November Unusual Pet Claim Recap

With an average of 80,000 pet insurance claims received every month, we get more unusual claims than we can cover in detail on the Hambone Nation blog. While not every claim can receive its own post, we thought our readers might enjoy, and benefit from, a monthly recap of some of the more interesting claims submitted by VPI policyholders.

One of the reasons we share these stories is to educate pet owners on some of the less obvious dangers their pets can encounter. But just because they are less obvious, doesn’t mean they are less likely to happen.

Wild animal encounters continued in November. We had two of our insured dogs have run-ins with deer, with one of them getting kicked. I guess a kick from a deer is slightly better than getting kicked by a mule. We also had two dogs that made the mistake of tangling with a porcupine and a husky that was attacked by a bird!

As usual, we had our share of oddities eaten in November. One dog ate multiple scouring pads, another ate caulking sealant, and one had a taste for money eating “ten quarters, one penny, one Canadian coin, and three Chuck E. Cheese’s tokens.” And like Becca, a previous Hambone Award® nominee, we had a dog that didn’t learn from experience and had to have a second surgery in the space of two months for eating rocks.

Other unusual claims we received included a Lab that needed to have pieces of a Spanish bayonet removed from his foot, a cat that followed in Sandy’s footsteps and got caught in a dryer, and a dog that managed to get a one-inch metal spring lodged in its teeth!

All of that in just November! So even though these stories don’t belong to Hambone Award® nominees, they will hopefully educate pet owners about the unexpected nature of pet accidents and prevent future trips to the animal hospital.