want to lose everything should some numpty let my horses out of their field into the path of an oncoming driver. I have a friend who puts cash aside each month and up to press she's "saving" money on insurance costs. Like all insurance it's there for the risk factor and major vet problems such as colic surgery or serious injuries. Let us know what you decided to do.....

 

[Imonone]

Its perfect for veterinary fees and you can join the BHS/Pony Club etc for the other cover.

I have had a horrendous time recently with my company and it was my first claim after over 20 years of paying out for insurance. Now they are refusing to pay because I cant complete the treatment within the time allowed.

I have tried to insure my new beasty with another company but they wont touch me because I have had a claim within the last 2 years, its a total farce.

I am going to do as you suggest at least I know the money will be there when I need it.

 

[Carys]

I think I'd still carry some insurance unless things like colic were excluded or the horse was of an age where I wouldn't have them operated on.
If colic was an excluded condition then I'd probably do the same.

 

[hairycob]

It can work if you are disciplined and not extremely unlucky. It can help to put it in an account you have to make an effort to extract money from! I have done this for years with cats & dogs & as 2 of my horses are "vintage" I include them too. I do have my son's horse insured though.
How significant are the exclusions - Pickle had legs & skin which was pretty major, HP only has cataracts which I can live with.
How disastrous would it be if you had a mega bill or bills for more than 1 before you had time to build up a good fund? That's the reason HP is insured -I would put him through £000s of treatment if necessary & I couldn't fund it without insurance. But even if I could insure the others I would retire/PTS rather than confine them to a stable for weeks (days for Pickle, she would go stir crazy!) or put them through surgery in their old age.

 

[Nats_uk]

A friend of mine has told me that some insurance companies do also just do a cover for colic and colic surgery

 

[nessie1288]

We don't insure. We have 3 competition horses, 3 oldies, a broodmare and 2 youngstock. We have worked out that it is better to take a risk on it. We did end up with a vets bill for £5000 once investigating lameness, but still think we will carry on uninsured. Only reason I can think of for doing it is if you want loss of use cover.
We have 3rd party etc through various memberships.

 

[knightsbridge]

Maybe you should consider going for a high excess on vets fees to reduce the cost, and then just putting the excess amount in an account in case you ever need it.

I have put mine on an excess of £500 or 17% of the total claim, as i know that i could just about cover a bill up to £500 but definately couldnt afford a bill of £5000 if any of them got colic and had surgery ( Had a horse with colic surgery 3 years ago and the total bill was in excess of £5000) very scary but thank god insurance paid it in full.

Also then if anything really bad happened and one had to be put to sleep, at least hopefully you would get something back in relation to their insured value, which would enable to you go and buy something new.

 

[Shilasdair]

I am extremely disciplined with money, so would not even feel tempted to spend it.

One of my horses is 20yrs old now, with an exclusion for uveitis, the others are 4yr old (with a total exclusion from any form of colic as she had surgery as a 2yr old) and a 3yr old with no exclusions.
The age of the horse, or its future viability as a riding horse wouldn't worry me, but I would only undertake vet treatment if it was considered to be in the horse's best interest in terms of a reasonable quality of life for them afterwards.
The more I think about it, the more I think 'self insuring' might be the right idea for me, with BHS or other insurance for third party liability.
S

 

[pricklyflower]

Best thing I ever did with my 3! Saving loads of money and I have put it in an account where I can use it in case I do need it and if (god forbid) anything happened to one of them I have enough money to buy a new one. Although *touch wood* I haven't had to call a vet for non-routine things for my horses for a while!

 

[Pearlsasinger]

We do something similar and have BHS gold membership for 3rd party cover. We have over the years spent a fortune on insurance premiums, for very little return. Single vet's visits rarely come to more than the excess, so you have to pay for them anyway. If you do claim (or even if you don't) the companies exclude for the slightest thing but the premium stays the same. The final straw for us was when our mare had to be pts and insurance company were less than helpful. The only note of caution is that you do need to be sure that if your horse needs expensive treatment shortly after you cancel your insurance cover you will be able to pay for it. I am sure you have thought of this.

 

[YorksG]

We no longer pay an insurance company for our three, we do have BHS Gold cover, for 3rd party and public liability. We had to have a mare PTS last year, had paid more than her value in insurance over the years. She had a colic which we informed them of, although the vet bill was less than the excess, they then excluded colic. To cut a long story short, no payout. We will pay for appropriate treatment, but have decided that any treatment which requires extensive box rest etc. will not happen with our horses. The reason for this, is that the quality of life during box rest is too poor in our opinion and the horse has no concept of it being in its best interests, or of shortish term pain for long term gain. I am aware that other people will not agree with this, but this is a long debated and well thought out plan of action, after over 30 years of horse ownership.

 

[Chumsmum]

[ QUOTE ]
A friend of mine has told me that some insurance companies do also just do a cover for colic and colic surgery

[/ QUOTE ]

Any ideas which company did this? I'm thinking of doing this for my shetlands.

In answer to the original post, I think if you are very disciplined with money (unlike me

) it's worth doing - I know several people doing it now after having problems with insurance claims.

 

[ladyt25]

If you're disciplined enough to save then it can/could work very well. Just make sure you get some decent PL cover (think the BHS membership is one of the cheapest ways of doing this) as that is the cover that could potentially be very very expensive - ie not the amount you could save easily.

Put it this way - vets bills we pay out rarely hit the max (that we offer) of £5000 but liability claims can run to hundreds of thousands if not more. We have one recent claim where, if the horse owner is found liable is going to cost at least £65K as, due to the horse escaping from its field and a man who swerved to avoid it ended up with severe injuries.

 

[Theresa_F]

I am about to start doing this for my cats - 2 are reasonable to insure, the other 3 being old crocks would cost a fortune so instead I am putting what I would have paid on the insurance away.

Nags - both have £5000 of fees but £500 excess to keep costs down and are insured for £4,000 each.

In a few years when they are out of the daft youngster stage, even though they are very sensible, I propose to put a fund by for them to cover their vets bills and will reduce their value.

With Cairo, well lets just say thank god he was ill in the time of easy credit and interest free transfer balances - I did this every time, paid on one card, transfered to 12 months interest free and paid it off bit by bit at a couple of hundred a month - he always did a couple of grand every few years bless him on cancer.

With your scenario, I would put aside a fund or hope that interest free credit card balances hurry back.

 

[Lonesome_Dove]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
A friend of mine has told me that some insurance companies do also just do a cover for colic and colic surgery

[/ QUOTE ]

Any ideas which company did this? I'm thinking of doing this for my shetlands.

In answer to the original post, I think if you are very disciplined with money (unlike me

) it's worth doing - I know several people doing it now after having problems with insurance claims.

[/ QUOTE ]

Think it's KBIS.

 

[Shilasdair]

Thanks all.
As I said, I am disciplined enough with money, so that's not an issue.

I do worry, though, that the vets might treat my horses differently; when the Shire x Tb went in (at 1am) for her colic surgery, they were more interested in whether she was insured than anything else.
Since then I have wondered why they were so interested - do they charge more if the horse is insured? Or do they choose not to do beneficial procedures to avoid running up a vet bill for fear that uninsured owners won't pay?
S

 

[Hippona]

I have pondered this many times.....I have £500 excess on my vets fees, to keep costs down, but even when I had the usual excess, I pretty much always ended up paying the bills as they were usually about a tennder under the excess.....

my veteran has an exclusion for a previously fractured cannon bone, and the 4yo has no exclusions.

I did think about insuring for 3rd party liability and death of horse only, to keep costs down.....sadly though I am far better at spending than saving....

 

[Angua2]

If you can do it then it is a good idea and one that I am now seriously considering following the disaster that I am having with Sids insurance claim and the whole farce over ru's ovaries

 

[Nando]

Many vets will charge more for insured horses as up until recently they know the insurance company won't challenge a vet's decision. Therefore they will proceed down the lines of more expensive procedures etc..It's a good extra income for them.

None of ours are insured (we have 7 competition horses so would cost a fortune) and our vets know that so will always try the practical treatments rather than referring staight to xrays, unnecessary expensive remedies etc. For example, my TB had what looked like a tumour growing in his frog - nasty looking thing that bled although horse wasn't lame. Vet's first reaction was to get him down to rossdales to operate, however knowing he wasn't insured opted to give me a bottle of pevadine for £5.95 to wash the area - 4 weeks later it was gone (much to both our amazement!)

You are def doing the sensible thing, as you say as long as you have the cash in the event the horses need serious treatment it saves alot of money and hassle along the way!

 

[lochpearl]

I would love to have the nerve to cancel my insurance but I am too chicken. I guess this is because one of my boys has had exposure to 4 claims within the last 10 months - if we had utilised the full vets fees on each claim that would have £20,000, something that I would never have been able to afford.

One thing I find interesting is that my horse went in for a lameness work up, had copious blocks, tests and scans and they put it down to soft and thin soles on his feet. Lameness was still there and had a second opinion and lameness was due to serious damage to the stifles and had an operation on them both. Insurance has paid out for both. To today's date, they have paid £12000 since June last year and I still have money to play with.

Saying that I don't think there is much point in him being insured now as his back, neck, stifles and feet are not covered and I wouldn't put him through anymore surgery.

My youngster is insured and will continue to be as this last year has scared the hell out of me!!!

 

[BBH]

If you have the funds and are able to withstand any costs without compromising your horses care I would do it. IME insurance companies are excluding anything and everything they can, and getting claims agreed can be a fight.

 

[Archangel]

I use the BHS membership for the liability side of things and have a standing order going out every month into an account for the horses. I've been doing this for 17 years now and for me it works better than insurance. Untouched, the money builds up astonishingly quickly. Over time the fund has paid out £2,500 for vets fees and an astonishing £1k when the stable cat fell off the roof.

 

[chestnut cob]

[ QUOTE ]
If you have the funds and are able to withstand any costs without compromising your horses care I would do it. IME insurance companies are excluding anything and everything they can, and getting claims agreed can be a fight.

[/ QUOTE ]

Don't get me started...I am still waiting for a claim to be assessed from Xmas, never mind even thinking about when I will get payment for it.

And I discovered yesterday that my insurer use an underwriter who is based in the Isle of Man and therefore not regulated by the FSA here in the UK...

I loathe insurance companies and wish I could afford not to have mine insured.

 

[MrsMozart]

Hm. All good food for thought.

I stopped insuring my five dogs a few years ago. Last year my Saint Bernard needed an emergency operation (middle of the night stuff) - total bill was £2300. She was six, so £20 per month x 72 = £1440.

 

[Booboos]

My husband works in risk assessment and explained it all to me (why we should not be insured) but I am too dim to remember it all!

Basically you need to do some calculations:
- number of horses
- value of each horse, as this affects the premium for most insurers (I think! Don't shout me down if I am wrong, just adjust the figures)
- excess you would be asked to pay
This gives you the sum you would have to pay every year for the horses and in case of treatment. So for example, I have a horse that cost £9,000 and was quoted 10% of its value for insurance premiums per year so £900 with an excess of £250. For it to be worth insuring him, he would need to have an injury exceeding
- £1150 in the first year
- £2050 in the second year
- £2950 in the third year
and so on

Now you need to guestimate how much a claim would cost. I would say that on average claim would be around £2000 in any one year (only the first year is relevant as insurers tend to exclude that injury after that - again if you disagree with me on the guestimate just adjust your figures accordningly). So the risk is you would need to supplement the money you put away in the first year only, in subsequent years you would be 'ahead' of the insurance cost.

Hope this makes sense!
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