Keep your fucking dog under control

[Merryoldgoat]

I nearly just ran over a very small puppy. I’m really shaken up. I saw a flash out of the corner of my eye and managed to emergency break in time whilst honking the horn loudly.

At first I thought I’d hit it - a nearby pedestrian (with children who were really upset) told me it was ok and I missed it by a few inches.

It had run out of a house where two women were chatting on the doorstep and hadn’t secured the puppy.

The owner raised her hand in apology but I’m still shaken. Could you imagine how awful it would’ve been if I’d hit the puppy? And if I’d had a car behind me it could’ve gone in to me.

I just feel really angry thar I could have killed that puppy through no fault of my own.

You’re totally reasonable to be upset about it op, I would be the same. I understand accidents happen but it really sounds like they weren’t that bothered. Well done for managing to stop.

And as an aside - you cannot claim against a dog or dog owner so the over £2k damage to my car had to be claimed on my insurance (including the £300 excess which I had to pay immediately).

You can. Pet owners should have third party/public liability insurance, either under their regular policy or you can buy it for a few quid a year from somewhere like Dogs Trust.

I won’t bore you with all the details but I pursued it, my insurance company pursued it - due to the situation of the owner, my only option was to take the owner to the small claims court and our solicitor advised not to (cost vs benefit).

All of this chasing and damage and distress and inconvenience could have been avoided if the owner had their dog on a lead in a car park on a busy road, was my main point.

@AnnieKN

I won’t bore you with all the details but I pursued it, my insurance company pursued it - due to the situation of the owner, my only option was to take the owner to the small claims court and our solicitor advised not to (cost vs benefit).

All of this chasing and damage and distress and inconvenience could have been avoided if the owner had their dog on a lead in a car park on a busy road, was my main point.

So you could have claimed, but for various reasons chose not to. That's not the same as not being able to claim at all, which is why people corrected you.

Absolutely the owner should have had their dog on a lead, though.

I hit a dog once, or at least clipped it. It was being walked on a residential street without a lead. It just ran across the road to get to another dog and I couldn’t stop in time.
I pulled over and got out. The dog had run back and it looked as though he had hurt his mouth. I apologised, though it wasn’t my fault. I appreciate that the owners were shocked, but they didn’t say anything to me, not an apology or anything.
I also had my 12 year old son in the car at the time.

Guarantee if you'd run over it it would have been your fault in her opinion.

The thing is, even if the owner didn’t blame me I’d still have done it - I’d still have felt dreadful. It’s not like them saying ‘sorry - I should have kept a better eye on him’ means I’d have gone ‘no biggie’.

It sounds so stupid but it genuinely shook me up! Thankfully all is ok. Hopefully they’ll be more careful now.

I agree op - people need to be more careful. When DS was in primary school walking back from a trip, a puppy ran out of a house and into the kids. Half of them wanted to cuddle it abs the other half ran off. I picked it up, found the house it came from and the people couldn't have been less bothered!

Hope you're ok.

There's a lot of idiots walking their dogs off the lead lately, including around sheep.
A lot of idiots feeding other people's horses too.