Why did my pet insurance go up? Split the increase into age, trend and plan, then find the filing

One renewal, taken apart

The chart below walks an illustrative policy from last year's price to this year's. Every input is stated so you can swap in your own: a dog whose rating factor steps from 1.00 to 1.12 at its birthday, an 11.5 percent filed rate change (the same size as NAPHIA's 2025 industry average, used here as a stand-in), and a $3.00 monthly multi-pet discount that ends because the household's second policy was cancelled.

Read the result two ways. In dollars, the filed rate change is the biggest single piece, but it is also the one the owner can do the least about, because it is filed for a whole product rather than for one pet. The age step is smaller, but it repeats: it will come back at the next birthday that crosses a rating band, and the band boundaries are set in the same rating rules. The discount piece is the most avoidable, and the one owners most often mistake for a price rise, because nothing about the dog or the market changed. For the yearly view, multiply by 12; the generic percentage calculators on CalculatorVillage will run the same arithmetic on your own numbers.

What the renewal paperwork has to tell you, line by line

The useful document is not the email that announces the new price. It is the renewal declarations page, the one-page summary of what you are buying for the coming year, and the forms are explicit that it controls. Spot's Arizona sample says coverage and rates "are subject to change at renewal", that the renewal declarations page "will specify the coverage and rates that apply", and then: "You accept these changes by renewing your policy." Paying the next premium is the acceptance. That is why the comparison has to happen before the renewal date, not after the first higher charge appears on a card statement.

Notice periods are written into the forms too. The AKC sample says the insurer may change "the premium, Coinsurance amounts, annual Deductibles and Policy terms" at renewal, with written notice at least 30 days before the renewal date. The MetLife sample (form PET21-01-V) promises written notice "not less than 30 days" before the policy ends if premium rates will increase. Figo's sample says all changes will be notified "within the renewal notice." If your increase arrived with less warning than your own form promises, that is worth raising with the insurer and, if needed, the state insurance department named on your policy paperwork.

Put last year's declarations page next to this year's and compare them line by line. The table shows what a change on each line usually means and which of the three components it belongs to.

Sample forms checked October 24, 2026: Spot Arizona PET-P-20000-1024, AKC North Carolina IAIC PPI AI POL 007 NC 0421, Figo multi-state dog sample, MetLife PET21-01-V. Your own declarations page controls.

Two lines deserve a second look even when they did not move. The underwriting company printed on the page (Spot, AKC and Figo samples all name Independence American Insurance Company) is the legal name you will need for the filing search later in this guide. And if the deductible line dropped by $50 since last year, the policy may carry a claim-free deductible reduction; MetLife's and Figo's samples both cut the deductible by $50 for each claim-free year and restore it after a paid claim, which matters for the last FAQ below.

The age step was in the contract from the first day

Age is the component owners most often read as unfair, because it feels like a penalty for keeping the policy. On the forms read for this guide, age is a named rating factor: the AKC North Carolina sample lists "Pet age" first among its renewal increase reasons, and Figo's dog sample names age among the factors that set the premium. Embrace's coverage FAQ puts it in one line, "Premium may increase due to the age of your pet at renewal", and lists age, breed, location and coverage selections as factors that influence rates. That is not universal: Trupanion's deductibles page advertises rates that "won't go up just because your pet ages", so check which kind of policy yours is. The Washington insurance commissioner's consumer page tells buyers to ask what premiums will be based on the age and breed of the pet.

The NAIC Pet Insurance Model Act turns that question into a disclosure. Section 4A(4) requires an insurer to disclose whether it "reduces coverage or increases premiums" based on claim history, the pet's age, or a change of location. The Model Act is a template that applies only where a state has adopted it, and Washington's 2023 pet insurance law (SB 5319, in effect January 1, 2024) is one example of a state writing the same disclosure into statute. Where the rule applies, the honest answer to "will my premium go up as my dog ages?" was supposed to be in front of you before you bought.

What the disclosure does not give you is the size of each step. Age factors live in the insurer's rating rules, and those rules can rise steeply in the senior years. That is why the pet insurance age limits guide collects what each company says about age, and why the senior dog guide deals separately with whether to keep, adjust or leave a policy once the steps get large. This guide stays with the narrower question of what the step is and where its size was set.

Age can change the conditions of renewal, not only the price

One sample shows age reaching beyond the premium. Figo's dog sample says that when renewing a policy for a dog aged eight or older, or a cat aged ten or older, the owner must follow the veterinary provider's advice on senior wellness testing. That is a policy condition, not a rate, and it is easy to miss because it sits in the general conditions rather than on the renewal notice. Read your own form for any clause that switches on at a set age.

The trend: everyone's vet bills, priced into your renewal

The second component has nothing to do with your pet. When an insurer files a rate change, it is responding to what claims across its book of business have cost and are expected to cost. Healthy Paws describes the inputs openly in its FAQ: rates reflect "the cost of treatment advances in veterinary medicine", breed, gender, age and other factors, and "the overall claims experience for the program within the region where the pet resides." The same FAQ says its premiums follow the rates and rating rules filed with, and where applicable approved by, each state's insurance regulator.

The industry averages show how fast that pressure built. NAPHIA's 2026 State of the Industry report gives the average annual US premium for accident-and-illness dog policies for each year from 2021 to 2025.

Two cautions keep this chart honest. First, an average premium is not a rate change. It moves when insurers file new rates, but it also moves when the mix of insured pets shifts: more older dogs, more large breeds, richer plans. NAPHIA's same page shows the average for dog policies with embedded wellness at $1,414 in 2025, so plan design alone can add about 70 percent ($1,414 against $836). Second, cats followed a different path, nearly flat from 2022 to 2024 and then up 12.6 percent in 2025, which is a reminder that each insurer's filing for each species and state can move on its own schedule.

Why the claims side keeps rising is a separate story, with the price indexes and the bill items behind it, and it is told in the companion guide on why vet bills are so expensive now. For a renewal, the practical point is narrower. If your increase is close to the industry's recent 11 percent a year and your pet did not cross an age band, the trend component is most of what you are looking at, and no change of plan setting will make it disappear.

Plan, discount and address changes that look like a price rise

The third component is the grab bag, and it is where owners find the most surprises, because it can change without any filing at all. Discounts are the clearest case. Figo's sample says premium discounts offered to policyholders who meet certain underwriting criteria may be "altered, changed, modified, revised, discontinued, or terminated" at the company's discretion, on 30 days' written notice. A multi-pet discount that disappears because one pet died or one policy lapsed is a real increase on the surviving policy, even though the rate for that pet never moved. The multi-pet households guide covers how separate each pet's policy is; the discount is often the one thing that ties them together.

Billing frequency is another. The Spot and Figo samples both charge a non-refundable installment fee for monthly payment and waive it for annual payment. If a card update or a missed payment moved the account from annual to monthly billing, the total for the year rises even though the premium per month looks familiar.

Moving house matters more than most owners expect. The Spot, Figo and MetLife samples each say a change of address may change rates, and MetLife's sample allows premiums to change during the policy period for changes in address or the pet's details, not only at renewal. Pricing reflects local vet costs and claims, so a move across a metro area can land in a different rating territory. Embrace lists location among its rating factors for the same reason.

Finally, some renewals change the plan on purpose. A benefit the insurer adds automatically is not always a charge: MetLife's sample raises a policy limit of $5,000 or more by $500 at renewal "at no additional cost" when at least $1,000 of the limit went unused. But a tier you upgraded mid-conversation with a sales agent, or an add-on bundled at renewal, belongs in this column too. If the declarations page shows a richer plan than you meant to buy, that is the easiest part of the increase to reverse, provided you understand the timing rules in the next sections before you do.

Finding the rate filing behind your increase

Pet insurance rates are regulated state by state. Insurers file their rates and rating rules with state insurance departments; Healthy Paws, for one, says its premiums follow rates filed with, and where applicable approved by, each state's regulator. Many departments publish those filings through SERFF Filing Access, a free public search portal run by the NAIC. The portal is not a single national database you can browse by brand. Each state has its own entry point, each state decides which filings and which attachments are public, and the coverage window varies: Kentucky's instructions, for example, say filings made before November 1, 2018 are not in the portal and must be requested from the department directly. The procedure below follows the instructions state departments publish for the portal.

1. Find the underwriter's legal name. It is printed on the declarations page or the policy form footer, and it is often not the brand you bought from. Section 4A(5) of the NAIC Model Act requires a disclosure when the underwriting company differs from the brand name; the Spot, AKC and Figo sample forms are all underwritten by the same company, Independence American Insurance Company.
2. Open your state insurance department's page on rate and form filings and follow its link into SERFF Filing Access, so you land in your own state's portal. There is no fee.
3. Choose to begin a search, then read and accept the user agreement. Georgia's instructions describe exactly this sequence before the search page appears.
4. Select the Business Type. Georgia's page notes this field is required. If a search returns nothing for your underwriter, it can be worth trying a broader search before concluding that no filing exists.
5. Narrow the search. Enter the underwriter's legal company name and, if you can identify it in the list, the type of insurance that covers pet policies. Georgia's guidance is that the more specific the search criteria, the greater the chance of a match.
6. Open the filings dated in the months before your renewal. Each result row opens a filing; look for ones that concern rates or rating rules rather than forms only.
7. Read the outcome before the request. Georgia's instructions point to the Disposition page for the final outcome, using the most recent if there are several, and warn that the figures on the Rate Information page, which shows what the company originally asked for, often differ from the Disposition. To keep the whole filing, select all attachments and download them as a zip file.

What you find varies. A public filing may show the overall rate change requested and approved, the reasons the insurer gave, and the rating rules that set factors such as age. Some attachments are marked confidential and will not appear, and Kentucky's page warns that rates shown may not necessarily be final, so confirm the status before relying on a number. If the portal does not cover your state or your filing is not visible, the department that regulates your policy can usually supply public filings on request, and its contact details should be in your policy paperwork: Section 4K of the Model Act asks insurers to print the state department's address, phone number and website on a disclosure delivered with the policy.

The filing will not tell you whether the increase is fair to you personally. It tells you something more useful: whether your increase matches what the insurer told the regulator it needed across the whole book. If the filing shows a 10 percent change and your premium rose 30 percent, the other 20 points are age, plan or discount, and the declarations-page comparison above will show which.

Settings you can change at renewal, and the ones that cost later

Renewal is the window when most forms let you rework the policy, and the three dials are the familiar ones: deductible, reimbursement percentage and annual limit. A higher deductible or a lower reimbursement percentage lowers the premium and raises what you pay on each claim. The deductible, reimbursement and limit guide works through how those three trade against each other on a real bill, and the plan comparison worksheet lets you price two settings side by side.

What the renewal notice will not mention is that the dials are not symmetrical. Turning coverage down is usually easy and immediate. Turning it back up later can be restricted, delayed or partial, and the forms say so.

Each insurer's own sample form or FAQ. Your declarations page and your state's version of the form control.

Read together, those rules point to one habit. Before cutting coverage to absorb an increase, ask how a later increase would be treated for conditions your pet already has. On the MetLife wording, a dog whose limit is lowered this year and raised again next year carries any condition that started in between at the lower level. On the Spot wording, a change the insurer treats as a new enrollment turns today's diagnoses into tomorrow's exclusions. Raising the deductible is usually the cleanest cut, because it changes your share of each bill without narrowing what is covered, but your form decides that, not this guide.

Why leaving for a cheaper insurer resets the clock

The renewal protections in the Model Act attach to the policy, not to the pet. Section 3F says a condition for which coverage is afforded on a policy cannot be considered pre-existing on any renewal of that policy. Section 3J says waiting periods may not be applied to renewals of existing coverage, and Section 5C bars an insurer from requiring a veterinary exam for the policy to be renewed. The AKC and Figo samples write the same idea into their own terms, waiving waiting periods for renewals of continuous coverage.

None of that follows the pet to a new company. A new insurer is writing a new policy, so its waiting periods start again and anything already in the vet record can be read as pre-existing. For a young dog with an empty chart, a cheaper quote elsewhere may be a straightforward saving. For a dog with an allergy file, a knee history or a heart murmur on record, the cheaper policy may exclude the very conditions that make insurance worth having. The guide to switching pet insurance sets out what restarts and the order of steps that avoids a gap, and the full set of clause guides sits in the coverage decoder.

What to ask the insurer in writing when the rise outruns the trend

If your increase is well above the recent industry pace and you have already ruled out a move, a lapsed discount and a plan change on the declarations page, the next step is a short written request to the insurer. Writing matters because phone answers are not part of the contract, and because a written reply is something you can take to the state insurance department if the explanation does not hold up.

Start with the split. Ask the insurer to break the increase into the part from your pet's age, the part from a rate change filed in your state, and any part from discounts, fees or plan settings, in dollars. Ask for the effective date of the most recent rate filing that applied to your renewal and, if the company will give it, the filing's tracking number, which turns the portal search into a one-line lookup.

Then ask about the future, because the age component will come back. Ask at what ages your pet's rating factor changes again, and whether the company's Model Act disclosure, or your state's version of it, says premiums or coverage change with claim history, age or location. Ask what happens to conditions your pet already has if you lower the limit or reimbursement now and raise them at a later renewal. And if a discount ended, ask whether it can be restored, and whether the notice your form promises for withdrawing a discount was given.

Keep the reply with your declarations pages. Over a pet's life the same three-part split will recur at most renewals, and a file of past answers shows quickly whether the trend, the age curve or a plan decision is driving the cost.