Protecting Your Pet

Protecting Your Pet

It''s a fact: pets are expensive. A cat costs roughly ?10,000 over its lifetime, and a dog comes in at ?13,000. This includes food, immunisations and vet''s bills. If this isn''t scary enough, there is more bad news for pet owners. VAT has just gone up so food is costs are going to rise, but increasingly even faster are the costs incurred at the vet''s.

Over the past 12 months, vet''s fees have risen by up to a staggering 15%. If these costs continue to rise, and there is no obvious reason why they shouldn''t, in the next few years, the cost of owning a pet will be significantly more than ?10,000 to ?13,000.

If someone asked you how much your pet sets you back each year, could you give them an accurate answer? Most of us don''t really know, or even think about, how much our pets cost us. So when we sit down and crunch the numbers we get a little scared.

So, one way to lower the costs of our pets and take some of the pressure off of our bank balances is through insurance. We all insure our cars, our houses and our own lives, so why not our pets too?

Insurance doesn''t have to be expensive. You can obtain cat insurance for about ?5 per month and dog insurance for ?10. Insurance can then pay for expensive operations as well as overnight stays at the vet''s.

But of course, we don''t want to pay too much for the insurance policy in the first place. So how can we reduce the cost of pet insurance without significantly reducing the level of cover? Here are a few tips to help you along your way.

Firstly, shop around. There is huge variation in terms of what is covered and for how much. To get started, make use of online comparison websites, however, make sure you compare the comparison sites, because they all use a different selection of insurers.

Once you have found a few good deals, check out the insurers'' sites directly because most will offer significant online discounts, as much as 20% in fact.

Once you have found a good deal, you can make sure you get the best price available by keeping your pet fit and healthy. If your pet has all its immunisations, it has a healthy weight and gets plenty of exercise you are likely to pay a lot less than a dog that lacks these qualities.