Confronting an unhappy neighbour?

[OneTiredMama]

We've just moved to a new private rental. We've been here for three days now and today I get a phonecall from the agent saying my new neighbour has complained about my dog. He's a toy poodle and the landlord has agreed to him being here. He hardly ever barks but now I'm worried that he may be barking when I'm not in. I'm a bit miffed that the neighbour didn't come to me himself.

Should I go next door to ask what exactly upsets them about my dog so I can try to prevent it happening again? Apparently a couple living here before had a bull terrier that tried to attack their cat and they are wary of any dog. I'm not sure what to do in case they are aggressive and it creates more tension.

If they were aggressive they wouldn't have called the agent to handle it, they'd have come and banged on your door. Go and ask them exactly what's upsetting them - you'd want to know if your dog was barking all day while you were out. Is your dog cat friendly?

I feel for you, I had a bogus complaint about my dog and ignored the source. I've since had police called, social services turn up on the doorstep, complaints made to landlord about complete rubbish and been reported for benefit fraud (even though I'm not on benefits!) I would probably bring it up next time you see each other in the street, I don't honestly believe that in the space of 3 days your dog has been such a nuisance it warranted a complaint to the agents!

Thanks for the advice, I went over ask about it and try to reassure them. Turns out it was the neighbour across the path from me so they haven't heard him crying. They said a dog lived here before and killed their cat so the landlord and letting agency told them that they wouldn't let another family with a dog live here. We weren't told about this.

I've tried to reassure him that my dog is a small, petted toy poodle and has never attacked anyone or anything. He is rarely in the garden alone (the garden is surrounded by a 7ft fence on all sides anyway) and he has been viciously attacked himself in the past, in fact we're lucky he's still with us. The neighbour still doesn't seem happy but I don't know what else I can do. I've told him to knock my door if there's anything else I can do but he says we'll have to talk about it more over the next few days.

He will bark at cats purple but only since he was attacked. If we hear him bark he's called straight inside but he wouldn't go near one, he does it more out of fear than anything else. That's awful mopants, it's scary how out of hand these things can get. It really worries me!