Owning a Pet on a Limited Budget
It is a sad fact of life in our society that medical care is a costly commodity and, unfortunately, veterinary care for our pets is not an exception to that rule. We may have an ‘Affordable Health Care Act’ (if indeed you happen to feel that Obamacare has actually made health care ‘affordable’ for anyone) for us, but don’t hold your breath waiting for government assisted health care for your pet. Therefore, for those who must live life with limited financial resources, planning in advance is the key. A rainy day fund is a must if you are ever faced with a serious and immediate veterinary emergency.
If you don’t have a regular veterinarian, find one. Take your pet in and get a routine annual checkup and vaccinations. If finances are limited you might inquire about vaccinating your pet once every three years instead of annually. You should lose little in the way of disease protection by vaccinating every third year, yet will save some money. Monthly heartworm and parasite prevention medication can be a lifesaver over the long run. Don’t cheap out cutting corners that will end up costing more down the road. Visiting the same full-service veterinary hospital for all of your veterinary care needs will make you one of their “regular” clients and might help if at some point you need emergency treatment. They may be more willing to help finance an emergency veterinary visit if you are not walking in off the street as a total stranger.
Have a functioning credit card and keep your payments current. After-hours veterinary emergency hospitals do not offer credit. This is a simple fact of life. Unfortunately a veterinary emergency is only an emergency for the pet owner until the pet goes home. If the bill isn’t paid before the pet goes home, it’s not likely that it ever will be, and emergency clinics live by that rule. An after hours emergency clinic is not a free clinic, and emergency veterinarians are in the business of providing veterinary care for your pet, not financial services. So, no credit! That means that when you have an emergency with your pet, you actually have TWO emergencies, both equally important. One is to get your pet to the emergency clinic ASAP where the experts can deal with the problem; but just as important is the other factor: coming up with the money to pay for it. Before leaving for the ER, get some money. Call friends, call neighbors, call family, or go to the local cash advance facility. Don’t waste valuable time standing in the lobby of the E-clinic arguing about how the money is more important to them than your pet’s welfare. The onus is one you. Find a friend with a credit card to go with you and make an agreement with him/her to pay whatever it costs. If you can’t provide a substantial payment, it’s very possible your pet will not get anything more than just bare minimum treatment. If you expect to get more than minimal treatment you will need more than minimal funds. It’s that simple.
Here are some steps that you can take to put yourself in a more favorable position should your pet need emergency pet care:
Save money and put away a rainy day fund of $1000 or more. That may sound like a lot of money, but most emergency situations tend to be costly; this amount should at least allow you to get started with some significant diagnostics and care while you scramble around to get more. If you have multiple pets, remember, these potential expenses and problems are multiplied by the number of pets.
Next time you’re thinking about a new video game, a trip to the beach or the amusement park, a new tattoo or another piercing, or some other expense, ask yourself how much more practical would it be to have that money put away for a pet emergency?
Set up a Care Credit account. You can do this yourself online. Go to www.carecredit.com and fill out an application. If you have a job and have any kind of reasonable credit rating, you may qualify for anywhere from a few hundred dollars to a couple thousand or more. Care creditis accepted at most veterinary hospitals and emergency centers and also is accepted by some human physicians and many human dentists. Don’t waste your line of credit on routine things. If you do, it won’t be there when you eventually need it. If you have crappy credit, they won’t touch you and you’re back to plan B – building your own pet emergency fund.
If you are thinking about pet insurance or one of those veterinary health care plans offered by the big corporate veterinary groups, consider the following. Most veterinary health insurance plans have limits and only make a token payment toward whatever the problem might be. You’ll be left owing the bulk of any significant expense. Not only that, but in all likelihood you will be required to pay the entire veterinary bill in advance before you are eventually reimbursed by the insurance plan for whatever paltry amount they elect to pay. If your coverage is through a veterinary hospital plan, generally those plans only provide a minimal discount on anything other than routine preventive care. And the plan is only good at their clinic during their office hours. You should realize up front that with corporate owned hospitals most significant health care expenses are generally overpriced enough to allow for the “discounts” you get, and, like most insurance programs, over the long haul you end up throwing away a lot of money. Don’t get sucked in. Don’t get screwed. Take the equivalent amount of money and put it away each month or each week into your pet care fund and you will likely come out way ahead.
If you are spending premium dollars on pet food, STOP! In all likelihood, any extra money that you are spending on a special overpriced pet food is a waste if it is taken away from your pet’s emergency welfare fund. If finances are tight, step down to something cheaper and put away the money you save into your pet health care fund. The nutritional difference between feeding something like Ol’ Roy and a “premium” food like Science Diet or Iams is negligible. For the most part, the pet food industry is a huge scam. Before you spend your hard-earned cash on overpriced pet food, try to be certain that you’re actually getting something that is really better than the cheaper brands. You may do well to feed the cheapest stuff you can get until you have your rainy day fund saved up. Then do your pet food research. You can visit dogfoodscoop.com or dogfoodanalysis.com. for information. They have done the research to help you tell the good from the bad. Most commercial pet food is pretty much garbage anyway – so why pay more than you need to? If your pet doesn’t do as well on a cheaper food (yes, some pets do actually do better on a more expensive food), then go back to the more expensive stuff. You can at least cut your cost in half sometimes by mixing a bag of the really cheap stuff with a bag of the more expensive stuff and save money that way. Then once you have saved up your emergency fund, go to a better food. You are what you eat – and so is your pet.
Likewise, don’t waste your money and risk your pet’s health by feeding nasty processed pet food treats. Boxed and packaged junk like Pup-Peroni, Begginstrips, and other pet snacks belong in the trash, not in your pet, and are likely to lead to health problems, not the least of which is obesity. Just because pet treats are labeled with “natural,” “organic,” “homemade,” “premium,” or some other marketing ploy, it doesn’t mean they are good for your pet. Avoid these kinds of treats and, above all, do not allow these sorts of treats to become a part of your pet’s routine.
Last, but certainly not least, avoid anythingChinese. There are simply too many unresolved issues with Chinese imports.
Get yourself ready! Don’t put yourself in that unfortunate situation of finding yourself facing an emergency and having to choose euthanasia for your pet because you have left yourself financially unprepared.