# what deductible/co-pay would you choose for insurance? (Petplan)



## taem (Oct 29, 2011)

I think I've decided to go with PetPlan, for the hereditary/congenital condition coverage. Also covers vet exam fees, medicines, etc. This is for a 9 week old mini poodle, both parents have full set of tests with good results. I'm posting this question on both dog forums I post in, hoping for as much feedback as possible.

Anyway now I have to choose a deductible and co-pay. Obviously this is a personal situation issue, but I was hoping folks might offer some thoughts and experiences. It's been such a long time since I've had a dog I just have no clue what the pets and vets landscape looks like. The vet I've picked charges $55 exam fee, and vacc shots are $21, that's about all I know at this point.

PetPlan offers three tiers, Bronze ($8,000/year total), Silver ($12,000/year) and Gold ($20,000/year). I'm opting for Gold, because I'm just that paranoid.

At $200 deductible:
--80% coverage, the monthly premium is $29.84
--90% coverage is $33.26
--100% cov is $37.36

At $100 deductible:
--80% cov is $41.88
--90% cov is $46.80
--100% cov is $52.70

At $50 deductible:
--80% cov is $53.91
--90% cov is $60.33
--100% cov is $68.04


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## xellil (Apr 4, 2011)

I've been looking at pet insurance for awhile but not bought any. And of course I just had a $2000 vet bill - I should have gotten some.

What I'm planning on getting is where they pay for catastrophes but not regular exams, vaccines, heartworm etc. Just surgery and maybe ER visits. 

The reason being is that filling out paperwork and getting them to pay is just a hassle I'm not interested in doing every time I take a dog in for an exam.


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## MollyWoppy (Mar 19, 2010)

Personally, depending on your families finances, I'd go with any one of the deductibles that suits you, but the 100% coverage.
I know people health insurance isn't anything like a dog's, but there is many a day I've absolutely blessed having 100% coverage with my husbands insurance. Without a doubt, we'd be in the poorhouse now if we'd had to pay 20% of his medical bills.
I'm guessing if your dog got cancer or something, the 20% could get up there in pretty short order. That's just my personal preference.


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## Javadoo (May 23, 2011)

We have the Bronze plan with the $200 deductible and 80/20 coverage.


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## taem (Oct 29, 2011)

Yeah it's the catastrophic stuff I'm mostly concerned about as well. I'm probably overthinking this lol. I don't even know what my own health plan terms are come to think of it.

Do you guys think $20,000/year is plenty though? Is there any reasonable possibility of going over that? I know of only one case where someone incurred anything close to $20,000 in a year, usually even the catastrophic stuff involves like $6,000-$8,000 in bills. I was also considering Trupanion, which has no limit, so is probably better for catastrophes, but is more finicky about covering hereditary/congenital. One of the things that concerns me about Trupanion is that it's self-insured, while PetPlan is with Allianz, which is German I believe since Bayern plays in Allianz Arena, and you always bet on the Germans. It was Gary Lineker who said "football is a game where 22 men run hard for 90 minutes and in the end, the Germans win."


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