Insuring for under market value?

doodle

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Would this reduce my premiums? I have robin insured for what i bought him for. I would guess he is still worth the same as more of a be record but 3 years older at rising 12. If the worst was to happen he wouldnt be replaced so its not like i would need the money to buy another. Nfu jave hiked thr premiums up as they are doing to everyone which makes it even more eye watering.
 

Lintel

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I gave up on insurance two years ago when it got astronomical for a 8 year old Highland pony who had never claimed! I still have my WHW insurance that covers public liability- you can also upgrade it now for £100 a year you get injury(horse) insurance, but it won't cover colic... etc etc
I put away money each month for if my boy ever needed anything.

Not saying this is the right way forward but insurance is RIDICULOUS now.
I would be happy to under value my boy on a policy as if anything ever happened no amount of money could replace him. :)
 

The-Bookworm

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Yes it will drop the premuims.
They only pay the market value at that time based on what's about. What a horse is worth is usually Imo subjective.

They queried the fact that I hadn't increased the value of mine since got her. But how can you put a price on something you don't plan on parting with.

You may wish to check if your vet will still treat you without insurance. At the time my vets were declining new customers without insurance due to unpaid bills and horses being sold after treatment, owner untraceable.
 

milliepops

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Yep I don't increase my sum insured as they progress, to be honest i only insure for the vets fees cover because mortality etc is so hard to claim for anyway, the BEVA guidelines being what they are.
So my advanced welsh is insured for £2k though she's probably worth more than that in some respects (and that would be overpriced in others!!) and the WB is insured for the £900 that I paid for her 12 months ago.

I think it's different if you paid a lot for a horse and then underinsured... but i don't see the point of ramping up their value unless you had a serious megabucks horse.
 

Flyermc

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When both my horses were PTS (16 months apart) both were paid out for in full on death, so i dont think its that difficult to claim for?

However if i had my time again, i wouldnt have bothered insuring them.

Yep I don't increase my sum insured as they progress, to be honest i only insure for the vets fees cover because mortality etc is so hard to claim for anyway, the BEVA guidelines being what they are.
So my advanced welsh is insured for £2k though she's probably worth more than that in some respects (and that would be overpriced in others!!) and the WB is insured for the £900 that I paid for her 12 months ago.

I think it's different if you paid a lot for a horse and then underinsured... but i don't see the point of ramping up their value unless you had a serious megabucks horse.
 

milliepops

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When both my horses were PTS (16 months apart) both were paid out for in full on death, so i dont think its that difficult to claim for?

However if i had my time again, i wouldnt have bothered insuring them.
It really depends on the reason, i know friends of mine were unable to claim despite vets agreeing that pts was the best option on welfare grounds. Last one was a wobbler, Beva guidelines wouldn't have kicked in until the horse was a danger to handlers even though it was expected to deteriorate steadily :(
 

Flyermc

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that is really bad!

One was pts who met the guidelines, the other didnt at the time. He was pts on welfare grounds, but was also paid out on death, with no issues. They were both with petplan. I was expecting them not too, with the second horse.
 

FestiveFuzz

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I've had the same experience as MP when my 5yo was PTS. Vet said there was nothing more that could be done but insurers argued she didn't meet BEVA guidelines as she could still be box-rested (albeit whilst pumped full of copious amounts of painkiller!). There was no way l was going to put her through anymore (she'd already been box-rested for the best part of 9 months) and her prognosis was beyond poor (it was doubtful she'd ever even be field sound) so we did what was best for her and said to hell with the money. Whilst I strongly feel BEVA guidelines need to be reassessed, I would make the same decision in a heartbeat if I were unfortunate enough to be in the same position again.

It's for this reason I've always kinda assumed there would be no payout if I were to lose one of the boys, but on the flip I'd always worry that the one time I hadn't given an accurate value would be the one time they would pay. I guess though that's less of a concern if you don't plan to buy another.
 

Greyhorse1

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I tried to under insure mine with petplan last year however after around 2 weeks of taking the policy out I was contacted by underwriters who said I had to insure her for a minimum value of £2000 or they would cancel the policy. This put the premium up by about £20 per month!

I had originally tried to insure for 1k, which for a pony doing riding club sounded about right but petplan would have none of it.

I cancelled the policy!
 

Leo Walker

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Mine got laminitis. I fought for 4 months to save him, but he had rotation and sinking. He was 10/10ths lame in the worst leg/ The pedal bone was less than 5mms from coming through his sole. He was at a rehab yard and they were getting up hourly through the night to check this hadn't happened. I called time and had him PTS as no horse of mine is ever going to be made to suffer like that. He still didn't meet BEVA guidelines as they can apparently be rehabbed from that point!
 

be positive

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I tried to under insure mine with petplan last year however after around 2 weeks of taking the policy out I was contacted by underwriters who said I had to insure her for a minimum value of £2000 or they would cancel the policy. This put the premium up by about £20 per month!

I had originally tried to insure for 1k, which for a pony doing riding club sounded about right but petplan would have none of it.

I cancelled the policy!

I suspect they are catching on to people under insuring to keep the premiums down yet still get the full vet cover, it is suggested so frequently now that it is not surprising if they question values, they should be insured for roughly what they would cost to replace and I don't think you would find many RC/PC ponies for £1k unless they were ancient.

The OP may need to justify a drop in value much the same as they would an increase.
 

The-Bookworm

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I suspect they are catching on to people under insuring to keep the premiums down yet still get the full vet cover, it is suggested so frequently now that it is not surprising if they question values, they should be insured for roughly what they would cost to replace and I don't think you would find many RC/PC ponies for £1k unless they were ancient.

The OP may need to justify a drop in value much the same as they would an increase.
But does it really matter if you under insure? If you insure for 1k that's all you get on death. The only part of the premuim that goes up should be the loss of horse?
I don't know how many people really give a toss about the money if you lose the horse.
I wanted loss of horse taken off, money isn't going to replace the bond, the work, the time, the training, the horse I own because that's the one I loved.

My insurance has added in new wording in what they won't insure. So using laminitis as an example they would exclude that condition and now anything that arises from it. So how likely is it that if that's the cause of the loss, the animal was already excluded from payment?
 

The-Bookworm

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Thank you that.

Wow that's an eye opener. My vet would have discussed their thoughts with the insurance that she was given a 20% chance. As an owner that's a really low **** place to be. It looks like if I had called it a day they wouldn't have paid because your horse is still breathing!

Sorry to go ot, but our emergency services are getting like this. If you are breathing you can wait an hour. But if your not we can come now.
 

ihatework

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Most insurance companies will have a policy for under insuring, which is usually allowed to a certain extent.

In days gone by you could dramatically under insure. These days they are a little less lenient - but most seem to allow 50% of market value.

I’ve just insured one and the horse had to be assigned a minimum value of 2K to get the full vet cover, under that they only got 3K with a higher excess.
 

Greyhorse1

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I suspect they are catching on to people under insuring to keep the premiums down yet still get the full vet cover, it is suggested so frequently now that it is not surprising if they question values, they should be insured for roughly what they would cost to replace and I don't think you would find many RC/PC ponies for £1k unless they were ancient.

The OP may need to justify a drop in value much the same as they would an increase.


I think this must be true. I wasn’t looking for the value of the horse back and didn’t select loss of use.
To be honest I didn’t even think it would be a problem as the only person who would loose out if she did die was me. They would still pay the same vets fees etc for a 1k horse as they would a 2k horse.

Anyway I just went with another company but I did insure her for a bit more just incase 😄
 

Hormonal Filly

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I have always insured mine for £500 and they're more likely worth over £5000 market value.

They still pay the same vet fees as a 5k horse even if hes 'valued' at £500 but if something happened to him I wouldn't get what he was 'worth' back only £500, although that doesn't bother me.

If I paid that for my horses it may be different but they both all cost me under £500 as babies.
 

ycbm

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I suspect they are catching on to people under insuring to keep the premiums down yet still get the full vet cover, it is suggested so frequently now that it is not surprising if they question values, they should be insured for roughly what they would cost to replace and I don't think you would find many RC/PC ponies for £1k unless they were ancient.

The OP may need to justify a drop in value much the same as they would an increase.


Why do you say this BP? The sum insured shouldn't affect what it costs to insure for vets fees. It's no cheaper to treat a cheap horse than an expensive one. Value of the horse should relate only to what they pay out if the horse dies. And if the horse is worth ten grand but they only pay out one grand, whose business is that but the owners?

It seems a bit of a con if any insurers are insisting on insuring for market value when the owner doesn't want that cover.
 

be positive

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Why do you say this BP? The sum insured shouldn't affect what it costs to insure for vets fees. It's no cheaper to treat a cheap horse than an expensive one. Value of the horse should relate only to what they pay out if the horse dies. And if the horse is worth ten grand but they only pay out one grand, whose business is that but the owners?

It seems a bit of a con if any insurers are insisting on insuring for market value when the owner doesn't want that cover.

Because the premium is based on the whole policy taken out, a percentage will be for each part and the value is taken into consideration, so if under insured and the premium is lower because of that at some point premiums will go far higher to take this into account, the death part is a lower risk of being claimed against than the vets bills.

I can see changes being made to equine insurance as a whole because at the moment an owner can buy a horse, not get it vetted or check it's history, insure for a minimum value and in the first year or so claim many thousands in vets bills, if it were a car it would be written off once the insured value is exceeded, they may start to put a ceiling on claims and be more careful who can take out insurance if they are regularly claiming.
 

Flyermc

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I've had the same experience as MP when my 5yo was PTS. Vet said there was nothing more that could be done but insurers argued she didn't meet BEVA guidelines as she could still be box-rested (albeit whilst pumped full of copious amounts of painkiller!). There was no way l was going to put her through anymore (she'd already been box-rested for the best part of 9 months) and her prognosis was beyond poor (it was doubtful she'd ever even be field sound) so we did what was best for her and said to hell with the money. Whilst I strongly feel BEVA guidelines need to be reassessed, I would make the same decision in a heartbeat if I were unfortunate enough to be in the same position again.

It's for this reason I've always kinda assumed there would be no payout if I were to lose one of the boys, but on the flip I'd always worry that the one time I hadn't given an accurate value would be the one time they would pay. I guess though that's less of a concern if you don't plan to buy another.

Did your vet help you make your case? all i had to do, to make the claim for my boy who didnt meet the guidelines, was to get a letter explaining his issues, plus evidence (xrays)
 

Laafet

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KBIS were good when I dropped my horse's value, they agreed that based on his vet history they were unlikely to pay out what I paid for him despite his market value being a lot more now, I dropped it from £2k to 1k then to £500 and now I have just catastrophe insurance as he's had claims for most other things they would pay out on!
 

FestiveFuzz

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Did your vet help you make your case? all i had to do, to make the claim for my boy who didnt meet the guidelines, was to get a letter explaining his issues, plus evidence (xrays)

Yep, they still wouldn't budge as she didn't meet BEVA guidelines. They were pretty black and white about it. From my own experience and what I've heard from others in similar situations I'd say you were very lucky if your insurers paid out for PTS when it didn't meet guidelines on the say so of your vet.
 

The-Bookworm

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Because the premium is based on the whole policy taken out, a percentage will be for each part and the value is taken into consideration, so if under insured and the premium is lower because of that at some point premiums will go far higher to take this into account, the death part is a lower risk of being claimed against than the vets bills.

I can see changes being made to equine insurance as a whole because at the moment an owner can buy a horse, not get it vetted or check it's history, insure for a minimum value and in the first year or so claim many thousands in vets bills, if it were a car it would be written off once the insured value is exceeded, they may start to put a ceiling on claims and be more careful who can take out insurance if they are regularly claiming.
Not sure if that would work.
Mine isn't worth the £4000 I have claimed over the years of ownership. But she's priceless to me.
However nfu have brought in new wording that suggests that any complications directly or indirectly from something you have claimed for is excluded. So will be interested if we start to see insurance companies refusing to pay.
I think I had her two stage vetted and included that with my application. Could be wrong but thought some insurance companies already wanted a certificate- which as we know is only as good as the day it was done!

I don't see why someone with a 1k horse should pay less than a 4k horse- apart from the loss of horse part. Car insurance isn't on the value of the car is it? It's engine size, driver age, and whether you have had any accidents?
You can't write a horse off because that's going to mean an amended pts. Horse isn't worth saving.
 
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