Pets might give you unconditional love, but they aren't free - caring for them can cost you thousands of pounds over their lifetime.

A dog will cost £14,750 over its 12-year typical lifespan and a cat £14,230 over 16 years, says insurer Petplan.

Given these expenses, many pet owners choose to insure their pets. Claims on pet insurance are more common than on other types of insurance: every year 34 % of policyholders make a claim, compared with just 9 % of those with household insurance.

Since 98 % of claims are for vet's fees, the most important consideration is whether your cover is sufficiently comprehensive.

None will pay for routine treatments such as vaccinations, neutering and deworming, which can be expensive - coming in at a typical £420 a year for an average dog.

The most expensive pet insurance policies offer lifetime cover for any illness, up to a maximum limit per year. The cheapest gives protection for 12 months only for each ailment. So if your pet needs treatment for the same condition the following year, it will not be covered and when you come to renew, it will be excluded.

Premiums vary depending on the type of pet and where you live. For top-level lifetime cover, you'll pay £150 a year with Halifax for a three-year-old golden retriever in Exeter or £196 from the AA.

A three-year-old cat living in Manchester would cost £85 a year with M&S or £92 from Saga.

It's also important to look at what happens when your pet is older. Premiums can leap by to a fifth or more once a pet is over eight years old for a dog and ten years for a cat, and you will probably have to pay a larger part of each claim, known as the excess.

Insurers usually pay the vet directly once you've completed a form. And they all include cover up to £1m for third-party liability if your pet causes an accident or damages someone's property. Other extras are typically for accidental damage, advertising a reward if your pet goes missing, kennel or cattery fees if you have to go in to hospital, death, and holiday cancellations as a result of your pet being sick.

Before taking your pet abroad, check your policy will pay for overseas vet's fees. If not, you can often add it to your existing policy. Provided you have a pet passport, you can travel with your dog or cat to the EU and more than 90 other countries worldwide.

But you need to start planning six months before you travel. Before you can get a passport, your pet must be micro-chipped - a small, numbered chip under the animal's skin - which links to the owner's details. Then it has rabies jabs and a month later the vet does a blood test to check the vaccination has taken.

The vet will then give you a passport issued by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra). The passport is free but the vet's fees are likely to be £150 to £170. The rabies vaccination is usually renewed every two years.

Within the 48 hours before you return to Britain, you need to visit a local vet to have your pet treated for ticks, fleas and tapeworms. The vet will stamp the passport to show it's been done in the past 48 hours.

If you want to take your pet abroad, it would cost about £1,000 return to take a dog to Europe - more than the cost of two weeks in a kennel. Eurotunnel charges £30 return for each pet, as does cross-channel ferry operator P&O.

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