While the concept of pet insurance is appealing, the manner in which it has been and still is conducted in Australia since 2008 has been much, much less than ideal.
Pet insurance is a financial contract between pet owner and pet insurer. As veterinarians, we are not an obligated party to this contract. We will never sign any paperwork associated with a pet insurance company and nor are we obliged to.
Under existing legislation, there is no requirement for us to provide our records, notes or indeed anything to pet insurers. Similarly, as a pet owner, you have no legal entitlement to these records. This information is private, confidential and the property of the veterinarians that made them and the hospital that holds them. This is enshrined in law.
Sadly, the pet insurance industry has been intimidating owners and veterinarians to the contrary. They have declined requests to clearly and concisely state in their product disclosure statements (PDS) that no veterinarian is required to provide any information to them nor can this be used against you in a claim.
As such, we will never supply our records or notes to any pet insurer under any circumstance. Our experience has been that in almost all cases they do not need this information to process your claim but are simply data mining to find some remote information that may be used to exclude this and future claims.
However, as a courtesy to all clients, we will verify the information requested by a pet insurance company and if appropriate, provide sufficient information in a brief summary so that the pet insurer can process your claim.
We will not provide information if ;
a claim does not pertain to treatment provided by Applecross Veterinary Hospital,
there is a request for information regarding pre-existing conditions,
the requested information has been provided to us by other veterinarians,
the request is impolitely written in bold capitals demanding FULL CLINICAL RECORDS or similar
the request is irrelevant.
If you have concerns regarding the obligations of the veterinarian then please contact the Veterinary Practice Board. If you have concerns with the conduct of the pet insurance industry then we suggest you contact the insurance industry ombudsman or a consumer advocacy group such as Choice Australia.
Updated Thursday, 3rd April 2025.