What to Know About Pet Travel Insurance

What Is Pet Travel Insurance?

Pet travel insurance can help protect you financially if problems arise with your pet during a trip. Individuals can't buy stand-alone pet travel insurance, but some insurance companies offer it as an upgrade when you buy travel insurance.

While coverage can vary, pet travel insurance typically helps pay for emergency veterinary care if your pet is traveling with you. It may also reimburse you for additional pet boarding expenses if you're traveling without your pet and a covered delay or cancellation requires boarding your pet longer than you had planned.

Pet travel insurance works like most kinds of insurance: You pay a premium, file a claim if a covered incident occurs and receive reimbursement up to your policy limits if your claim is approved.

Learn more: What Is an Insurance Claim?

Pet Travel Insurance vs. Pet Health Insurance

Pet health insurance is ongoing coverage that helps pay for veterinary care for your pet. Although some plans may cover veterinary care while you're traveling with your pet, pet insurance doesn't cover travel-related issues, like a trip delay that requires extended pet boarding.

Pet travel insurance is a short-term, one-time policy designed to cover pet-related problems that occur while you're traveling, such as your pet getting sick on a trip or a flight delay that requires extended pet boarding. You can typically add pet travel insurance to a standard travel insurance policy for an extra charge.

Learn more: What Does Pet Insurance Cover?

What Does Pet Travel Insurance Cover?

Pet travel insurance generally covers two types of issues: veterinary care while traveling, and pet problems that disrupt your trip. Here's a closer look at what pet travel insurance may cover.

• Emergency veterinary expenses: If your pet becomes ill or is injured while traveling with you, pet travel insurance typically pays for emergency veterinary care. Preexisting conditions usually aren't covered, and a licensed vet may need to attest that treatment couldn't wait.
• Pet return: Some policies pay to transport your pet or service animal home if you become seriously ill or are injured on your trip and can't travel.
• Pet boarding: Policies may cover extra pet boarding fees if a covered travel delay requires kenneling your pet longer than planned.
• Trip cancellation and interruption: Pet travel insurance policies usually add pet-related issues such as the illness, injury or death of your or your traveling companion's pet as a covered reason to cancel your trip or cut it short.

Before adding pet travel insurance to a travel insurance policy, check to see what the policy already covers. Some travel insurance policies cover extra pet boarding fees, pet return or trip cancellation and interruption due to pets. However, travel insurance won't pay for veterinary care.

Learn more: Does Pet Insurance Cover Emergencies?

Do You Need Pet Travel Insurance?

Consider the following before buying pet travel insurance.

• Do you have pet health insurance? If so, it may cover veterinary care while traveling with your pet; review your policy for details. Coverage can vary depending on your destination—for example, your pet insurance might cover veterinary care in the U.S., but not outside the country.
• Are you taking your pet on a road trip? If your auto insurance includes collision coverage, it may help pay for veterinary care if your pet is injured in a collision, or reimburse you if the collision kills your pet. Check the details of your car insurance policy for coverage and limitations.
• Will you be traveling with a service animal? Some travel insurance policies treat service animals as family members or traveling companions whose illness or injury are considered covered reasons to cancel a trip.

Tip: Cancel for any reason (CFAR) travel insurance lets you cancel your trip for almost any reason, giving you more flexibility than standard travel insurance. It's also more expensive, though, and you'll typically recoup only 50% to 75% of your travel costs.

How Much Does Pet Travel Insurance Cost?

The cost of adding pet travel insurance to your travel insurance policy can vary widely depending on the type and amount of coverage you buy. Plans that offer trip cancellation and interruption coverage for pet-related reasons may cost more than plans that just cover veterinary care and kenneling, for example. Travel insurance, which you'll need to get pet travel insurance, generally costs between 4% and 8% of the insured cost of your trip.

Learn more: Average Cost of Travel Insurance

How to Get Pet Travel Insurance

Follow these steps to get pet travel insurance.

1. Determine what kind of coverage you need. Consider any coverage you already have, such as pet health insurance, flight insurance or credit cards offering travel protections, and assess what's missing.
2. Research plan options. You may need to look for plans that cover travel veterinary expenses, pet-related trip protection or both.You can usually find coverage details on the insurer's website; if not, ask the insurer.
3. Compare coverage and prices. Carefully evaluate policy exclusions to ensure the plan covers what you need it to. Also compare coverage limitations, which can vary quite a bit from one insurer to another. Weigh the premium costs against the potential payout if you need to file a claim.
4. Pay your premium to start your coverage. Keep in mind that to get the most comprehensive protection, you typically need to buy travel insurance within 14 to 21 days of making your first nonrefundable travel payment.

Tip: Is your pet traveling without you? Companies that transport pets typically carry pet taxi or pet transport insurance so they can offer coverage to customers. Check to see what coverage your pet transportation service includes.

Learn more: Should You Buy Travel Insurance?

The Bottom Line

Some of the best travel credit cards reimburse you for travel expenses paid with the card if your trip is delayed or interrupted for reasons outside your control. While pet-related problems may not qualify for reimbursement, using a credit card with travel protections is one way to defray unexpected expenses if you need to cut your trip short due to your pet.

Many travel rewards credit cards require a FICO^® Score^Θ above 670. You can check your FICO^® Score for free with Experian to see where you stand.