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Dog Medical InsuranceDo you need dog medical insurance or is there a more creative way for you to handle the dog health insurance issue? See what your options are...and decide for yourself! Do you have dog insurance now? If you are not willing to max out your credit cards when your dog needs medical treatment, then you should consider health insurance for dogs or a creative alternative! When you first acquire a new puppy , you don’t expect to have any medical emergencies. That’s only for old dogs —or is it? Well, that's a common misconception. More and more, dog owners are finding that their new puppies need medical help and having some form of dog medical insurance could certainly help! Even healthy pets can have sudden emergencies, and some breeds are prone to conditions requiring surgery. For example, we learned recently that friends living in the Midwest spent much of the winter helping their 1 year old miniature schnauzer recover from being hit by a car. No-one ever expects to have to face that kind of emergency, but tragedies do occur. Make sure now, that when an unforeseen event occurs, you will be prepared to deal with it! The most obvious way, of course, that you can hedge against possible unexpected expenses, is to purchase pet insurance. Consider this-- 37% of US households own a dog or cat and, of those households, 70% spend $1000 or more per year on their pet. Most of that is spent on routine care. How much more would be needed for an emergency? When you look at pet care in that light, it makes sense to consider spending a little up-front to avoid having to spend a lot later. Having dog health insurance would certainly help you through a crisis. But, if nothing ever happens, all those insurance payments might as well have been thrown into the toilet. You'll never see them again. If you have the discipline, another approach might be best for you. Self-insuring Your PetThere is another alternative. In the business world it’s known as self-insuring. A company can put aside a specified amount of money to insure its employees and thus avoid having to pay an insurance company for the service.In our personal world of finances this method can best be compared to the old Christmas Club or Vacation Club that we belonged to at the local bank. In the case of those clubs, we contributed faithfully every month or every payday, and the bank made the “last payment” for us—interest paid to us for loaning our money to the bank. A central Pennsylvania bank has taken this concept a step further and they have created what they call the Critter Club. Here’s how it works. You open an account and “name” it—you can call it your pet’s name. Depositors earn .85 percent for their annual contribution, and they receive discounts for veterinarians, groomers, boutiques and pet sitters. Your bank probably doesn’t have a Critter Club yet. But why don’t you consider saving money for your dog’s vet bills and any unforeseen expenses yourself? Putting a few dollars away each payday is relatively painless, and it could help you immensely someday when you really need it! Since consumers are saving very little these days, it makes sense to put a bit aside for medical emergencies for your dog or to invest in dog medical insurance for your dog.
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