Hi guys. I read somewhere in a previous thread that ASPCA offers medical insurance for older horses. I went on the website and for my 17 year old gelding, all that was available was “Colic + Accidents”. The price was around $300. Now I’m thinking, “accidents” could be anything, really. So I’m looking into the details. It sounds too good to be true, honestly. Is anyone experienced with this type of policy?
Thanks!
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I just submitted a ~4k claim for a corneal ulcer. It takes about 3 weeks to be processed so I don’t know the outcome but I will update. According to my understanding they won’t cover illnesses or infections (unless infection resulted from an “accident”).
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I use them for my cat. So far haven’t had any issues other than them being a bit slow to payout.
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I have a younger horse insured with ASPCA for colic and accidents. Have had several claims over the years and they have paid quickly and with no issues. I do everything online and they contact my vet for any questions they might have.
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I have their insurance for my dog and it worked well. I know a couple of people that have it for their horses. Read the exclusions carefully! In their cases a lot was excluded - vet call charges, anything diagnostic, joint injections, etc. It helped with expenses but the owners who didn’t read carefully were not happy at all it didn’t cover.
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After seeing the posts on COTH, I signed my three Morgans up (21, 16, and 3), for around $75/month (for all three). Even with the 16-year-old having had surgery, his rates were the same. Hopefully, I never have to use it, but I sure feel better having it.
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I signed up a month or so ago for accident + colic + preventative care. It’s about $80/month with a low deductible for 2 horses, but also not a super high max payout (7 or 8k each). Thankfully I haven’t had to use the regular insurance yet, but I did use the preventative for my annual stuff and got $400 back in a couple weeks. I calculated how much I’d save in a year with the preventative, and it’s only like $150 if I use all of it, but that’s still something! Just wanted to add that the process for that was very easy - I just uploaded the pdf bill I got from my vet. I didn’t have to itemize or anything, they took care of that (I had other things done on the bill like X-rays to check a preexisting fracture).
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Oh wow - mine said that I had to wait a year to sign up for preventative. Maybe it varies by state?
I am in Virginia, if that helps!
I did have an issue where I signed up my horses and somehow didn’t include the preventative for one when I signed up, but did for the other. I was on my phone and had changed the options multiple times to get quotes and made a mistake when I finally filled it out. At that point, it told me I could sign up horse #2 for preventative in one year from sign up. I called them and they took horse #2 off, then re-added with the preventative. Since it was within a week of my sign up, I didn’t really care that the “effective” date for the rest of the insurance was delayed a bit. They were very helpful on the phone for this, which is reassuring.
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My horses all have this policy. They just paid $10k toward colic surgery, no questions asked. I pay $18/month/horse.
They’ve also covered stitches, a suspensory injury and all that comes with it, medical colics, a weird ear injury that required a stay at the vet school, cellulitis from a cut, etc. No trouble.
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They denied a claim for cellulitis for me saying it was routine care which was frustrating. I’ve still kept it mainly for surgical backup
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They covered over 3k of a 4k bill for a corneal ulcer. My coverage was 90%, $500 deductible. Insanely pleased, will definitely be insuring all the dang animals now!
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My horse had cellulitus and I asked vet if it was considered an illness or an injury. She said illness so I did not submit a claim for that.
I have an older horse on Smartpak Colicare for about $50/month for the supplement required, It covers up to 15K so you don’t have to make difficult choices when you’re old man colics - I had it on another horse that needed colic surgery and they paid immediately
