Thread: Insuring your Maine Coon?

Ours have always been indoor cats and have always been insured. Despite being indoor cats, we have had:

1. Three with Cat Flu that they picked up in the last ever cattery that we used - their vaccinations were all up to date, but of course, that doesn't necessarily mean they won't get it. The bill for that little lot was around the £500-mark. They now stay home if we go away and we use a pet-sitting service.

2. Widget's diagnosis and subsequent treatment for HCM - that was a total of, I think, £750-800.

3. Spike's "mystery eye" complaint, where his left eye bulged alarmingly to the size of a ping-pong ball. Never did get to the bottom of that one, but that was a bill around £250.00

4. Gabby's kidney cancer - diagnosis, ultrasound, blood-work and palliative treatment (only for a week after diagnosis as she went down so quickly, we had no choice but to be kind and let her go) £600.00

5. Alice's illness, which is being diagnosed as FIP - so far, the bill is at £550.00, with blood tests, x-rays, abdominal fluid slides etc and of course, consultations.

Now, this all sounds really alarming, I know, but we have had six Maine Coons over fourteen years. HCM was starting to be recognised when Widget was diagnosed and now breeding lines are tested. Gabby was almost 14 when she was diagnosed with cancer - so, an older cat - heartbreaking but not unusual. Spike's weird eye lasted a couple of weeks and the Cat Flu incident was a real one-off. Mostly, our lot have only seen the vet for their annual check-up & boosters.

We have ours insured on the Insured for Life policy - there are multi-pet discounts available - so there is no cut-off age point (except for death by illness, of course). The excesses increase as the cat gets older, obviously.

My husband and I run a small company and there have been times over the years that we have had to take cuts in our income to ensure the company's survival. A significant vets bill at the "wrong" time could have been difficult to meet, so for us, there is no question - we continue to insure our indoor Coonies.