Covid has a lot to answer for

Gosh that's a huge increase.
A lot of vets do similar plans. Ours has furry friends club. But our dog gets nexgard spectra and droncit and we stopped getting it from the vet and stopped the furry friends and get it on line at half the price. Our dog still gets her booster etc from the vets but I find places like vio vet and the like a lot cheaper than vets and if you but in bulk, cheaper again

I use Frontline Plus on my cat which I got through the post. Now I've changed my pet plan at Companion Care Vets I get advocate. They told me to only use the dewormer every 3 months.

I'm taking the view that every day is different, going back is a retrograde move and lots of bad habits etc were cleared away that outweigh any good stuff 'lost' I think we've all gained more choice now In Everyday things, I've found companies more willing to be flexible and practice much better customer service probably in an attempt to gain and retain client base? Win win!

Thanks kevincharley I have always thought along your lines. I only got boosters because they were in the package, my dog doesn't have to go into kennels (very helpful son) where they insist on boosters. I've always questioned vaccinations - we don't get our children done every year so why animals?

Harmonypuss

Since the age of 6, I have had at least one cat in my life and up until recently I was dismissive of taking insurance out because I'd always been lucky with my cats' health. Until recently when my good luck ran out.

I bought a beautiful Siamese kitten in March. He was entirely healthy until I took him for his castration. Since then, he has had salmonella, a terrible skin infection that took 3 months to clear up, the skin infection caused his eyelids to grow inwards, and he also had a staph infection. He had an operation on his eye and then got an infection on both sides on his bottom lip where his canines rub. He has been on antibiotics almost continuously since all this began, had anti-hypoallergenic food, numerous tests, corticosteroids, pain-killers, antibiotic gels, etc, etc. The grand total so far is £1,3770. The vet suggested that this time I get him insured because he just seems to get one thing after another, but he's had so many things go wrong, I doubt there's much left over to cover him for!

What I'm trying to say is you take your chances with insurance. Most times it works out but sometimes it doesn't.

Going back to the original post, I don't think it's worth taking out the vet's health plan for cats at least - they don't need all of the treatment included.

Harmonypuss

I don't think it's Covid or Brexit related, it's just vets being able to charge whatever they like.

I bought a lifetime vaccination plan when I bought my dog, it was about £100. This gives my dog his annual boosters every year for life at no extra cost to me. My dog is now almost 8 so I've definitely had my money's worth from this.

I do take him for kennel cough vaccinations each year. In 2018 it was £25.50, 2019 - £27.00, 2020 - £37.00! He's due again this month and they've quoted me £43.00, so I've shopped around and found another local vet charging £33.70, it's still ridiculously expensive but has to be done.

Some of these monthly plans are really pointless. Taking one plan previously mentioned at £16.99/month (£203.88 annually) for annual boosters, 2 general health checks and 10% off any medication. Clearly I don't pay for annual boosters but I imagine they're no more than £60, my vet does general health checks every 6 months for free, so to me, this means you're paying at least £140 per year to save 10% on any treatment, that means you're expecting to be receiving at least £1,400 worth of treatment every year (not including the consultation fees). You're only benefiting if treatment costs more than this. Even then, this is in addition to any insurance you're paying, which basically means that it's your insurance company that's benefitting, not you because the cost of your treatment (minus your discount) is reported to the insurer and they pay that, you don't get the 10% back.

Plans that include flea and worming treatments are also seriously overcharging, you can get these treatments online from any one of at least 8 common vet medication stores for a fraction of the price. I buy 3 months of flea and worn treatments for a medium-sized dog (15-25kg) for around £20 and it gets cheaper if I buy 6 or 12 months at one time.

People need to do their homework before signing up to these plans with their vets.

My monthly plan is far from pointless. Not only does it cover annual boosters and kennel cough vaccinations, for which my vet would charge upwards of £80, plus the free health checks and unlimited nail clipping, I get 10% off medication - even with the discount I pay approx £500 every three months for medication for a couple of conditions my elderly dog has, so the plan definitely saves me money. Yes I might be able to buy the medication online but prefer to have the vet’s approval and any necessary checks before each repeat prescription. I don’t have pet insurance and never have. One vet told me there are some insurers that are very difficult for vets to deal with and I wouldn’t want to find I had paid out for insurance only to find the vet unwilling to deal with the insurer if treatment was needed - also my pets have mainly been ageing rescues for whom insurance would be very expensive. Fortunately I can afford whatever treatment is needed but I realise many can’t, hence my support of the PDSA. My vet is possibly more expensive than many as it’s a proper veterinary hospital with scanning and in-house diagnostic facilities which I have been very glad of in the past.

I didn’t use flea/tick repellent on my dog and she ended up with a deer tick attached to her which could possibly have infected her with Lyme disease.

Josianne 'It does worry me all these chemicals we put on our pets.' - speak for yourself. There's no need for organophosphates or neurotoxins at all. Not near my family!

Regular stool sample tests (via vet) show no worms and my pets are flea free too. I use food grade diatomaceous earth for both - messy but very effective. Farmers use it on livestock.

The worst it can do to you (or pets) is irritate your eyes or lungs, temporarily, should you manage to send loads airborne and/or breathe it in.

Bossyrossy, same here, instead of pet insurance there's a family savings account to cover most emergencies. (I suspect my little dog and cat have more money than I do!)

Kevin charley
Absolutely agree with you about boosters that are not needed but it is condition in the small print of insurance policies that they require your pet to have the boosters. They have you over a barrel whichever way you turn!

What about lungworms prevention? Isn’t that important?

AND - I forgot! Test for worms instead of medicating your dog for something it may not have.

Forget these plans.
Forget vaccinating every year. This isn't needed.
If you don't believe me take a look at the PDSA website. Or medivet.co.uk or the RSPCA or just google 'how often does a dog need vaccinations?'.
This for core vaccines - distemper, hepatitis and parvovirus.
OR consider having a blood test done which tells you whether your dog carries antibodies.
One of my dogs is 8 and hasn't had a booster since she was 12 months old.
And why treat for fleas if your dog hasn't got fleas? It's like taking paracetamol in case you maight get a headache.

Apparently a few private groups have taken over loads of practices, hiked the prices and if you need referrals for specialist treatment they only recommend their expensive sister practices, there be a lot of money in corporate veterinary care!!

I fear to mention the B word but I suspect that Brexit may be more to blame than Covid for price rises, as the former increases the cost of importing goods and the consumers will inevitably be the ones who pay in the end.

Not that a big price rise like that can be wholly due to increased costs. Sounds like they are ripping you off.

Every time I go to the hairdresser, the price has gone up.

Some see covid as a good excuse to overcharge.

Our vet fees have increased because they had to take on more staff during Covid - the owners were not able to go in to the examination rooms so more nurses were needed

My vet has an old horse box that he uses on a Sunday morning for just vaccinations, nothing else, so it's saves time in the week for surgery. Prices hadn't really gone up too much for her annual jabs, but her medication for epilepsy nearly doubled and I put a flea treatment on her every 4 weeks myself and worm her too to save me money.

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Elless here. The leaflet was handed out at our vets.

@Bossyrossy

I to have had numerous cats, dogs, rabbits etc over the past 35yrs and only ever had the insurance for a few weeks that was provided by my breeders.

Over all those years I've only had 3 instances where one of my pets had needed treatment and all 3 (total) have cost me less than £2,000.

Imagine paying insurance off minimum £10/month for just one pet for 35 years (35x12x£10), it would have cost me £4,200 and that's an extremely generous estimation for maybe a rabbit, cats and dogs (depending on breed) are exponentially more expensive.

I guess I've been lucky but even so, if rather keep the money in my account than paying ridiculous sums to insurance companies.

I don't think it's Covid or Brexit related, it's just vets being able to charge whatever they like.

I bought a lifetime vaccination plan when I bought my dog, it was about £100. This gives my dog his annual boosters every year for life at no extra cost to me. My dog is now almost 8 so I've definitely had my money's worth from this.

I do take him for kennel cough vaccinations each year. In 2018 it was £25.50, 2019 - £27.00, 2020 - £37.00! He's due again this month and they've quoted me £43.00, so I've shopped around and found another local vet charging £33.70, it's still ridiculously expensive but has to be done.

Some of these monthly plans are really pointless. Taking one plan previously mentioned at £16.99/month (£203.88 annually) for annual boosters, 2 general health checks and 10% off any medication. Clearly I don't pay for annual boosters but I imagine they're no more than £60, my vet does general health checks every 6 months for free, so to me, this means you're paying at least £140 per year to save 10% on any treatment, that means you're expecting to be receiving at least £1,400 worth of treatment every year (not including the consultation fees). You're only benefiting if treatment costs more than this. Even then, this is in addition to any insurance you're paying, which basically means that it's your insurance company that's benefitting, not you because the cost of your treatment (minus your discount) is reported to the insurer and they pay that, you don't get the 10% back.

Plans that include flea and worming treatments are also seriously overcharging, you can get these treatments online from any one of at least 8 common vet medication stores for a fraction of the price. I buy 3 months of flea and worn treatments for a medium-sized dog (15-25kg) for around £20 and it gets cheaper if I buy 6 or 12 months at one time.

People need to do their homework before signing up to these plans with their vets.

We have had four dogs over 40 years and have never taken out pet insurance. Annual vaccinations and flea/worm treatment about four times (not monthly) a year doesn’t cost that much. They have the odd illness or infection but one off payments are doable. Perhaps we have been lucky, no serious illness or accidents but pet insurance seems to me to be a rip off. If the pet develops a chronic illness that needs constant medication you find that when renewal is due that illness isn’t covered or the price increases exorbitantly, likewise when the pet becomes a senior. Yes, our dogs have cost us in vets fees in their last couple of years as old age brings with it age related ailments but I think we are still quids in by not taking out insurance.

I have an old rescue cat who has an overactive thyroid. I am with the PDSA when I phoned them earlier this year about her annual vaccinations, I was told that they weren't doing them because of covid. Luckily my cat rarely goes out only to soak up the sun in my back garden.

Josianne where can I find that Healthy Pet Club?

Clevedon I have looked online but it always says you need a script for Advocate, where do you get it from?

geekesse It was a metaphor