Insurance

[Lambkins]

Hmm I am with a (normally) good insurance company (not e&l) I have a claim going at the moment ..with no problems ..I send them the bills they pay them ..perfect about £2000 at the mo .. But I received a letter yesterday to say they have been through his old vet reports (which is fine nothing's to see really , or so I thought :/) well in 2011 he had puss in the foot ,I week of poltice and back to normal ..(to be honest I forgot all about it ) well in the letter .. They will no longer insure his 'feet and pedal disorders, right hind limb ' ...this does not affect my current claim ..but to be honest was I little shocked .. I called them and they said they will look into it..and the girl on the phone was very understanding .. But if my horse had injuried his hind limb it would not have been covered ..because he once had puss in the foot ???

 

[Polos Mum]

And hence why I don't bother insuring but put the money into a savings account instead! They are in business of making money, overall they HAVE to pay out less that people pay in, hence it is their JOB to spend time getting out of paying for things.
Sometimes they can be reasonable and if you call them and discuss, maybe get your vet to write to say it was a one off and no ongoing effect on his health they might lift the exclusion.
I think the most tricky thing they do is not to look at any of this before you make a claim, so you can happily pay £100's a year for several years, then need them for something and only at that stage do the look though your vet history to find low and behold the thing you've claimed for isn't covered !!

Same as tack needing to be in a building with 5 level mortice lock with less than x number of liveries having a key (which I've never seen on a tack room door)
or
death only being paid on specific guidelines even when numerous vets agree it's the right thing they want the pony to suffer for longer or undergo pointless painful treatments/ ops before they pay.
or
Loss of use where they only give you a %age as you could breed from the mare (even though there is plenty of overbreeding going on already!)

Sorry for ranting !!!

 

[PandorasJar]

Get a vet letter sent over.

Friend had this and vet wrote that it had no bearing to any other future problems and was removed as a restriction.

 

[PandorasJar]

And hence why I don't bother insuring but put the money into a savings account instead! They are in business of making money, overall they HAVE to pay out less that people pay in, hence it is their JOB to spend time getting out of paying for things.
Sometimes they can be reasonable and if you call them and discuss, maybe get your vet to write to say it was a one off and no ongoing effect on his health they might lift the exclusion.
I think the most tricky thing they do is not to look at any of this before you make a claim, so you can happily pay £100's a year for several years, then need them for something and only at that stage do the look though your vet history to find low and behold the thing you've claimed for isn't covered !!

Same as tack needing to be in a building with 5 level mortice lock with less than x number of liveries having a key (which I've never seen on a tack room door)
or
death only being paid on specific guidelines even when numerous vets agree it's the right thing they want the pony to suffer for longer or undergo pointless painful treatments/ ops before they pay.
or
Loss of use where they only give you a %age as you could breed from the mare (even though there is plenty of overbreeding going on already!)

Sorry for ranting !!!

I'm the same.

I use BHS for third party on all, wouldn't be without it.

But don't insure for anything else, have a bank account with the equivalent that insurance would cover vet fees for and a good vet who would set up a monthly payment if required.

 

[Polos Mum]

I use BHS for third party on all, wouldn't be without it.

Absolutely, too busy ranting to be 100% accurate, third party is critical (unless you have say £5 million in your savings account to pay a claim of that nature!!!)

 

[smanf]

I read it that they have excluded future feet and pedal disorders that may occur to his right hind limb, not the whole right hind limb itself. I know a little as used to work for Petplan.

 

[Elbie]

I read it that they have excluded future feet and pedal disorders that may occur to his right hind limb, not the whole right hind limb itself. I know a little as used to work for Petplan.

Agree, I would have thought it would just be problems with the RH foot or pedal bone, not the whole RH limb. I used to work there too! Assuming they had the history, would've thought they could see if the issue had resolved or not. I would just ask your vet to write a letter to say it was just an infection which resolved on dd/mm/yyyy and she/he has not seen or treated your horse for this condition since. Hopefully they'll then remove it. Think the problem is you would've been sent a generic letter which auto-populates. Never agreed with those as they offer little explanation.

Polo's Mum - they ask you to give details of any illnesses/injuries your horse has had when you take out the insurance. That is for you to disclose to them as part of the contract, they shouldn't have to investigate it. If you don't mention something and they later see something on a vet history then it's not their fault. Normally vets will submit a history with a claim so while its there it gets passed to the Underwriters to review.

And the BEVA criteria for mortality is in place to stop people putting horse's down willy nilly to claim from insurers. For the interests of treating customers fairly, if a horse doesn't meet the guidelines set by BEVA then it doesn't meet a claim for mortality. However, some insurers will consider a settlement on economic grounds.