Can anyone help me with some general advice please?
We (us and the dog)will be spending up to 6 months a year at our house in Limousin. We have UK dog insurance though I dont believe this will cover us for anything of that length. When not in France we'll be in the UK so will keep the current policy going.
Does anyone have any experience or views here please?
Many thanks
Adrian
Have just been quoted Euros 70 (ish) per month to include cover for illness for the two collies.
While all insurance policies will have differing terms and conditions, Third Party Liability Insurance covers loss of damage to third party property and injury to third party persons. As a result if your animal bites, for example, a "third party", or attacks a cyclist then your insurance would come into play for any claim made against you as owner of the animal. A third party is someone to whom you are not related in general terms
Hi Theo, thanks for this.
Our main residence is UK and have a current policy there which we'll keep going for the UK side of cover for the dog.
Ours is a labradoodle at 54kg (all muscle!) he may look the part of a guard dog but in reality I think not.
Wow, now that's value for money!
Thanks David, yes health insurance was what I was thinking of here.
Can you tell me what is covered for your 30 euro per month please. I have insurance too I pay 52 euros a quarter for each BC.
We have been quoted €30 per month, in total, with the first two months free(?) to cover two border collies (females) from April Assurance. We tried the Allianz but the office in Eymet said that the Allianz France did not do that class of insurance.
We have them insured in Germany. Adrian, is your main residence UK or FR? This was for the insurance where we insured 2 dogs the deceive point because they (Allianz) have dependencies in France. The dogs are covered for various preemptive treatments, respectively vaccination against rabies (every 2 years in France!), leiomyomatosis, etc & have a EU wide valid pass which also includes Switzerland. The insurer also knows that the average vet in France is skilled and competent, so they would accept to reimburse invoices in case of an incident (!) involving a car, - or biting another dog, or being bitten by another dog. (I have had provocations by people from the village who let their "hunting"-dogs from the lead, deliberately provoking, biting ours a couple of times till both our Rottweilers pinched back not really using their strong bitting force but running them over). I mention this because you need a insurance, you are legally obliged to have the dog insured if they are category 1 or 2 (as it is the case e.g; with Rotties). The Mairie accepted the contract e have in Germany. So do the Swiss authorities when we are there with both dogs. Then keep in mind: Having a certified guard dog can reduce the fee of your insurance against burglary, - now we do not pay more insurance fees as we did without dogs. The costs for the house insurance was reduced to fee to insure them. Another thing: If you have more then one dog, and it has a chip, each of them must be insured because the code goes into all databases... Thats were they are really very good in France.
Ditto!
Yes! I was assuming (which I shouldn't have done) that you (Adrian) were talking about health cover.
We ahve 4 dogs, insurance on one, lovely vet who puts all visits on the one policy, ssshhhh!
Tim that is a good point. If travelling with our pets we then need the rabies jab every year in line with the country we live in, not the UK because that was where it came from. OK, perhaps going back and forth between the UK and France is fine, but even within the Schengen area random controls are made and woe is anybody trying to cross a border without a valid jab. Also the insurance policy cover can be affected by not having it, look at the small print.
When we went to the vet last year, we had gone a week beyond the year anniversary and were told by the vet that if we wished to travel with him, we would need to wait three weeks.
Regarding the second point, I thought that is why the dog is chipped and has a carte d'identité.
He will not need an annual jab. I live here and have my collies jabbed in the UK every 3 years. It is not obligatory to jab at all in France but adviseable in case of outbreak. I checked with DEFRA about their requirements going back to UK, they informed that it is only the dated renewal they look at. Incidentally if there an outbreak of rabies in France and your dog is loose it would be PTS (kind way of saying!) as considered a risk of spreading.
We were confused by insurance for dogs in France. Basically for them breaking stuff in your home or biting someone for instance your household insurance covers them so long as you tell the household insurer you have a dog and they cover it. For vets bills that is separate and seems a mine field. We have a medium sized Fauvre-de-Bretagne cross from the local SPA. We inquired about vet/health insurance and she would cost a fortune to insure, far more than in UK. She is only 18months old and healthy and only visit to vets in 6 months was for passport to be sorted out for a trip to UK. They also seem to do health insurance that only covers accidents or that only covers illness or combined so do not be caught out. Some of the ones in the supermarkets only cover illness not broken limbs for instance. Good luck.
There are a number of specialist companies in France that offer pet insurance you can pick up leaflets from your vet. The prices for treatment here in France is much cheaper than the UK mainly because we don’t have pet insurance which has inflated the UK prices. I had a cesarean operation on a cat a few months ago and we lost the cat most of the cost was the cats cremation rather than the vet fee and a couple of hundred euros it would have been over a £1000 in UK.
I would suggest that you take a general policy from your insurance company we use AXA. They cost about €50 and it insures you against people suing you. It’s a very litigious country and if the dog ran out in front of a car etc. you would have some peace of mind.
It is somewhere between what David and Lavinia are saying. There is some cover for such things as damage and household related accidents in the household policy. There is also the age at which you can take out a policy thing. A foreign insurance policy does not count, which was our mistake with our older dog. Do not let anybody convince you otherwise. The insurance is annual, that is to say it must be renewed every year instead of the way the other insurances are notified then continue unless you cancel. Our younger one is insured, the older not. So, ideally, if you have a new puppy or a very young dog go for it, but if it is a five year or older dog forget it. There way be some companies doing it but there will undoubtedly be so many let out clauses that if you ever read through them you would wonder why you bothered. We used our vet for advice, he was very helpful, may be the way to go further with it for you.