Insurance, anyone not bother?

This really makes me think I need to drastically review my policy. At 14, with 3 legs excluded my horse is essentially worthless, probably worth less than £1k, but currently insured for 3 I think. Also need to take off vets fees, but are you then still covered for accidental vets fees like stitching etc? Definitely food for thought, would revolutionise my bank account.
 
yep defiantly insured in the past year the tb ahs had two claims, one for ulcers and one for ripping his leg open, the ulcers went nearly up to the £4000 limit and the leg went over it and we had to get the emergency vet credit card out. if they wasn't insured there would be no way we would be able to pay for his treatment.
 
stencilface said:
This really makes me think I need to drastically review my policy. At 14, with 3 legs excluded my horse is essentially worthless, probably worth less than £1k, but currently insured for 3 I think. Also need to take off vets fees, but are you then still covered for accidental vets fees like stitching etc? Definitely food for thought, would revolutionise my bank account.
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What's your excess?
For me, visits for infections, and minor issues were always under or around the excess so not really able or worth claiming for anyway....
 
No, I don't. I have bhs gold, a horse account and an emergency credit card. It's never failed me in years.
 
Hippona said:
What's your excess?
For me, visits for infections, and minor issues were always under or around the excess so not really able or worth claiming for anyway....
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Not sure, I've always been way over! Policy is with a company my sister used to work for, so I've not pored over the details, I would guess at £150 ish. He also currently insured for lots if different competing, none if which he's done in the last 20 months due to new baby and footiness due to he going barefoot :o
 
Just have bhs gold membership.
Couldn't bear to have treatment or otherwise dictated by a third party.
I wonder what the insurance companies will do if horse policy numbers keep falling, will they bump the price up for those left? Make it cheaper to tempt us back, or just get out of it altogether?
When insurance was reasonable everyone I knew had it, now it seems, people only insure in certain circumstances.
 
Ive been wondering this for years

My boy is insured at a cost for £45 per month. He's been insured for 14 years with the same company and ive never claimed, however the one time i tried to, i couldnt and have wondered since then, why i bother! Like others have said, vets fees keep going up and up, but the amount im covered for is the same. Each year the cover costs more, but id be getting less treatment for me money!

how much per month do you put away?
 
I've never insured a horse. Insurance is a business, they make their money from YOU. If horse needs a vet I pay the bill.
 
My last boy was and everything he needed doing was excluded. I didn't insure my current pony as is mostly a field ornament with occasional pony rides for my small children, in the last year he has cost me over 2.5 k in vet bills ! Part of me is kicking myself, part of me reckons they would have excluded most of it anyway. He came to me as no one wanted him so wasn't vetted and has no purchase value. The insurers said they wouldn't insure him anyway without a vetting and my vet insists he has signs of previous lami, even though everyone who has had him denies this !
 
I have been unlucky enough to claim far more than I've ever paid out for my horses. I will keep my young horse insured but am considering cancelling my retired 19 year olds which is up for renewal. She is only insured for accidental & external injury and colic, has all legs and back excluded and breathing and since I would definitely not put her through any surgery or extended box rest due to existing problems, I would PTS in her best interests always so highly unlikely the insurance would pay out on death. I already have a small savings account for her to pay for her death vet fees so might as well add the monthly insurance to that. Trouble is my head says that but my heart feels like I am abandoning her......stupid but she's been with me since 4.

I do have liability with BD and a credit card I could use in emergencies.

Just got to get my heart accepting that decision.
 
I don't insure.

Doublethyme you're not abandoning her, you'd save money so you could treat her if needed. Your insurance after exclusions seems to cover you for colic treatment only and since you don't want surgery surely that insurance premium would be better saved for treatment for eg lameness etc.?
 
I don't. BHS gold member and thats it. I spent thouands on my last horse through insurance and the defecit paid by myself when what I really should have done was just knock her on the head when it started on that expensive road. Learnt my lesson there, no more expensive horses OR insurance!
 
Nope - BHS Gold member for third party and some money stashed in Premium Bonds which is there for emergencies. He has cost me £400 in treatment in the 18 months I have had him which works out at £22/month and is about £20 less per month than I was quoted for insurance.

If he damages himself majorly, I won't have any Premium Bonds any more but in the meantime, I might just win a few quid to cover shoeing or buy a new rug...
 
I own an awful lot of horses and none are insured for vet bills. There are way too many stipulations with insurance over here that it's never seemed worth it to me. I just pay as I go, and tbh, vet bills for injury/accidents over the past 10 years, have been minimal.
 
I generally ask myself the question

'If something went horribly wrong, would I want to throw extensive veterinary treatment at this horse' the answer to that then drives whether I insure or not.

The retired/happy hackers don't get extensive vets insurance.

The competition horses do.

I would also seriously consider taking out LOU cover on any new competition purchase for the first year - if you have been sold a dud I think you generally know within this time frame.
 
Sugar_and_Spice said:
I don't insure.

Doublethyme you're not abandoning her, you'd save money so you could treat her if needed. Your insurance after exclusions seems to cover you for colic treatment only and since you don't want surgery surely that insurance premium would be better saved for treatment for eg lameness etc.?
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I know, my sensible head completely agrees and it is I think what I will do. Just I suppose its linked to accepting my much loved girl is getting old. I have had to be very honest with myself over possible future decisions with her recently and think its all linked. She won't make old bones with the issues she has...she has been mostly retired after an injury at 12 and I won't prolong her life just for me. Suppose really regaining control from the insurance companies will help me with making the right decisions for her in the future, hopefully a little further down the line at least.

Thank you everyone who has contributed to this thread, its clarified things for me.
 
It is a scary decision, but you're not abandoning them if you think through what you'd do in an alternative.

I have bitten the bullet. I have told them I won't renew. I'm going to cancel the dog's insurance too. Now I just hope they don't all get injured in the first few months!
 
moleskinsmum said:
Nope - BHS Gold member for third party and some money stashed in Premium Bonds which is there for emergencies. He has cost me £400 in treatment in the 18 months I have had him which works out at £22/month and is about £20 less per month than I was quoted for insurance.

If he damages himself majorly, I won't have any Premium Bonds any more but in the meantime, I might just win a few quid to cover shoeing or buy a new rug...
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Premium Bonds are a good idea, I'm paying out over £180 per month for my 3 (and about £100 for the 3 dogs!) but have never trusted myself not to spend the money if I put it in a savings account. I am the world's worst at money burning a hole in my pocket but if I bought Premium Bonds that would be different I think I could be trusted not to spend those.

It's a scary decision though, I have definitely claimed more both for the horses and dogs than I have paid out over the last 10 years (one JRT has claimed over £11k in various incidents) but some of the equine treatment we tried 'because he was insured' and it didn't work to get the horse sound anyway.
 
I didn't insure some of my horses for a year once while I had a lot of savings, and the vets were different, not rushing to do x,y and z but doing x and giving it a bit of time to see how it went. A livery got the same injury as one of my uninsured ones, her bill was thousands, mine was £150. Both horses are fine now.
 
I don't insure, have 4 of them so it would be extortionate, I have liability insurance through WHW. they all get the vet out if they need it and the bill always gets paid.
 
I used to insure my mare fully, but now only insure her for death/theft and public liability. It was costing me £600 per year to insure her, so I would rather put any large vet's fees on a credit card if it happens. But most of the average £100/£200/£300 bills I just pay straight up anyway.
 
I have just had my renewal in for Ebony she is now 20 and it has now gone to over 70 pounds a month, and I now think that this is the time to drop her down to Vet cover which I must do as she costs me more a month now than my house. The cover I get everything is costing me more money the vet fees still remain the same as when I first got her fourteen years ago, so I am going to change and put the savings away.
 
I didn't bother with insurance for my first boy, I went for a vet fund instead.

18mths down the line we were hit with a 4k colic bill - unfortunately the vet fund didn't have chance to reach that kind of money. I've insured ever since.
 
I am only insured 3rd party liability.

I don't have a vet fund either but do earn good money and would be able to afford vet fees if something went wrong as my vet is very good at letting me pay in installments.

I think I will start putting some money back each month for vet fees though as ned is getting older.
 
Hippona said:
Not for vets fees....IMO they try to wriggle out of paying then exclude you following a claim.
And if you get the vet out for something and don't claim you still have to inform them....and risk an exclusion anyway.

The one time I claimed they wanted to put my veteran horse through colic surgery costing££££££ rather than let me PTS and pay out his life cover which was significantly less'....I thought it was dreadful that they would put him through that so I PTS anyway as it was in his best interests'. My vet was disgusted with them and wrote a strongly worded letter and they did pay out in the end. Thank you Pet Plan for making a very upsetting situation much much worse. For that reason I don't insure..I make my own decisions based on the horse not what insurance will pay for
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Had a similar thing with my 17 yr old sec D. Said goodnight to him in field sunday. Found him monday morning with colic. Called vet, did everything they could but decided against surgery because of level of pain, distance to vets, organising transport, time involved, and personality of horse, he wouldnt have coped. Broke my heart to make the decision to say good bye, still wonder if I did the right thing. Then had fight with ins company, who said I shouldnt have had him put to sleep. They weren't there, in the end wonderful vet wrote report and they did pay up. Hard struggle though and very upsetting. Still have insurance for my 2 which costs me about 96 pounds a month plus bhs gold for liability. Got me thinking now though.
 
I've got three out of four insured for vet fees. I stopped the old boy's insurance cos at his age I wouldn't put him through any major interventions.

I've had a couple of claims, one for A lameness issue which involved a Tildren drip, but I guess it was a 2k claim in all, which I could have coped with. Years ago, though, I did have a lameness claim which cost about 7k and, although the limit was 5k for one incident, NFU were great and treated the lameness as two separate incidents and paid out the full amount.

I'd like to cancel the vet fee insurance and pay the money into a vet fee savings account, but I don't know when to cancel and when to start! I can't afford a period when I'm paying both! I have public liability with BHS.
 
Honey08 said:
I've just had my renewal through from KBIS and my 16 year old is considered old and they will only pay out 75% from now on, even though their premiums are going up by £12 a month! As my cover is up to £3k it means they won't be paying much at all. They already exclude every tiny thing that occurred years ago. I have never claimed in my life and neither horse had has any serious illnesses or lameness in the 9 yrs I've had them.

So I'm thinking of putting a couple of hundred away each month instead. I have a credit card with enough available in the meantime, and a policy that will mature in 18 months.

If I go down the BHS gold cover will it cover my husband and stepson too or will they need to be members as well? I think I need to ring them for a chat!
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Nope gave up insuring my horses a few years back.
 
Hippona said:
Not for vets fees....IMO they try to wriggle out of paying then exclude you following a claim.
And if you get the vet out for something and don't claim you still have to inform them....and risk an exclusion anyway.

The one time I claimed they wanted to put my veteran horse through colic surgery costing££££££ rather than let me PTS and pay out his life cover which was significantly less'....I thought it was dreadful that they would put him through that so I PTS anyway as it was in his best interests'. My vet was disgusted with them and wrote a strongly worded letter and they did pay out in the end. Thank you Pet Plan for making a very upsetting situation much much worse. For that reason I don't insure..I make my own decisions based on the horse not what insurance will pay for
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A friend had a youngster with colic. The vet said that there was a slim chance of surgery being successful, so 2 yr old was transported to nearest horsepital (about 15 miles) in a trailer. I am amazed that they even got there as the horse kept going down and trying to roll.
By the time they got there the attending vet only gave the horse a 1% chance but the insurance co wanted the op to go ahead. Needless to say the poor thing died under anaesthetic.
If the horse had been mine, she would have ben pts at home but my friend wasn't very experienced, neither was her YO and they followed the vets and insurance co advice.

We have 4 horses and BHS Gold membership. Over the years we had paid a fortune in premiums with no claims but an exclusion for colic on the Clydesdale. When she had to be pts in an emergency with a rectal prolapse, we couldn't claim and tbh I couldn't be bothered arguing about it, as she wasn't insured for very much. But I shall certainly not be insuring any more horses.
 
I don't understand why the insurance companies insist on putting horses through these operations with low success rates, surely it just costs more money in the end?? I'd have thought they'd not want to spend money on something that is unlikely to work.
 
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