Financial
Lemonade Pet Insurance Review: Policy Options & What’s Covered
Pets have always been an important part of many American families. Yet, I don’t think I’d ever really considered the idea of purchasing insurance for a dog or cat until I learned that Lemonade was adding such an option. Cut to a mere month ago when my wife and I added a dog (we named her Rigby) to our family and now I’ve had a chance to take a closer look at what Lemonade’s pet insurance is all about. In fact, after going through the process of getting a quote, we ended up purchasing a policy for ourselves.
So how does Lemonade’s pet insurance work and what has my experience been like so far? Let’s get into what you need to know about their policies along with my initial thoughts.
Lemonade Pet Insurance Review
Lemonade Pet Insurance: An Affordable and Customizable Coverage Option
4.5
Eligible pets
Cats and Dogs
Discounts available
10% bundle discount, 5% multi-pet discount, 5% annual plan discount
Waiting periods
2 days for accidents, 14 days for illnesses, 6 months for cruciate ligament events
Lemonade makes it easy to obtain a pet insurance quote and explore coverage options. Plus, those with other Lemonade policies (including renters insurance, life insurance, and more) can save 10% by bundling. Other discounts include a 5% multi-pet discount and a 5% discount when you pay for a year of your policy upfront.
As for downsides, even with top-tier coverage, Lemonade policies only cover up to 90% of expenses (not including deductibles). Additionally, while waiting periods are largely reasonable, the wait period for cruciate ligament events is six months.
Pros
- Adjustable coverage plans
- Discounts for multiple pets or bundling with other Lemonade policies
- Reasonable wait times
Cons
- Maximum plan option still only pays 90%
- Wait times do still apply
- Adding all available options can make policies pricey
What is Lemonade Pet Insurance and How Does it Work?
What is Lemonade Pet Insurance and How Does it Work?
What is Lemonade?
Lemonade is an insurer that’s aimed to make the process of buying coverage easier. Initially, the company started this endeavor by offering renters insurance but has since expanded into other coverage options — including pet insurance. Currently (as of September 2022) Lemonade pet insurance is available in: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin
The basics of Lemonade pet insurance
Before we get into the specifics about what Lemonade pet insurance covers and what coverage options they offer, let me address some basics. First, with your policy, you’ll be able to take your pet to any licensed vet in the United States. Next, it’s important to know that preexisting conditions are not covered by any of Lemonade’s policy options. Lastly, should you wish to cancel your policy, you are able to do so at any time.
Of course, there’s a lot more to Lemonade’s coverage than those three things, so let’s dive deeper.
Requesting a quote
To get started with a quote, you’ll need to complete a questionnaire. I see this part of the process as being broken into two segments, starting with the basics:
- The type of pet (dog or cat)
- Age
- Boy or girl
- Breed (if generic “mixed breed” is selected, you’ll also choose a size)
- Length of time you’ve had your pet
After this, you’ll need to answer a few questions about your pet’s health and history. These include disclosing any:
- Head issues
- Tummy issues
- Leg issues
- Parasites
- Chronic issues
Once you’ve submitted this information, you’ll be able to see your base coverage quote while also going through the additional coverage options.
Base Plan coverage
As you’ll be informed when finishing up your quote, the base plan covers three main things: diagnostics, procedures, and medications. Examples of diagnostics include blood tests, urinalysis, x-rays, MRIs, labwork, CT scans, and ultrasounds. As for procedures, this may include outpatient procedures, specialty and emergency care, hospitalization, and/or surgery. And medications are, well, medications.
In addition to these core coverages, Lemonade offers a number of other options.
Extended Accident & Illness coverage
The first of the additional coverage options you’ll find falls under the “Extended Accident & Illness” banner. One option you’ll have here is to add vet visit fee coverage. With this, Lemonade will pay for visits you make to the vet for pet accidents and illnesses. This includes vet exams, vet check-ups, physical consultants, office visits, or emergency room visits. However, this option still does not cover visits related to pre-existing conditions nor those made for preventative care.
Another option in the section is physical therapy coverage. Should your pet need physical therapy due to illness or injury, this coverage will apply. Examples here include acupuncture, chiropractic care, cryotherapy, electro-acupuncture, gait training, heat therapy, hydrotherapy, joint mobilization, laser therapy, and therapeutic exercises. But, once again, preventative physical therapy or treatment for pre-existing conditions are not covered.
Preventative packages
On top of the base plan and aforementioned add-ons, Lemonade also offers preventive packages. These include plans for adult dogs/cats as well as plans tailored to puppies/kittens.
As an example of what some of these packages cover, the “Incredible for Dogs/Cats” plan includes:
- The Base Plan
- 1 wellness exam
- 1 fecal or internal parasite test
- 3 vaccines
- 1 heartworm of FeLV/FIV test
- 1 blood test
- Routine dental cleaning
- Flea/tick or heartworm medication
Note that each of these items have an annual cap amount. Furthermore, that amount will depend on the percentage option you choose (more on that in a moment). However, the items covered in your preventative package do not have a deductible.
Customizing your policy
Once you’ve selected all of your other coverage options, it’s time to customize your policy and adjust your terms. First, you can select what percentage of the bill you’d want Lemonade to pay. Your choices here are 70%, 80%, or 90%. As you can imagine, the higher the percentage, the more you’ll pay on your premium.
Next, it’s time to choose a deductible — which is the cumulative amount deducted from your claims, over the course of a year. Here, your options are $100, $250, or $500. In this case, the smaller the deductible you choose, the more it adds to your premium price.
Lastly, you’ll also select the yearly maximum amount that Lemonade will pay. The options here are $5,000; $10,000; $20,000; $50,000; or $100,000. Your premium may go higher if you choose a larger maximum here.
For what it’s worth, from what I can tell, the base quote defaults to the middle options. So 80% pay, $250 deductible, and $20,000 yearly max.
Waiting periods
Now that you’re getting ready to purchase your policies, it’s time to talk about waiting periods. In short, your Lemonade pet coverage won’t kick in immediately, with different coverages becoming available in different stages. For injuries, the waiting period is 2 days — meaning that, should your pet be injured more than two days after you purchased your policy, you’re covered. Meanwhile, the waiting period for illnesses is 14 days and the waiting period for cruciate ligaments is 6 months.
Discounts
Now that we’ve gone through what types of coverage options Lemonade offers, let’s talk about how you can save money. One fairly easy way to save on your policy is to pay for a year of coverage upfront instead of paying monthly. If you do this, you’ll save 5%.
Meanwhile, if you have more than one pet, you can score a multi-pet discount when you cover them. Similarly, those who bundle Lemonade pet insurance with other Lemonade policies can also save.
My Experience Purchasing Lemonade Pet Insurance
My Experience Purchasing Lemonade Pet Insurance
Obtaining my quote
Since I already had a Lemonade account, it was quite easy to move forward with getting a policy quote. I hope I didn’t make the application process sound daunting at all because it really took about five minutes. In fact, the bulk of the time I spent on purchasing my policy was looking over all of the options and making a decision.
Funny enough, when I first started looking at options, we didn’t actually have a pet just yet. Thus, I had to just make stuff up to get a ballpark idea of how much coverage costs. Of course, once we did get Rigby, I was able to go back and edit my answers appropriately.
What I Purchased
After looking at all of my options, we eventually landed on a fairly simple policy. Specifically, we went with the base coverage but added Vet Visit Fee coverage. We also adjusted the policy coverage to 90% while also upping the deductible to $500 — yet, left the Annual Limit at $20,000.
As for the payment plan, we opted for the annual payment, which entitled us to a discount. So, in total, we paid $228 for the year.
After Purchasing My Policy
With my policy selected, I went ahead and purchased it. When I did, I was then asked to upload our dog’s vet records. In the event that I didn’t have them, Lemonade’s interface told me I could also provide them with the name and phone number of her vet and they’d obtain them that way.
Luckily, seeing ahead, I already had a vet appointment scheduled for Rigby and so I was able to send over the report afterward. In this case, all I needed to do was upload a PDF and that was it.
Claims
One of the downsides of trying to review an insurance policy is that I can’t really get into the process of filing a claim without actually doing so. I suppose it’s actually a good thing that this hasn’t come up yet — but, nonetheless, I can’t yet share this part of the experience. However, rest assured that, when the day should come that I do file a claim, I’ll be sure to update this post with the details.
Final Thoughts on Lemonade Pet Insurance
Final Thoughts on Lemonade Pet Insurance
Having previously explored Lemonde and even purchased a term life insurance policy from them, it was an easy place to start when looking to cover my dog, Rigby. While the coverage I purchased wasn’t the absolute cheapest option I could get, I was more comfortable with the level of coverage I got with Lemonade than some of the competitors I checked out. Additionally, I appreciated how easy Lemonade makes it to explore different coverage options and instantly see how these customizations impact your premium.
So, while I can’t yet speak to how this pet insurance policy will work in practice, I can say I’ve been pleased with coverage in principle and was impressed with the process of purchasing said policy. Therefore, I’d recommend that pet owners seeking coverage for their dog or cat at least check out Lemonade and see what they have to offer.
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