Should I claim on my insurance?

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myhorsefred

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Read an earlier post, which got me thinking....

About 2 months ago Fred was kicked in the field, on his near foreleg. Huge gash. Managed to stop it bleeding, bandaged it etc. Rang vet for advice, who came out following day and took 6 xrays, redressed, anti inlam injections and bute. usual stuff. Xrays confirmed no break or fracture, so we were lucky.

I paid the vets bill, which came to about £250.

I was wondering today, whether I should have claimed on my NFU insurance policy. I just paid up at the time and thought no more of it.

What would you have done?

thanks
 
I've had similar recently and will claim, after excess why miss out on £200 ish ?
You are obliged to declare any incident whether you claim or not and any pre-existing condition is excluded on renewal anyway so you may as well get a little bit of dosh back!
 
You pay insurance for your horse to cover vet bills & the policy has a £120 excess. The bill came to £250 so the insurance should have paid the £130. I cannot see whay you don't want to claim........£130 in your pocket is beter than in theirs........ why bother having insurance f you don't want to claim?
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I don't think NFU have a no claims bonus
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Oh yes, not thought about that. Just looked and its £120. Not worth bothering then, really. thanks.

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You must have too much money then as I would class £130 worth bothering for!

You'll have to let them know about the injury anyway so you might as well claim imo.
 
You will have to declare the injury anyway. The insurance company may or may not exclude it (personally I feel an exclusion would be unlikely due to the nature of the injury and no permanent damage caused).

It is up to you whether you wsh to claim for the £130, as people say £130 is £130. If you don't need it then fair enough. The only reason I would suggest for not claiming is that, if you have had any other claims or claim frequently for relatively small amounts (£130 is a V small sum for an insurance company) the it is likely your excess could be put up.
 
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You pay insurance for your horse to cover vet bills & the policy has a £120 excess. The bill came to £250 so the insurance should have paid the £130. I cannot see whay you don't want to claim........£130 in your pocket is beter than in theirs........ why bother having insurance f you don't want to claim?
confused.gif

I don't think NFU have a no claims bonus
crazy.gif


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Because you will usually end up with an exlusion.

So do people consider that insurance is for every incident of damage then?

I've always considered that insurance would normally be claimed for if a bill was going to be excessive - say upward of £500 or for a problem that was likely to be ongoing and going to cost in the region of a couple of thousand.
 
Hi, thanks. I've never claimed on my policy before. Which is why I think it slipped my mind when I paid vets bill. Seeing as I need to report incident anyway, I think I may as well claim the £130, and just hope my excess doesn't go up at renewal next year. Seems unfair though if excess does go up, seeing as I've never claimed. Will just have to see what happens to premium I suppose. Would also be unfair if they excluded that leg, seeing as it wasn't broken etc. Oh well.
 
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Because you will usually end up with an exlusion.


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But under the NFU policy terms you would have to declare the injury/veterinary treatment recieved at renewal anyway so if they were going to exclude they'd do it regardless of the claim.
 
I agree AmyMay. I only really thought I'd ever claim for large bills or ongoing prob, as you say.

Which is why small bill for what ended up being just a cut which healed easily didn't really prompt me to claim.
 
lzt - that's good news. I do like NFU, I think they're a good insurer. Whenever I've had to ring them, they have always been quick to answer, and really knowledgeable about their product and polite. I rate them.
 
For the last 3 vets visits I had for my two- cut head needed stiches, bashed eye, and graze to the fetlock down to the joint I have just paid the bill as they were all under the insurance excess. I have however just started a claim for the "biggie" which is ru's potential surgery.
 
I had a similar claim a few years back to approx same value - claimed on my NFU insurance, no exclusion was applied, they just wrote to vet and asked for her professional opinion over whether issue would have long term effect - was straight above knee. She said no, they paid out, no exclusion
 
I am with NFU, and claimed last year for a suspensory injury. They were fab and even paid for the increase in my livery bills. They didn't exclude anything and didn't put up my premium. When I asked about not claiming they said that everything had to be disclosed anyway, they'd always look at vet records and take stuff into account, whether you'd claimed or not.
 
You should def declare it at renewal - any injury really where a vet has been called out to be honest. Otherwise, should you later claim for something your veterinary history is likely to be requested and previous treatments will obviously be made apparent so this could mean the insurance company will want to dig further and will want to know why you didn't tell them etc.

It is extremely unlikely any terms/exclusions would apply from what you've said about the injury and, if only this one claim so far it shouldn't affect your excess either. It's entirely up to you if you claim. Some people don't claim for the smaller bills, some do, it's your choice.
 
The leg wont be excluded for a cut..... however large..... unless it has damaged structures other than the skin, because there should be no long term effects on the leg itself.....

You may as well get some of your money back, unless you have enough not to miss it..... but cant see what you would have to gain by not claiming.
 
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