
Dog insurer: 'jumping, running, slipping, tripping, playing' not covered (2016) - pseudolus
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/pet-insurer-says-dog-not-covered-if-injured-jumping-running-slipping-tripping-or-playing-1.3781371
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Waterluvian
Pet insurers, at least in Canada, are just an industry of highway robbery.
They deny everything and make you fight up hill for anything. You're usually
better off paying a premium into a TFSA or other savings apparatus and be your
own insurer.

~~~
dylan604
How is this different from human health providers? They deny everything, and
force you to fight them as well. Maybe Canadian health insurance is different,
but in the US, it is exactly as you describe pet insurance.

~~~
reaperducer
_They deny everything, and force you to fight them as well. Maybe Canadian
health insurance is different, but in the US, it is exactly as you describe
pet insurance._

Worthless political echo chamber hyperbole and demonstrably false.

Just off the top of my head: Virtually every American with health insurance
can get flu shots for free, paid for by their insurance carrier. Ditto for
women who want birth control pills (though that is usually a legislative
mandate).

A friend works for a small insurance company, and she says it paid over a
billion dollars in claims last year for fewer than 50k members.

~~~
OnlineGladiator
I have personally seen women struggle to get birth control with health
insurance. I have also had to sue medical practitioners in the past for
fraudulent billing. I have also seen people be unable to buy life-saving drugs
because of an insurance hiccup.

The American health insurance industry is completely fucked if you think it
has anything to do with providing healthcare and isn't entirely about
maximizing profits for the inner circle. People are literally dying because we
have the least efficient health insurance system in the world. And it's
designed that way because some people are getting ridiculously wealthy from
other people's pain and suffering.

~~~
reaperducer
_I have personally seen women struggle to get birth control with health
insurance._

Then check with your state's attorney general. In many states, insurance
companies are required to provide it at no cost. Certainly in the last three
states in which I've lived.

If it's not required in your state, then contact your legislators and try to
get a law passed.

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CWuestefeld
Our vet advised us against buying insurance. He said that in his experience,
the policies tend to exclude a given dog breed's common maladies. So, for
example, if your German Shepard ever got hip displasia, it wouldn't be
covered.

We had Buster, the GSD, for 13 years and over the course of that time his vet
treatments cost a fair amount in addition to normal stuff

* Root canal (he broke a fang chewing a rock)

* 2x surgery for ACLs in both hind legs

* surgery to remove carcinoma on his jaw

* prednisone shots for arthritis

That probably comes to something around $10K over those 13 years. But really,
it's not that different from what we'd have been paying in premiums anyway.

~~~
mikemac
I have a standard poodle and the breed is particularly susceptible to GDV
(Gastric Dilatation-Volvulus).

My dog got it suddenly at around 1.5 years old and our insurance paid out for
the full emergency surgery (about 5k) with no issues; as with any providers
the details are what matter.

------
reaperducer
I looked into health insurance for my cat a few months ago. The quoted premium
was more than what I and my employer pay to cover my entire family of humans.
And this was for a single four-year-old spayed cat with no history of health
problems.

~~~
MichaelApproved
I'm trying to make sense of this but then I realized, maybe you're not
American and your health insurance premium is somewhat reasonable.

Care to share more? What was the premium for the cat? Are you American?

~~~
voxic11
Yeah except they get their insurance through their employer, so probably
American.

~~~
shortercode
Some companies in the UK offer health insurance for private healthcare. The
main advantage of private being you can get appointments much faster. I'm not
really sure what the relative pricing is for private healthcare in the UK vs
the states, so it might be the insurance costs reflect that.

------
Pigo
Would you like to pay $20 for a protection plan on your new foot massager?

What makes me the most upset about these little games of chance companies want
us to play, is how it takes advantage of certain demographics, like the
elderly.

~~~
froindt
For $3 I could get protection on my ~$20 Sonicare toothbrush heads from
Walmart. It's a premium, consumable item.

That offer really caught me off guard.

~~~
Pigo
Yeah, it used to be just for televisions or other big purchases. But they're
making so much money off of these things, it's creeping into smaller and
smaller purchases. Unfortunately there are a lot of people who don't
understand upselling, they're just excited about their new toothbrush.

~~~
froindt
It really feels predatory when they do it on consumables. I hope I'm never
offered it again on a consumable.

I was shocked by the 15% premium! I could self insure and break even if 1/6
products were defective.

Televisions will be around for years. The 3 toothbrush heads should last under
a year. How are they going to break? I'm sure the manufacturer would give me a
coupon for a free head if something _was_ wrong, and it'd take about the same
amount of time as finding the receipt, driving to, and doing a return at
Walmart.

~~~
buckminster
You don't need to do any calculations to figure out if insurance on low value
items is a bad deal for you. The insurance company has already done the sums.
It is a bad deal for you.

You should never insure anything you can afford to replace yourself.

~~~
froindt
Oh I know that. I've been reducing my insurance as my financial position has
improved. I think almost nobody on this forum would buy insurance on low value
items, as the math and straightforward probabilities explain themselves.

But there are many people who don't understand the math or theory of
insurance. And those people often have less overall education and earning
potential. And those people are getting swindled hard.

~~~
lotsofpulp
> But there are many people who don't understand the math or theory of
> insurance. And those people often have less overall education and earning
> potential. And those people are getting swindled hard.

I find that most people have such an emotional loss aversion, that there is no
point to explaining the math or the simple concept of only insuring losses
that you can’t afford.

You can even try to show them that if the grocery store offered insurance for
a cucumber, would they buy it? And they will say no, and if you ask why, it’s
because they can buy another cucumber for not much money.

But then they will turn around and buy insurance for a TV that costs a few
hundred dollars, even though they can very well afford a new TV.

So I stopped seeing it as people getting swindled. What I see as having
negative utility, they percent as positive utility due to the emotional
comfort it provides.

------
awinter-py
revel moped rentals have an insurance plan that's dependent on compliance with
their entire rental agreement, including maintaining a safe driving record.
seems like a catch 22.

4.01 'Revel provides third party auto liability coverage ... if the Member
complies ... with all terms and conditions of this Agreement'

2.06 'maintain a safe driving record during the entire Term'

[https://gorevel.com/rental-agreement/](https://gorevel.com/rental-agreement/)

consumers have been generally willing to sign long contracts without reading
them but small businesses with legal resources are going to start getting
burned by their vendors and insisting on shorter, simpler, fairer contracts (I
hope). These contracts are pure slime.

------
GuB-42
Catch-22

The insurance policy doesn't cover running, jumping, playing... Things that
any healthy dog do. But they also don't cover "preexisting conditions".

So... if your dog doesn't play, he is unhealthy and therefore he isn't
covered.

------
hirundo
Moral: Read the fine print. Especially on insurance plans. _Expect_ loopholes,
and if you don't find them, read it again, more carefully. Yes, it can be a
lot of work. You might end up not buying just because you can't understand it.
But if you go in expecting the insurer to pay out on the basis of what you
think is "reasonable", you're not going to do due diligence. Expect each claim
to be adversarial, so you can be pleasantly surprised by the exceptions.

~~~
imgabe
The moral is don't buy insurance for anything where the loss wouldn't ruin you
financially unless legally required.

------
mrfusion
Check out self paid dental insurance. I spent hours going over the plans and
basically couldn’t find any scenario where I’d come out ahead.

~~~
twoodfin
It’s very difficult to sell “insurance” for something 100% of people will
need.

At the end of the day, it’s just a marketing plan for the covered dentists.

~~~
lotsofpulp
In the US, it's just a way for employers to offer tax free income to
employees.

And nowadays, it's morphed into a crazy scheme where large Dental Service
Organizations (DSO) offer super cheap cleanings to the insurance, and then
treat their dentists and hygienists like sales staff who try to push bullshit
like fluoride treatments and sealants with 1,000% markups that you have to pay
for out of pocket.

It's crazy what the situation is, I stopped going to certain dental practices
and had to find an independent one I could trust. I'd almost rather forego the
employer provided insurance cleanings and pay cash just to makes sure the
incentives are aligned and the dentists and hygienists aren't trying to scam
me.

------
ab_testing
The sad reality is that similar shenanigans are employed by health insurance
companies in the US. Every year millions of claims are denied for frivolous
reasons by health insurance companies and often times, the denier is a person
with no or very little medical knowledge compared to their doctor. Just that
there are human lives instead of pet lives on the line.

~~~
lotsofpulp
> the denier is a person with no or very little medical knowledge compared to
> their doctor.

This is not true. There are teams of MDs and PharmDs that evaluate what
treatment options are effective and are backed up with data, and they create
the criteria with which to determine what is appropriate or not based on the
persons medical history and chart notes. Also, employers and governments often
provide insurance (or better named managed care organizations - MCO) companies
with the criteria of what they want to pay for, so many times it’s not even up
to the MCOs themselves.

