Best Pet Insurance
Based on In-Depth Reviews
- 200+Hours of research
- 30+Sources used
- 15Companies vetted
- 3Features reviewed
- 5Top
Picks
- Healthy Paws
- highlightBest Overall
- benefitsUnlimited Benefits
- Spot
- highlightSee Any Vet or Specialist
- benefitsUnlimited
- Trupanion
- highlightVeterinarian Favorite
- benefitsUnlimited
- Pumpkin
- highlightExtensive Coverage
- benefitsUnlimited
In Canada? See our list for the best pet insurance in Canada
- Insure healthy pets; pre-existing conditions are not covered
- Most pet insurance works on a reimbursement model
- Policies have a waiting period before coverage begins
- Unlike with health insurance, there are no networks
How we analyzed the best Pet Insurance
Our Top Picks: Pet Insurance Reviews
Best pet insurance for cats
Though Healthy Paws doesn’t have as many coverage tiers or bonus benefits as other entries on our list, it doesn’t suffer for it. None of its coverage plans have per-incident, annual, or lifetime caps. You don’t have to worry about exhausting your benefits. Let that sink in for a moment.
In addition, Healthy Paws lets you choose your single annual deductible as well as your reimbursement percentage to give you more control over your premium and policy.
Screenshot of https://www.healthypawspetinsurance.com 12/19/2019
Healthy Paws can cover expenses such as accidents and illnesses, cancer treatment, emergency vet visits, genetic and hereditary conditions, alternative treatments and more.
Healthy Paws does have a slightly longer than average waiting period of 15 days for coverage for accidents, but that’s hardly a dealbreaker. Of greater concern is the relatively restrictive window for hip dysplasia coverage. The waiting period for hip dysplasia issues is 12 months and coverage ends when animals reach the age of six. Because hip dysplasia manifests either very early (by four months) or later in life, and is an excluded pre-existing condition, your chances of being covered during this window are not great. Consequently, Healthy Paws may be better for cats or smaller dog breeds who are at less risk of hip dysplasia.
The Healthy Paws app includes some standard administrative functions, including the ability to submit claims by scanning a veterinary receipt, but lacks the more powerful tools some of its competitors offer.
Read our full Healthy Paws pet insurance review to learn more. You can also compare two popular pet insurance companies in our Healthy Paws vs. Nationwide pet insurance comparison.
Best pet insurance for preventative care
While Embrace offers perfectly good coverage for your pet, the basic features of its policies aren’t anything to write home about. The options are pretty flexible (if a bit on the pricey side), allowing you to choose your coverage limits and deductibles. What separates Embrace from other pet insurers, though, are the extras.
Screenshot of https://www.embracepetinsurance.com/ 12/19/2019
To begin with, like auto and homeowners insurance, Embrace offers a diminishing deductible the longer you don’t file a claim, essentially giving you a healthy pet discount. Pair this with choosing your own deductible and you can design a plan that’s tailored to your needs.
Embrace covers similar services as other pet insurance companies, such as emergency vet visits, diagnostic testing, breed-specific conditions and orthopedic treatments like physical therapy.
Embrace is one of the rare pet insurers that includes coverage for dental illnesses — up to $1,000 worth. And its wellness coverage, an option we generally don’t recommend, acts as a flexible spending account, giving you more control over your money. Extras like these turn a vanilla insurer into more of a full-on sundae.
You can read more about how Embrace pet insurance stacks up against the competition here: Embrace vs. Fetch pet insurance.
Best pet insurance for older dogs
Fetch covers a wide range of services, including emergency vet visits and exam fees, comprehensive dental, breed-specific medical issues, diagnostic tests, holistic care, cancer treatments and more. The level of coverage is helpful for aging dogs that may begin to face more health issues as they get older.
Screenshot fetchpet.com, December 2023
Fetch is another insurer that allows for a high degree of plan customization. Fetch has unlimited benefits and doesn’t restrict congenital or hereditary illnesses. We love this kind of flexibility in an insurer. So, too, does The American Animal Hospital Association, which named Fetch its preferred insurer.
The average cost of a dog policy from Fetch is around $35 per month. In addition to your coverage, Fetch has extra perks such as Fetch Forward™, which allows you to gain insights from your pet’s medical records to improve their health for the future. Fetch pet insurance reviews reveal mostly happy customers that felt the cost of the pet insurance was worth it.
Best pet insurance for dogs
Trupanion has some of the best pet insurance for puppies and dogs, although it may not be the cheapest option available if you’re just judging by premiums. However, with a single lifetime deductible per condition, it can save you a bundle of cash in the long run. This is particularly helpful for pets with chronic conditions requiring frequent vet visits and treatments. And because Trupanion doesn’t do annual renewals (the policy is active for as long as you pay the monthly premium), these conditions never become pre-existing conditions.
However, it’s a bit of a gamble for breeds that aren’t as prone to predictable illnesses. It’s also not helpful if your pet has multiple different health problems, each requiring the one-time deductible. If your pet is rarely or never sick, that’s great, but it also means you may be overpaying for coverage you don’t need.
Screenshot of https://trupanion.com 12/19/2019
Unlike the other insurers on this list, Trupanion only offers a single policy, which is a bit of a double-edged sword. To some consumers, too many options can be confusing and ultimately self defeating, so having only one option makes the decision of whether or not to go with Trupanion really easy. If it works for you, great. If not, keep looking.
Trupanion is a good choice for larger breeds who are susceptible to cruciate problems and hip dysplasia, as these are not excluded from the policy if they don’t manifest during the waiting period. Another selling point is that Trupanion can pay vets directly, saving you the time and trouble of filing claims and paying for expensive procedures out-of-pocket. This is particularly helpful in an emergency situation requiring expensive treatment you’d have a hard time paying for from your savings. That's a policy we wish all pet insurers would adopt.
Best pet insurance for multiple pets
Nationwide is the only major insurer that covers exotic pets (birds, chameleons, hedgehogs, turtles, potbellied pigs, etc.) under its normal policies. In addition, it offers a 5% multi-pet discount, which makes it a great option for people with multiple types of pets.
Screenshot PetInsurance.com, July 2023
Nationwide offers accident coverage, illness coverage and wellness packages. There are no per-incident, annual or lifetime caps. You can customize your policy with deductibles as low as $100 and reimbursement rates up to 90%. However, there is only one policy available, which limits the ability to customize your coverage options.
While pet insurance quotes for cats and dogs are available online, owners of exotic pets need to call Nationwide for price estimates. With that in mind, Nationwide is typically more expensive than other pet insurance providers.
Take a look at our full Nationwide pet insurance review to learn more.
Other good pet insurance options
If none of the companies above are to your liking, or you want to compare a few more options, here are some good pet insurance.
Pet Assure
Pet Assure offers both discount memberships and wellness plans for all pets of any age and health status. Its discount plans can provide savings from participating vet offices, while its wellness plans can help cover preventative care. However, it's not an insurance plan, so you won’t get large amounts of coverage for emergency situations. Most Pet Assure reviews are positive, but issues can arise if you don’t fully understand what your plan offers.
Banfield
Banfield is another insurance alternative that offers wellness plans for dogs and cats. You can customize your plan based on your pet’s specific health needs, but all plans include unlimited office visits, routine exams, diagnostic testing and educational resources. Banfield reviews are mixed, so it’s important to read the fine print before purchasing a plan. One disadvantage of buying Banfield insurance is that you must take your pet to a Banfield hospital for treatment; you’re not able to choose your own veterinarian.
Pawp
Pawp is a subscription for virtual vet services. You pay an annual subscription fee and receive unlimited virtual veterinary appointments, 24/7 access to care, guided care plans and personalized expert advice. You can also add an emergency fund that reimburses you up to $3,000 for one incident per year. Pawp reviews are generally good, but make sure you understand the eligibility requirements for reimbursement.
More insight into our methodology
There are a lot of pet parents on the editorial team at ConsumersAdvocate.org. To say that the health and wellbeing of our animals is important to us is a massive understatement. For that reason we resolved to be extra careful in researching the topic of pet insurance--or veterinary health insurance as it’s also known.
Knowing that the overwhelming majority of pets in America are cats and dogs, we first decided to limit our focus to conventional policies covering these animals, rather than the few policies covering the myriad species of exotic pets out there. Comparing only apples and oranges to other apples and oranges yields considerably more useful results.
We instead focused on the specifics of pet insurance policies: price point, reputation, financial stability, and care package--basically all the factors you yourself would look into.
Coverage
By and large, pet insurance companies offer two major types of coverage: comprehensive coverage (accident and illness) and accident-only. There are a few pet insurance providers that allow more flexibility letting you mix and match illness and accident coverage, or purchase certain conditions a la carte. Some companies also offer wellness plans as add-ons. Wellness plans cover the animal for routine care, vaccinations, neutering, etc.
No pet insurance plan covers pre-existing or congenital conditions if they are present before purchasing the policy. And some have waiting periods for specific congenital conditions (hip dysplasia, cruciate ligaments), during which no claim will be allowed.That being said, each company has its own definition of pre-existing condition. Some define it as any condition that your pet may have been treated for but has recovered from in the past year or six months.
Cost
Costs can vary widely, with an accident-only policies usually being the cheapest option. Pet insurance premiums depend on a multitude of factors. Location, age, and breed all play a major part. Also, the type of plan, deductible choice, reimbursement percentage choice, and benefit limit choice all play a part.
Your plan deductible is how much money you will have to come up with before the pet insurance company starts paying. Higher deductibles ($1,000 for example) translate into lower monthly premiums. A deductible is not to be confused with a co-payment.
Let's say you have a $500 annual deductible and have chosen an 80% reimbursement level. During the course of that year, you will have to pay 100% of vet bills for the first $500, after which your pet insurance plan kicks in 80% of all medical bills. You then get a $1,000 vet bill for surgery. Pet insurance pays $800 and you pay $200. The $200 is your co-payment.
Benefit limits come in a variety of combinations. Some of our top plans feature flat-out 100% unlimited lifetime coverage for all illnesses, procedures, and conditions. This means that after you pay your deductible, there will be no upper limit the company will pay to cover your pet's medical bills.
Sometimes plans will say they offer unlimited annual or lifetime coverage, but still set caps by condition—meaning they'll theoretically pay an unlimited amount in the aggregate, but still have dollar amount limits per condition. Some companies will set per-condition caps AND total annual caps.
Still others will set lifetime limits per condition. There are also individual plans that allow you to choose your annual benefit limit in the same way you choose your reimbursement percentage or deductible. Naturally, higher benefit limits will equate to more expensive premiums.
Finally, the reimbursement model is how the pet insurance company calculates reimbursement for a procedure. Some companies will pay the actual cost of your vet bill (minus your deductible and copay), while others will only reimburse procedures based on a benefits schedule. Benefit schedules are based on the average cost of a procedure nationwide. Most companies will only use one method. However, it is possible to use different methods for each plan.
Extras
Most pet insurance companies have you pay the bill yourself, then reimburse you after you file the claim. They can either do this by sending you a check, or in some cases through direct deposit (obviously the speediest option). A few providers will pay your veterinarian or veterinary hospital directly.
What is Pet Insurance?
In a perfect world, every pet would live a long life free of disease and injury. Unfortunately, that is not the world in which we live. Dogs, cats, hamsters, and even pet tarantulas all fall victim to accidents and diseases just like their humans.
Also, as with human healthcare, pet healthcare is far from free. In fact, it can be prohibitively expensive. Year after year, the costs of this care increase, putting more and more pet owners in the terrible position of putting a price tag on the lives of a family member. How much money is too much to spend to keep your best friend alive and healthy?
Pet insurance, like the health insurance you receive either through your employer or otherwise, is a means to protect yourself from potentially ruinous veterinary bills. Healthy Paws lists one particularly alarming example of the costs of pet care on its website, telling the story of a German Shepherd named Lupa who needed $52,021 worth of treatment for tetanus. Considering that the average per capita income in America in 2017 was $31,786, it’s not likely most people could afford Lupa’s care without insurance.
And yet only 4.85 million American pets are insured. This out of an estimated total of 89.7 million dogs, and 94.2 million cats.
Part of the reason for this low enrollment could be that pet insurance is a relatively new product. In fact, the first policy sold in the United States was for that shaggy star of the silver screen, Lassie, in 1982. The modest rise of pet insurance in the almost four decades since mirrors a curious change in how Americans interact with and think about their pets.
Dr. Craig Clifford, a medical oncologist and director of clinical studies at Hope Veterinary Specialists coined a pair of terms to describe the traditional model of American pet ownership versus the contemporary model. “The Snoopy generation,” as he called it, was content to leave their dogs and cats outside to mostly fend for themselves. Veterinary care was limited to relatively minor procedures and treatments and for more expensive, complicated illnesses, euthansia was generally the solution.
“The Brian generation” (a reference to the decidedly indoor family dog from the TV show “Family Guy”) on the other hand treats pets as literal family members, rather than a piece of property. Even the way these two generations refer to themselves—pet owners versus pet parents—broadcasts the dramatic difference in how pets are integrated into a household. When a dog or cat becomes a fully-realized member of the family, veterinary care becomes a bit more complicated. Opting out of, say, cancer treatments because they’re too expensive, isn’t an option at all. There is no dollar limit on the lengths some families will go to save one of their own.
To put it bluntly, pet insurance means not having to choose between a $52,021 vet bill and the $50-$400 it costs to to euthanize a pet.
How Does Pet Insurance Work?
Most pet insurance policies reimburse you for vet costs after you’ve paid them and file a claim. You pay your veterinarian for services and then file a claim to be reimbursed a certain amount of money based on your deductible and reimbursement rate. For example, if you have a deductible of $250 and a reimbursement rate of 80%, you would get 80% back of any costs that you paid over $250.
In some cases, pet insurance companies like Trupanion will pay vets directly so you don’t have to worry about paying out of pocket or filing claims in the middle of a medical emergency. Otherwise, the reimbursement process can take anywhere from days to weeks.
Most pet insurance policies also have a waiting period, which is the time between when you enroll in a policy and when you can get coverage. Most companies have a waiting period for accidents of between one to three days and fourteen days for illness. If they’re covered, congenital or hereditary diseases have a waiting period between six months to a year.
Things to keep in mind when buying pet insurance
Pet insurance differs from health insurance in a few key ways. To begin with, most pet insurance operates on a reimbursement model. This means that you pay for the veterinary treatment or services upfront and are then reimbursed for the cost once you file a claim.
Additionally, most pet insurance doesn’t rely on a network of providers. You can choose your own vet and not incur out-of-network fees. The notable exception to this model is Banfield Pet Hospital, which offers membership to hundreds of clinics, many of which are in PetSmart stores. Technically speaking, this is not insurance at all. It’s closer to a veterinary discount plan, which is a membership that provides you with discounted prices on veterinary services.
The thing to bear in mind about such plans is that they don’t pay for anything. You will end up paying for everything, though at a discounted rate. If--to go with the example of Lupa again--the original vet bill is $52,021 and your discount is an unheard of 50%, you’ll have to pony up $26,010.50. To put it in perspective, that’s roughly the cost of a Rolex Cosmograph Daytona.
Even with insurance, you may have to pay far more out of pocket than you thought you would. Besides the fact that pet insurance is a reimbursement product, you may run into benefit caps sooner than you’d thought. An all-too-common tactic used by some insurers is to advertise their plans as having no benefit caps, but bury the fact that only the top tier plan is cap free. The information is still technically available, so it’s not false advertising, but it does mean you have to be careful about which plan you pick.
4 Types of Benefit Limits
-
Unlimited Lifetime — After you pay your deductible, there will be no upper limit the company will pay to cover your pet's medical bills.
-
Annual Maximum — Some companies will cap payouts on an annual basis (e.g. $15,000/year). Once you reach that limit, you will no longer be reimbursed for treatments that year.
-
Annual Per Incident — This is the maximum dollar amount the company will pay for a particular illness, condition, or procedure in a given year.
-
Lifetime Maximum — This is the maximum amount the company will pay out either in total or per condition for the lifetime of the pet. If your pet has a chronic condition such as asthma or allergies, you can quickly hit the benefit limit.
Lastly, though most pet insurance providers offer “wellness” plans to cover annual checkups and vaccinations, you may want to limit your coverage to only accident and illness insurance. There’s a reason 82% of policies sold in the US do not cover wellness or preventative care. For the most part, the higher premiums of wellness plans will usually end up costing you more than you’d actually spend out-of-pocket for these routine expenses, and consumers seem to have figured this out. Run Do the math yourself and don’t be surprised if paying out of pocket for these costs ends up being a better deal.
Pre-existing conditions and enrollment
Pet insurance is not subject to the same legally mandated consumer-friendly protections as human health insurance. As such, it’s generally not very forgiving of pre-existing conditions, except under some of the more expensive and less-common policies. For the most part, pre-existing conditions are excluded from for coverage. As your pets age and your premiums increase annually in response, pre-existing conditions may very well lock you into one provider, precluding you from consideration insurers.
Enrollment, too, is complicated and varies greatly from one insurer to the next. The following restrictions may all apply:
- Max Enrollment Age: Most pet insurance providers have a maximum enrollment age, and deny coverage once reached. However, there are a few that will cover pets regardless of how old they are, usually for an extra cost.
- Minimum Enrollment Age: Conversely, most companies also have a minimum enrollment age as well, usually expressed in weeks.
- Accident Waiting Period: Most pet insurance companies require a waiting period between enrollment and when you can make a claim for accidents. Obviously the shorter the period, the sooner coverage begins. With some insurers, this period may depend on your state. In rare cases, accident coverage starts within 24 hours.
- Illness Waiting Period: Waiting periods for illnesses are usually longer than accident waiting periods. A common time frame is 15-30 days from the policy effective date, although it can be shorter.
- Free Look Period: Free Look Period means the period of time allowed for a new policyholder to look over the terms and conditions of the policy after delivery. During this time, the policyholder may cancel the policy with a full premium refund. Free look periods are usually represented in days.
Learn more about the best pet insurance for pre-existing conditions and your possible coverage options.
How To Get Pet Insurance
If you’re wondering how to buy pet insurance, it’s a relatively easy process if you're willing to do a little bit of research. Start your journey by comparing the best pet insurance companies like our top picks above. Get quotes from these companies by calling them, using the quote forms on their websites or checking with your existing auto or homeowners insurance companies to see if you can bundle coverage for a discounted rate.
Make sure you understand each company’s coverage options and exclusions. Look for whether they offer accident-only, accident-and-illness, or wellness plans. Also, look for extra perks like dental coverage or behavioral therapy treatments.
When you're getting quotes and signing up for coverage, choose your deductible, reimbursement rate and coverage limits. Higher deductibles will reduce your premiums, while higher reimbursement rates and limits will increase your premiums. You'll be required to pay either as a monthly premium or a discounted annual premium. Some companies may also require that your pet completes a routine exam to determine their overall health. Others just require that your pet has had an exam within a year of enrollment.
How Much Does Pet Insurance Cost?
Think of your cost of coverage like you would car insurance. When you buy an auto insurance policy, your monthly premium depends on a number of factors: how many vehicles will be on the policy, their makes and models, mileage and age, where you live, and the accident history for both you and your vehicles.
While Al’s Awesome Auto Insurance can claim to offer the most affordable policies in the industry, you’ll need to provide Al with a lot of specific information before knowing your exact premium payment.
The same is true of pet insurance. Generally, cats are cheaper to insure than dogs, younger animals are cheaper than older ones, and certain “problematic” breeds warrant higher rates Also, if you live in Manhattan, New York, you can expect to have a higher premium than you would if you live in Manhattan, Kansas because the cost of veterinary care in those two locations is not the same.
In line with other types of insurance, pet insurance has deductibles: money you pay out of pocket for treatment before insurance payments kick in. Generally speaking, higher deductibles mean lower premiums and vice versa. While you might be inclined to choose high-deductible insurance in order to lower your premiums, your plan to lower your overall costs could backfire if your pet requires a lot of treatments in a given year, requiring you to make numerous co-payments.
Pet insurance comes in three basic coverage categories of ascending cost: Accident Only, Comprehensive: Accidents & Illnesses, and Comprehensive + Wellness Coverage. Though an accident only policy, you’re out of luck if your pet gets sick or diagnosed with a serious disease. We recommend the middle option as it provides more of a safety net, without the extra cost of wellness protection.
Three primary types of coverage
- Comprehensive
-
FeatureAccidents & Illnesses
- The best pet insurance should cover accidents and illnesses. These include broken bones, surgery to remove swallowed objects, cancer, diabetes, ear infections and numerous other conditions.
- Accidents Only
-
FeatureAccidents Only
- Accident only coverage's main benefit is savings. They are usually the cheapest policies and will cover your pet for all manner of mishaps from getting bit by other animals to poisoning, but they do not cover illnesses or diseases.
- Wellness Coverage
-
FeaturePreventative Care
- Wellness plans cover routine procedures such as annual exams, vaccines, flea and heartworm prevention. We don’t recommend this because these expenses can be budgeted for annually.
So how much does a policy actually cost? According to data from the North American Pet Health Insurance Association State of the Industry guide, the average annual costs of insuring a dog or cat are:
Accident Only Plans |
Accident & Illness Plans |
|
Dog |
$200.58 annually / $16.70 monthly |
$640.04 annually / $53.34 monthly |
Cat |
$122.19 annually / $10.18 monthly |
$387.01 annually / $32.25 monthly |
The most expensive of these averages is still less than the cost of most peoples’ cell phone bills. It’s important to keep in mind that these numbers are simply an average and that the variables mentioned earlier--species, age, etc.--can put your bill significantly above or below these baselines. Additionally, wellness coverage will cost more, as will coverage for more exotic pets, generally.
Do I Need Pet Insurance?
Whether or not to insure something or someone is usually a personal choice, with a few exceptions--auto insurance if you own a car, mortgage insurance until you’ve paid a home loan down to a certain point, and various profession-specific insurances. There is no statute on the books mandating the purchase of a pet insurance policy when you have a furry member of the family. But just because it’s not mandatory doesn’t mean it’s not a good idea.
One out of five cats can expect to be diagnosed with cancer at some point in their lives--for dogs, the risk rises to one in four. Estimates of the cost of treatment vary according to breed, type of cancer, where you live, and treatment options, but the consensus is that it is not cheap. Diagnosis alone can run you $1-$2,000, with treatments ranging between $3-$10,000 and, of course, the ever-present possibility of a relapse.
And that’s just cancer. Treatments can run from $250 for a sprained muscle in a dog to $15,000 for acute kidney failure in cats. It is by no means certain that your pet will be afflicted by any of these or other conditions (though what dog owner hasn’t faced the prospect of emergency surgery because Fido swallowed something decidedly inedible?), so the question comes down to “how much risk can you afford?”
While the idea of economic euthanasia--putting a sick animal down because you can’t pay for treatment--is, to put it mildly, distasteful, it is a legitimate consideration in the realm of pet healthcare. Without pet insurance, the average person will reach a point where they simply cannot afford the treatment necessary to prolong the healthy life of their pet. Though it’s often sadly necessary to put down extremely sick animals when further treatment will only prolong their suffering, a broken leg or bowel obstruction shouldn’t mean the end.
However, if you have your heart set on avoiding pet insurance, a good alternative is to set aside some amount of money every month--peg it to what you would pay for an insurance policy, perhaps--in a contingency savings account earmarked for pet health emergencies. It’s unlikely that you’ll ever save enough to pay for a catastrophically expensive vet bill using this method, but it will pay for regular check ups, and the occasional small to medium accident.
Though we’ve already warned against veterinary discount plans if you’re shopping specifically for pet insurance, they do provide some cost savings for veterinary care. However, these plans really won’t help you much if your pet is diagnosed with something serious and expensive. Remember Lupa?
Having pet insurance can mean a better quality of life for you pet. People without insurance will often only pay for either relatively minor procedures or the literal do-or-die kinds of things that cannot be put off another minute. Between these categories exists a gray area of fairly expensive treatments that do not constitute life saving emergencies. Because not going through with them doesn’t imperil the life of the pet, these measures can be put off indefinitely.
If your dog is wall-eyed, for instance, she won’t die if you don’t get her vision fixed. But her quality of life will improve considerably if you do. Pet insurance can mean the difference between simply sustaining your pet’s life and improving it.
FAQs about Pet Insurance
How much is pet insurance on average?
The cost of Pet Insurance varies widely depending on your pet’s health history and age, as well as the deductible amount and reimbursement level you choose. That said, the average pet health insurance premium is usually between $20 and $50 per month, with cat plans normally costing less than plans for dogs.
Does Pet Insurance cover neutering or spaying?
Most Pet Insurance policies don’t cover neutering or spaying, as it’s considered a routine treatment. If your company does cover sterilization, it will usually be as part of an additional, optional wellness rider with spay/neuter benefits. Wellness plans can also cover checkups, flea/tick medications, vaccinations, and other treatments that aren’t part of a regular plan.
Does pet insurance cover prescription food and medication?
The vast majority of pet insurance plans include medications prescribed to treat a covered illness or condition. However, most pet insurance companies do not cover supplements. Those that do are Fetch by The Dodo, the most comprehensive plan that Nationwide offers, and Trupanion, provided that the supplements are prescribed to treat a covered illness.
Does Pet Insurance cover euthanasia?
Many insurance companies will cover euthanasia. In the case of illness or injury, your policy might stipulate a minimum age before coverage activates. Policies might also direct you to certain vets in order to properly certify cause of death.
Does Pet Insurance cover shots and vaccinations?
Shots and vaccinations are generally NOT covered by standard pet insurance policies. However, some companies offer “wellness” policies that will cover vaccines and other routine preventative care like physical exams. Wellness plans are offered as additions to standard policies, but in some cases can be purchased alone.
Does Pet Insurance cover surgery?
Pet insurance does cover surgery provided the surgery isn’t related to a pre existing condition that was apparent in the animal prior to purchasing coverage. If this stipulation is satisfied, policies cover surgeries relating to all kinds of accidents and illnesses. However, each company has its own exclusions so scrutinize their plans thoroughly.
Does pet insurance cover pre-existing conditions?
Most pet insurance companies will not cover pre-existing conditions. However, some insurers define “pre-existing” leniently, as in covering conditions that your pet has been treated for but has not had treatment for in 6 months to a year. Some very expensive policies may also cover pre-existing conditions under any circumstances. Congenital and hereditary coverage is included in some policies. But it’s important that you read the fine print of any policy you’re considering to see if other restrictions apply.
What is an annual deductible for Pet Insurance?
An annual deductible is the amount of money you must pay out of pocket before the pet insurance company starts paying. Some companies offer you the ability to choose the amount of this deductible. Generally, a higher annual deductible will translate into lower monthly premiums.
Does Pet Insurance cover vet visits?
The exam fees that are tacked on to your vet bills are generally not covered by insurance, but there are some insurers that will pay for them. In addition, if you purchase wellness coverage, exam fees for routine exams will be covered.
Our Pet Insurance Review Summed Up
Company Name | The Best |
---|---|
Healthy Paws Pet Insurance | Cats |
Embrace Pet Insurance | Preventive care |
Trupanion Pet Insurance | Dogs |
Nationwide Pet Insurance | Multiple pets |
Fetch Pet Insurance | Older dogs |