3
out of 5
POSTED: | BY: Lora Smeltzly
Getting harder to justify the expense as premiums rise
When I first insured Cody, we covered our cat Maia and Cody's brother, Skipper as well. I stopped insuring Maia because the cost did not seem to merit the benefit of insuring against a catastrophic injury or illness. The deductibles are very high, the limits of coverage for individual situations are lower than I believe they should be. After Skipper died in 2019, we recovered barely half of the cost of the treatments he received through his last battles with seizures. Cody's cracked mega-molar needed immediate attention and sadly came at the end of a coverage year, so that when he suffered a toe pad injury and then came down with a bronchial/respiratory illness we had to muscle through the deductible before getting coverage. And then boom, the limit was met before he's fully recovered from the illness. For nearly $700 a year, I'm beginning to think I've made a mistake. I think back to Skipper's two knee operations. In each instance, the limit of coverage made it so the cost was lessened by about 40%, but taking into account the premiums, it is lowered even more. Cody is 10, and a pretty healthy dog with strong legs (not like his brother's, thankfully), but I am seriously thinking about not continuing the coverage after this year. I'll of course keep it through the end of this year, since I've passed the deductible wicket and have "nothing" to lose.