Insurance

Deciding on whether or not to insurance your horse and how to go about it needs a good bit of homework, as there's no one-size-fits-all answer. 

As a starting point here are the different types of horse insurance: 

• Horse insurance - to help cover things such as unexpected vet's bills for accidents, new injuries and illnesses. Some policies will also include 'loss of use' if your horse is no longer able to do the activities you have insured it for. The policy may also pay an amount if your horse dies or goes missing. It is usually for horses aged 30 days to 20 years, though some will extend the age to 25 if the horse is already insured before they turn 20. 
• Veteran insurance - usually for horses aged 20 or above. The vet's bill limit tends to be lower, often around £2,000 to £3,000 and there are more limits on the types of things the insurance covers. 
• Catastrophe insurance - a more limited type of insurance that covers external injuries and some major surgery such as colic. It's often not available for horses over 20. 
• Competition insurance - sometimes called Sport insurance is for those horses who compete, and so tend to be more expensive, eg over £50,000,  and doing different types of activities. 
• Lifetime - this is a described as 'lifelong' as there is no upper age limit, and can be transferred to a new owner with the horse.

There are also different types of rider insurance:  

• Public liability insurance - for if your horse hurts someone or damages property. 
• Personal accident insurance - help provide cover if you or some other riders are injured.
• Legal expenses - to help cover legal costs 

You'll often find you can add rider insurance on to your horse insurance policy. 

1. If you're considering insurance, get as many quotes as possible to understand which options are available to you and how much they might cost.  

2. Read independent reviews, such as on Trustpilot, to get a sense of how other customers have found their experience with the company. 

The next step is to thoroughly read the small print to understand exactly what you're covered for and what might not be included. 

Now you've got an idea of the costs and an understanding of what will be covered, weigh up whether insurance is right for you or not. 

It's worth thinking through carefully aspects such as the level of cover, for example, would major colic surgery be right for your horse based on their age etc? Which pre-existing conditions would not be covered?

You could speak to your vet to get an idea of how much treatment could cost without insurance, for example, how much are X-Rays and painkillers, are there circumstances where they wouldn't recommend major surgery etc? Many veterinary practices hold open evenings that could be good to attend for these kind of questions. 

If you decide not to insure, it's worth considering how you would pay for treatment your horse may need. See our Professionals page and Horse Budget for more on this. 

If you decide to buy horse insurance there are a few tips to help try and bring down the cost: 

1. Check if it's cheaper to pay annually. 
2. Check if you can get cashback on a policy. Sites including Topcashback offer cashback if you click through them to get a policy, eg, at the time of writing cashback ranged between £20 to £100 for policies. It's important to think of this a bonus and following the cashback website's steps. 
3. Don't just auto-renew a policy. Check if any levels of cover has changed and compare it to other quotes to check it's still a good deal. There's also no harm in ringing your current provider and trying to haggle down the quote - providing alternative quotes may help with this. 

If you have a problem with your insurer here are some steps to try: 

1. Try to sort it directly with the company, via the complaints process if needed
2. If you're unable to sort it directly, you can escalate your complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service. You can do this once you've received a 'final response' from the company or 8 weeks after your initial complaint.