Deco calls for more transparency and consumer awareness in pet insurance

Consumer protection association Deco advises consumers to read pet insurance policies carefully to avoid surprises about coverage and calls on insurers to be more transparent.

“We still have few complaints,” the organization’s lawyer, Diogo Martins, told Luce, adding that many of them are due to “insurance companies saying they don’t cover a certain situation,” he said.

The lawyer stressed that from a consumer perspective, “it’s always important to understand what you’re contracting for” and to know that “there are multiple insurances” that don’t always cover the costs the customer expects to cover.

Diogo Martins also advised pet owners to “always consult with more than one insurance company” to find the one that best suits their needs.

For a lawyer, in most cases, policies are written in understandable language, but most people do not read the terms of contracts.

However, when problems arise, Diogo Martins said, “insurance companies are not transparent and they need to be transparent because if they claim something, they have to prove it,” adding that they often just say the cost is “not covered” without explaining why.

“It often happens that people have to go to complaint books and insurance companies or any other organisation have to react,” he stressed to some extent in these cases.

Deco’s lawyer calls for “better training of employees in this regard, because then people lose trust and change insurers.”

“Health insurance is important because, essentially, the only compulsory insurance is liability insurance, and even then it’s only for potentially dangerous dogs,” he said, but pointed out that there is no National Health Service for animals and that insurance, especially while the animal is still healthy, can help mitigate costs in the future.

“It is important to keep in mind that just because an animal is healthy or in good health does not mean that something cannot happen in the future,” he warned, adding that “it is much more difficult to get health insurance for an animal when it has already reached a certain age or when it already has certain problems.”