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Vet Bill

September 17th, 2014 at 03:56 am

I drove on the school field trip yesterday. Oh my gosh did I get lucky - I had three girls in my car and they were all super polite, funny, fun to drive with.

The field trip was to the animal shelter (not the one in our town, but one about half an hour away) because that’s the fourth grade service project for the year: they volunteer helping the animals in the shelter on weekends, make dog biscuits to sell and then the money goes to the shelter.

Anyway, the woman who showed us around asked the kids about what responsibilities you take on when you have pets. They thought of everything except the one that was in my head: taking your pets to the vet. Someone (I think an adult) finally said it!

Anyway, it was in my mind because our dog has been itchy, and she's scratched and gnawed at herself for about a week now. Nothing has helped. So I took her to the vet today... She has allergies! I went home $120 poorer and with three medications for her (two for allergies and one for the bacterial infection she got from irritating her skin so much).

This is what the "pets" budget is for. For some reason I rarely see that in people's budgets. Do you have a budget for pet food, vet visits, regular medications like heartworm? (We also go to a local pet store once every two months or so and pay $16 to use their large metal tub to give her a bath - way less expensive than a groomer and we use their shampoo, towels, tub - our dog is kind of big! - so that's in the budget, too). If you have a pet budget, how much do you allocate per pet?

Posted in Frugal Living, Volunteering and Charity | 7 Comments »

7 Responses to “Vet Bill”

  1. creditcardfree Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 12:25 pm 1410956744
    1410956744

    We have two cats and no true pet budget. I buy cat food and litter on a regular basis. The vet bills just get cash flowed when they happen.

  2. Ima saver Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 01:11 pm 1410959491
    1410959491

    Yes, we have a health catagory and I allot $100 a week for that. That covers us and my two dogs, Molly and Abbey. They are part of my family. I just spend $140 on a vet bill this week, plus they each get groomed every month.

  3. doingitallwrong Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 02:09 pm 1410962959
    1410962959

    I have pet food and incidentals in my monthly budget (toys, treats if we don't make them, birthday trips to McDonald's Wink ). We do a lot of natural rearing and feeding and treating, so my dogs rarely go to the vet unless is a pre-planned visit, and those are either cash flowed or we set aside funds ahead of time (depending on the purpose of the visit; wellness visits are cash flowed, semen collection is $$$ so we set funds aside!). This does mean that unplanned visits are often emergencies and thus very expensive, so I do plan to work on a separate "critter EF" when I'm able; in the mean time, I have a CareCredit card that the emergency vet accepts, which offers 6-24 months at 0% interest if paid in full at the end. (They also have longer-term financing, 24-60 months, but at 14.99% I'd use another credit card with a lower rate first. They do set up a fixed payment so that you pay it off completely in that time, rather than a regular credit card where it could take you 20 years of pay off the balance if you just paid the minimums.) I have 'wash and wear' critters so do all the grooming myself; we did get a professional grooming tub installed when we had to replace our laundry tub, which was quite expensive (we used S's bonus to pay for it) but so worth it in terms of saving both water and our backs compared to bathing them in the bath tub!

  4. ceejay74 Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 02:34 pm 1410964440
    1410964440

    Pet food and supplies are paid for under the blanket grocery/household budget category. When I had a medical EF, that's what I'd use for vet bills I couldn't cashflow. (and when I build up the medical EF again I'll do that again.)

    Cat sitting, like babysitting, is paid for with our spending money or vacation/travel money, depending on why we need someone to come. It doesn't come up except when we travel, usually.

    Basically the cat's expenses go under the matching human budget categories. That's why I don't have a separate item for him. Smile

  5. klarose Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 02:46 pm 1410965216
    1410965216

    My "livestock" animals have a separate budget from the normal household budget, since they bring in income.

    The "pets", the cats and the dogs; Their food is just counted in our household/grocery budget category. I cash flow vet and unexpected expenses, unless it is big, then I would pull from the other animal budget.

  6. CB in the City Says:
    September 17th, 2014 at 02:53 pm 1410965593
    1410965593

    I track my spending on pet supplies/vet bills, and my average is $35 per month. I've been pretty lucky in the last few years, with no big bills for the vet. I have two cats and an aquarium.

  7. FrugalTexan75 Says:
    September 18th, 2014 at 04:05 am 1411013150
    1411013150

    Yep, I have $30/month that I budget for my cat -food, vet, etc.

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