Life insurance for dogs offered in Thailand

BANGKOK: -- Each day Veterinarian Sombat Pipatmetha and his team visit many dog owners. His duty is to check up on dogs’ health and implant microchip identification under their skin before issuing them a life insurance policy.

Dog life insurance covers all kinds of losses including death, except killing for insurance. When the dogs die, their owners have to bring them to the veterinarian for an autopsy and inform of the cause of death.

Sombat said if dogs had a ‘Pedigree’ certificate issued by the Kennel Club of Thailand, they could apply for a higher sum of insurance, valued up to 100,000 baht.

Without a ‘Pedigree’ certificate, the maximum sum of insurance was around 10,000 baht.

“We do not always encourage dog owners to apply for the high sum insurance. Sometimes the dogs are killed for insurance. So we usually observe how the owners take care of their dogs. We consider many factors, such as gender, age and breed, before suggesting the insurance sum to the customers.”, said Vet. Sombat.

Varuthai Kaewkampaeng , the owner of Chiwawa dog farm, said she decided to apply for the insurance for her Chiwawas when all of them turn 3 months old, to prevent financial risk when they died.

“I run into many problems with Chiwawas. It’s small and has low blood glucose level. So it easily gets ill. The insurance helps me a lot.”, said Varuthai.

Today, there are just 2,000 dog policyholders although dog insurance was introduced to Thai people in 1998. That’s because only dog farms were then allowed to apply for the insurance.

A private dog owner started becoming entitled to buy a dog insurance policy two years ago. Also covered were vet fees of up to 40% of the insurance sum and third-party liability in case the dogs bite other people.

And with a huge number of dog lovers across Thailand, the dog insurance business is still far from saturated.

--TNA 2008-03-27

Unusual post, no indication of cost or where to get insurance, I have 6 dogs, do I get multiple discount?