Vets' Bill & Insurance Queries (Cat)
Discussion
Hi all
One of our cats was taken very unwell over the bank holiday weekend which resulted in an emergency vets visit, referral to a specialist hospital, and subsequent surgery for a "Subcutaneous Ureteral Bypass". On Sunday night she started vomiting and this continued into Monday when she became very lethargic. The emergency vet advised kidney issues/stones and the specialist confirmed this and offered the surgery.
We have insurance with a £7,500 limit which we naively thought would be plenty. We're now looking at around £12,500 in total fees and counting while the poor girl recuperates with them. We've now been told she's also suffering from mild anaemia and a heart murmur. She's only just five years old!
I'm posting looking for some general advice about vet bills and insurance as this is the first time we've had to claim.
(1) We've received an invoice from the initial emergency visit. Are there any obvious items which we can/should question on the bill? Ordinarily I wouldn't as it would be all covered by insurance, but as we're passing their limit I want to be sure we're not being taken advantage of here £13 for kitty litter is a little eye-opening when we can get a whole bag for that, but I'd appreciate the advice from those who have been here before... Copies of bills behind here
(2) I expect our insurance premium to now jump considerably if we wish for further care related to this condition to be covered. I'm aware that following a SUB our cat will need quarterly vets visits at a minimum for flushing/maintenance of the device. Would this usually be covered on a renewed policy? Or do the premiums generally go so high as to not be worth a pre-existing condition with known follow-up costs involved? My only insurance experience is car insurance so it's not quite comparable.
Any other general words of wisdom the great PH collective have are also welcome. Thank you!
One of our cats was taken very unwell over the bank holiday weekend which resulted in an emergency vets visit, referral to a specialist hospital, and subsequent surgery for a "Subcutaneous Ureteral Bypass". On Sunday night she started vomiting and this continued into Monday when she became very lethargic. The emergency vet advised kidney issues/stones and the specialist confirmed this and offered the surgery.
We have insurance with a £7,500 limit which we naively thought would be plenty. We're now looking at around £12,500 in total fees and counting while the poor girl recuperates with them. We've now been told she's also suffering from mild anaemia and a heart murmur. She's only just five years old!
I'm posting looking for some general advice about vet bills and insurance as this is the first time we've had to claim.
(1) We've received an invoice from the initial emergency visit. Are there any obvious items which we can/should question on the bill? Ordinarily I wouldn't as it would be all covered by insurance, but as we're passing their limit I want to be sure we're not being taken advantage of here £13 for kitty litter is a little eye-opening when we can get a whole bag for that, but I'd appreciate the advice from those who have been here before... Copies of bills behind here
(2) I expect our insurance premium to now jump considerably if we wish for further care related to this condition to be covered. I'm aware that following a SUB our cat will need quarterly vets visits at a minimum for flushing/maintenance of the device. Would this usually be covered on a renewed policy? Or do the premiums generally go so high as to not be worth a pre-existing condition with known follow-up costs involved? My only insurance experience is car insurance so it's not quite comparable.
Any other general words of wisdom the great PH collective have are also welcome. Thank you!
Have you got 'lifetime' cover, or is it one which only covers each condition for a year? If the latter, the issue of ongoing coverage is irrelevant unfortunately.
Pet insurance (in my experience) doesn't tend to jump because you've made a claim - although I've only had experience of two providers. Premiums tend to jump at certain age thresholds (3/4 and 8 or so). This is for dogs though, as that's all I've got experience of.
The problem is that - unlike with car insurance - you can't really switch providers easily once you've made a claim, as the new provider won't cover any existing conditions (and sometimes excludes anything similar).
Wishing you and your cat well; I hope that she soon recovers.
Pet insurance (in my experience) doesn't tend to jump because you've made a claim - although I've only had experience of two providers. Premiums tend to jump at certain age thresholds (3/4 and 8 or so). This is for dogs though, as that's all I've got experience of.
The problem is that - unlike with car insurance - you can't really switch providers easily once you've made a claim, as the new provider won't cover any existing conditions (and sometimes excludes anything similar).
Wishing you and your cat well; I hope that she soon recovers.
Hi,
That all looks completely reasonable to me. Katakor cat litter isn’t normal, it is small plastic balls that the cat thinks is cat litter but doesn’t absorb any urine so it can be taken for a sample. There is a decent mark up on it no doubt but it’s what most day practices would charge.
That all looks completely reasonable to me. Katakor cat litter isn’t normal, it is small plastic balls that the cat thinks is cat litter but doesn’t absorb any urine so it can be taken for a sample. There is a decent mark up on it no doubt but it’s what most day practices would charge.
Thanks for both your replies, they're much appreciated and help put our minds a little at ease.
Moorx, in reply to your points I'm happy to say that yes we do have lifetime cover and our policy documents specifically state that as long as we renew each year with our current provider we'll continue to be covered for long-term conditions.
It's good to know in your experience there isn't a huge jump, but my thoughts were that if we're paying £100/yr currently and it, say, doubles to £200, but we're claiming £2k/yr for on-going treatment... Surely they're going to bump the premium to avoid making a loss? I can't see how our premium would remain at a moderate level if the condition requires on-going medication etc?
Currently the poor girl is still in the hospital with kidney values which aren't quite enough to send her home, the soonest she'll be back with us is Thursday. She's not eaten since she went in so they're tube-feeding her, but we're hopeful that she's only on hunger strike because it's an unfamiliar environment and, due to the tube feeding, hasn't felt hungry enough to need to eat. We know when she's at home that if we have guests over she hides until they leave, even if they're overnight guests, and will go a day without eating to avoid being seen too much by them.
Moorx, in reply to your points I'm happy to say that yes we do have lifetime cover and our policy documents specifically state that as long as we renew each year with our current provider we'll continue to be covered for long-term conditions.
It's good to know in your experience there isn't a huge jump, but my thoughts were that if we're paying £100/yr currently and it, say, doubles to £200, but we're claiming £2k/yr for on-going treatment... Surely they're going to bump the premium to avoid making a loss? I can't see how our premium would remain at a moderate level if the condition requires on-going medication etc?
Currently the poor girl is still in the hospital with kidney values which aren't quite enough to send her home, the soonest she'll be back with us is Thursday. She's not eaten since she went in so they're tube-feeding her, but we're hopeful that she's only on hunger strike because it's an unfamiliar environment and, due to the tube feeding, hasn't felt hungry enough to need to eat. We know when she's at home that if we have guests over she hides until they leave, even if they're overnight guests, and will go a day without eating to avoid being seen too much by them.
We have a saying on the farm, “First loss is best loss”
£12.5k for a 5 year old cat 😮 were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
£12.5k for a 5 year old cat 😮 were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
We have a saying on the farm, “First loss is best loss”
£12.5k for a 5 year old cat 😮 were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
£12.5k for a 5 year old cat 😮 were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
Longwool said:
We have a saying on the farm, “First loss is best loss”
£12.5k for a 5 year old cat ?? were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
Yes, we were advised of the costs for the chosen course of action and chose them with the hope of saving her/prolonging her life.£12.5k for a 5 year old cat ?? were you warned that the costs could escalate to these levels before you undertook the course of treatment?
Or at least were you advised that treatment would be significantly in excess of your £7.5k insurance limit?
If you were told up front the cost was going to be £12.5k would you have proceeded or chosen the euthanasia option?
Sadly she didn't recover well after surgery and developed other complications which resulted in having to say goodbye to her just before the weekend.
If it helps others to know, these were the costs we've been billed for:
£1,682.34 - Emergency Vet, including ultrasound scan, bloodwork, fluid therapy, pain meds etc and an overnight stay.
£168 - Regular vet "standard day charge" which we are disputing. This was charged the following morning despite us collecting her before 10.30am to take her to a specialist hospital. If we've paid for 24 hours of care with the emergency vets which use their surgery, I don't expect to be billed for a further day's care when she was only with them for 3 hours max from time emergency vets leave. This was pretty much the soonest we were allowed to collect her as they had to get referral paperwork in place for the specialist and only completed this around 8:30am from memory. This charge was never discussed, either.
£8,692.05 - Specialist hospital stay for 9 days including surgery for "Unilateral Sub Cut Ureteral Bypass-SUB", all drugs, aftercare, further scans, chest drain etc plus euthanasia (£146.30) and cremation (£93).
Total = £10,542.39 of which we're hoping £7,500 will be covered by insurance.
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