Certain dogs make insurance rates rise

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By THOMAS LEE
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Rita is known by her foster owners as a "Velcro dog," a pet that needs to be near people 24/7. She loves children, plays tug of war, and lounges on the couch all day.

Beth DeLaForest, a director for A Rotta Love Plus rescue group in Minneapolis, says Rita would make a perfect apartment dog. But she can't find an owner for Rita, who has been with the group for a year now.

One big reason: Rita is a pit bull.

Rescue groups are having a hard time placing dogs such as Rita because prospective owners are struggling to find an insurance company willing to provide coverage for a home inhabited by a dog the industry has deemed dangerous.

"Some people don't want to go through the hassle of adopting a dog if they had to change insurance companies," said DeLaForest.

Of the 30 applications A Rotta Love receives every month, about five drop out because of insurance problems.

Ever since a woman was mauled to death by two Presa Canarios in San Francisco five years ago, in a case that drew national attention, insurance companies have been increasingly denying or restricting coverage to homeowners with certain breeds of dogs. The top targets: Rottweilers, pit bulls, Doberman pinschers and German shepherds. Insurers, who pay a steep price each year settling dog-bite claims, view these dogs as aggressive and more likely to attack and injure someone.

Aggressive dogs "have been expensive for the industry," said Carolyn Gorman, a vice president of the Insurance Information Institute, an industry group. Insurers "should have the latitude to determine what kind of risks they are willing to insure."

But rescue groups and some dog owners say insurers are unfairly targeting whole breeds of dogs instead of trying to determine whether an individual dog has a history or pattern of violent behavior.

St. Paul Travelers Companies Inc. does not write new policies for homeowners with particular dogs, though the company declined to disclose specific breeds. Allstate Corp.'s underwriting policies vary state to state; the company's policies don't exclude breeds in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Hartford Financial Services Group Inc. will not insure people with Rottweilers, pit bulls or Presa Canarios. Liberty Mutual reviews homeowner policies on a case-by-case basis.

If a homeowner has a certain dog, such as an Akita, German shepherd or pit bull, the company wants to know the dog's training, vaccination history and temperament before deciding on coverage.

The extra restrictions and scrutiny are resulting in lower industry losses and fewer claims. Last year, dog bites cost insurers $317.2 million, an 8 percent drop from 2002, according to the insurers' group. In that same period, the number of claims paid by insurers fell 28 percent to 15,000 in 2005.

The average cost per claim, though, rose 28 percent to $21,200, reflecting higher medical costs.

But dog owners argue excluding dogs from homeowner policies based solely on breed amounts to a canine version of racial profiling. Last year, lawmakers in 10 states unsuccessfully tried to pass bills that would prohibit insurers from denying coverage to homeowners based on their dog's breed, according to the American Kennel Club.

More homeowners are either not telling their insurers about their dogs or lying about it, breeders and some dog owners say.

Not everyone is sympathetic to such dog owners. Douglas Kennedy, a Minneapolis attorney who has represented insurers in dog bite claims, says breed restrictions will help discourage people from owning pit bulls and Rottweilers.

From 1979 to 1998, dog attacks killed more than 300 people, with pit bulls and Rottweilers accounting for half of the deaths in which the breed was known, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. More than 4.7 million people are bitten by dogs annually.

"If someone has to have an attack dog, they should pay for it," Kennedy said. "I'd rather not have my kid bit."