to be a bit pee'd off with these people!!

[dingdongmrs]

We have recently adopted a dog from a rescue, we were told she was healthy and had no proeblems. so we agreed to adopt her, she has settled in well, she is a wonderful girl but..we took her to our vets yesterday and they have told us she has a tumour that need operating on before she gets too old. i have spoken to the rescue and found out they are a non registered charity and very rarely have their dogs vet checked because they cant see the point! they said to get my vet to phone them and tell them she needs this op because they think im lying and if i dont want the vet to phone them i can just give her back to them!

Weve paid £150 to adopt her. and now we have a massive vet bill for her checks and consulation plus we will have the cost of the operation and they dont seem bothered, theyd rather we just gave her back. she is part of our family now, we love her and i wont return her and have her messed around, so we will have to pay for the op ourselves. but im annoyed that they didnt do a vet check on her before letting us adopt her. is there anything i can do? is there anyone i can complain to? this cant be right, surely?! plus as i say they are not a registered charity although they ask for donations ect which i thought wasnt allowed but imnot sure, but as theyre non registered that means i cant talk to the charity commission because they wont have heard of them!

Anyone know what i can do?

No advice, sorry. I have no idea about the law on these things.

But if it were me, I'd be livid.

pet insurance is a great thing - get some

animals are not like cars - they don;t come with guarantees

So sorry to hear this. I've just adopted two cats so I can imagine how terrible you must be feeling. My only thought is that you should contact the RSPCA, although it is probably too late to help you, they might be able to inspect the place, make sure they are doing things correctly in future? Hope your dog gets better x

Thank you guys. the problem with pet insurance is, because she already has this tumour and had it before she came to us, the pet insurance wont cover it! they only cover future illnesses ect not ones that are already there. and obviously we couldnt have got the pet isurance before the tumour because she wasnt living with us.

all our pets are insured and she is insured too with the same company we use for our other dogs but they cant cover a tumour that was already there before claiming.

i'll call the RSPCA and see if they can inspect the place, at least then it may stop it happening to anyone else.

I don't know the law either, but if they're not registered as a charity and you've paid £150 for the dog, surely it's essentially a commercial transaction. I suspect trading standards might be interested, but if they've offered to take the dog back from you, that might be the extent of their responsibility.

Someone more knowledgeable may be able to advise on the law here, but otherwise I think I'd phone trading standards and see if they can advise.

My parents adopted a vicious dog from a rescue once - I was with them when they picked the dog up and was struck by the caution with which the staff handled the dog. All became clear shortly afterwards, but my parents didn't want to take the dog back, so kept him away from people as much as possible, reformed him as far as they could, and kept him for years until he had to be put down due to disease.

I suspect there's a lesson here about checking the credentials of these rescues before you get involved.

I think YAB a bit U. It is a gamble surely adopting any animal. Perhaps the tumor has just appeared?
We had a dog for about three months who was given to me by someone I worked with. He seemed healthy enough for a 5 year old Staffy but one day he got a couple of lumps on his back. I thought they were tick bites and didn't pay too much attention to them. After a couple of weeks of them not going I took him to the vet. The vet drew some fluid out of them then phoned me the next day to tell me they were very agressive tumors that needed to be removed. It did cost us a lot of money to get rid of them, but I did insure him after that.

Sorry, to clarify, we had Pod for about three months before his lumps appeard.

I suspect there's a lesson here about checking the credentials of these rescues before you get involved.

That is very true and i wont be reccommending them to anyone. but the thing is my friend, or so called friend works for them, so i stupidly assumed as i thought she was an honest sensible person that they were ok. i was obviously wrong.

Thank you for your advice i will call trading standards too and see what they say.

Why did my post not appear?

OK take two but different

Agree with Pterosaur either it is a charity or not

If you have had the dog days or weeks then you may be in with a chance of getting at least some of the VET fees back.

Why do you not want the VET to phone them?

Gordy - animals often come with guarantees as far as pre-existing conditions are concerned, but the problem is that the usual solution is for the seller to take the animal back, which is of course not always what you want. I bought two pregnant guinea pigs once, and the shop offered to take them back, but as I said to them, 'They have names now, we can't give them back!'

the tumour is on her eye, and it was there the day she came to us, i thought it was a stye but the vets informed us it is not and that it is a tumour, i dont think it appeared in the five minute drive it took to get her to ours! plus the vet said its been there a while.

and like i say, she is insured with us now but we could insure her before adopting her so thats not our fault!

C0FFEE - i didnt say i dont want the vet to phone them, she just said matter of factly if i dont want the vet to phone or if the vet doesnt want to phone her, i should just gove the dog back!

ive informed my vet this morning and he has said he will call her so we will see if she agrees to help with costs but its not so much the costs that bother me its the fact she said quite flippently "we dont get the vet checked before rehoming as i dont see the point"

your pet, your responsibility. This organisation didn't tell you the dog was VET checked did they? Sounds like they couldn't afford to do this for all the animals anyway. Also is there any evidence the tumor was existing in a diagnosable state when you adopted the dog? Tumours can grow very fast.

Pets are expensive, do get sick & it can't come as any surprise to you that vet bills are horrendous. Regardless of where the animal comes from you surely must be prepared for all this before deciding to get a pet?

If they did tell you the animal was VET checked & it turns out they lied, I think you have good reason to complain. Otherwise
I think it's simply bad luck, and you just have to swallow it. As an animal lover do you possibly think the good this organisation is doing for animals might outweigh your disgruntled feelings? It certainly doesn't sound like they have knowingly passed off a sick animal onto you.

I hope your dog is OK.

Right my husband has just spoken to the lady at the rescue, she admitted she knew about the thing on our dogs eye but didnt have her checked because she assumed it was nothing serious. so my husband explained to her what our vet has said, again and she said she will give the vet a ring, so she hung up and rang the vet and rang us straight back and apologised and said yes it is a tumour and should have been sorted before she was rehomed with us and she will cover the vet fees for us and get it sorted.

so i guess thats a good outcome. i still think it is wrong that she didnt get it sported beforehand especially now she has admitted knowing about it. but i suppose at least now she has agreed to do something about it and maybe that will make her think twice about vet checking next time.