Pet insurance is one of those expenses which seems like a burden…until you need it – then it can be a life-saver.
Many vet visits can be reasonably cheap. Getting pet de-sexed, microchipped, or vacinnated isn’t going to cost more than a few hundred dollars – so it’s arguable whether pet insurance is worth it in NZ for these minor day-to-day costs of owning a pet.
BUT, imagine you are in a situation where your family dog runs onto the road and is hit by a car. You take a dog to the vet who, after a $500 consultation, recommends $5,000 to $10,000 be spent carrying out the necessary surgery and ongoing treatment.
You’re now faced with a decision – pay for the euthanasia for your pet, or open your wallet and start spending your holiday fund. 😨
If you had pet insurance, this could all be covered by your insurance company. The premiums that you’ve been paying, which could be as low as $40 per month, would mean you can pass on much of this cost to the insurer when you make a claim. In this situation, having pet insurance is without a doubt worth it.
There are however situations where pet insurance might not have been worth it, in hindsight. You might pay your monthly premiums each year for 10 years and never need to make a large insurance claim. In this case, you’ve paid premiums and got nothing in return.
The question is, are you willing to take the risk that your pet will live an accident-free, healthy life? 🤔
It’s sort of similar to car insurance in that no one really enjoys paying for it, but if you’ve ever written off a $15,000 car and had your insurance company buy you a new one, you’d thank your lucky stars that you had insurance. Or similarly, if you’ve had comprehensive car insurance for your $5,000 Mazda Demio and crashed into a $75,000 Audi S5 – you’d really wished you had car insurance to get you out of paying that hefty repair bill!