Friend lied about having emotional support dog.

[Otins]

A friend of mine has a dog. He is a pet. She loves him, but he is a pet. Nothing else.

She recently went on a day out to a stately home. Dogs not allowed inside.

She told them it was an emotional support dog and they let him in.

She thought it was really funny and clever to do this.

I told her that I didn’t approve - and we moved on, and it was fine.

But the more I think about it, the more it winds me up.

For transparency, I am not a dog lover (not a dog hater either) and the sense of entitlement I see from many dog owners annoys me, and I think dogs being allowed (emotional support or not) in cafes and shops is inappropriate.

Whatever happened to leaving your dog at home to snooze on the sofa while you went out?

AIBU

Yes - how does this affect you if she takes her dog into places when you’re not there.

No - she was wrong to deceive the stately home in this way.

Untrue. Only a dog in UK

There is no official identification and the harnesses are readily available online.

Also, who asked you for 'his papers'?

There are no official papers and they are not required by law anyway.

Think it was the manager of the bus station. He had a uniform on. Doggo wears a K9 harness which can make him look like a service dog (he is just a strong lad) and the chap said sorry can I see your ID for your dog , so I obviously apologized and said he isn’t an AD just my daft mutt and offered to walk round instead (he let us carry on as we were nice and polite). Dunno about the ID - if an autistic kid has a specially trained dog with them as a therapy dog do they not have something to identify them? Not something I know about tbh. I wouldn’t lie about it (tbh my lad would give himself away with his excessively waggy tail haha)

I have similar experiences at a historic country house but we're so into our inclusivity stuff we don't really 'challenge' and it's a bloody nightmare. I strongly suspect about 50% of the dogs we get are just pets with entitled owners chancing it. It really annoys me, not least because personally I am very allergic to dogs and will suffer an asthmatic reaction if in the same room as most dogs, and as a consequence of never really interacting with dogs due to allergies I am nervous of them too. So if ever I'm stuck in a room with a visitor with a dog for long it's a problem. I will take it on the chin for people who have assistance dogs for, eg sight - they are extremely highly trained and serve an essential purpose for their owner - of course. But the rise of all these other kinds of support dogs are a bloody nightmare to regulate and I hate the feeling of suspicion I have whenever we have one because it's really not fair on the genuine ones to be so sceptical. Who am I to judge whether they really need it or not? But often the dog is not well behaved so I just feel it is not actually properly trained and anyone can buy a jacket online that says 'support dog' on it. The absolute piss takers are those that say they are 'in training'. Obviously they've got to get exposed to things to be trained, but our fragile historic house is not a training ground and we shouldn't be bearing the risk of a puppy pissing itself with excitement on a historic carpet. But the fear of being accused of being discriminatory is huge in my sector, I think partly because all the funding nowadays is about inclusion and access etc etc, so all our rhetoric is about finding ways to include everyone. These chancers play into it big time.

On a similar theme, I have a friend with an assistance dog, he can fetch things for her. and she has brought him along to our hobby group for years which was fine, he is a friendly dog and we all give him lots of fuss which he loves. However the dog is now retired and she continued to bring him for a while but the group leader has now asked her not to bring him. She and some of the group are outraged but I don’t think they all realise that the dog is retired so no longer an assistance dog but … a dog! I presume that venues have rules about bringing dogs in, maybe it is an insurance issue.

Absolutely. It angers me.
My local coffee shop has a number of 'emotional assistance ' dogs and ( I know the coffee shop owner) the owner is reluctant to ban them, even though she knows the law.
The owners buy 'Emotional Assistance' harnesses online and feel that their pet is open to all places.

She needs the trade but she's fed up of dealing with 'little accidents' as staff have to take time out of serving in order to deal with them.

And I'm a dog lover and our dogs do provide emotional assistance but not 24/7 everywhere.

@Otins She was wrong to pretend her dog was something it wasn't, not that emotional support dogs are a recognised thing in this country, that's a US thing, but as the owner of an assistant dog who helps me in numerous ways you are unreasonable to say no dogs should be allowed in shops and cafes. I was hit by a car; some horrible person drove through a crossing, hit me and drove off and I have been left with life altering injuries, my assistant dog allows me to be part of the world again. I don't have her because I wanted a dog that could enter shops I have her because she helps me, a wheelchair user live my life independently. I waited years for a wonderful charity to give me an assistant dog. I hate people who say they shouldn't be in cafes or shops.

if an autistic kid has a specially trained dog with them as a therapy dog do they not have something to identify them?

No, there is no official identification which is why people like the OP's friend can get away with taking the piss unfortunately.

It's annoying and I see a dog in Tesco often that has a emotional support vest on... seems ludicrous especially when he's walking around with his partner aswell.

Why ludicrous because the partner is there?

Yes ludicrous to have a emotional support vest as there is no such thing, but why about the partner with them?

@Allfur A man in our village was in the military and has complex PTSD. He gets terrible flashbacks and panic attacks. He has a mental health dog who is trained to respond to an MH crisis by pressing him to sit down and then lying on his legs to keep him safe until he “comes to”. This could be needed just as easily in a stately home as in Asda.

Because why do you need your dog and partner? Surely the point of the dog replaces the partner?

I might be over the top but I honestly think I'd struggle to stay friends with someone who thought it was ok and even funny to do that. Massive piss take and makes a mockery of anyone who needs a genuine assistance dog.

This pisses me off. I know someone who does this too.
It's about time there was some kind of paperwork for genuine, trained assistance dogs. You don't have the correct piece of paper with you, the dog doesn't get into the venue.
If too many people take the piss with this, venues will crack down and that ends up with people who genuinely need an assistance dog possibly also being denied access.

Without reading too much into the legalities and definitions, I’d call this an Assistance dog, not an Emotional Support Dog.

I have already said I have no issue with a trained Assistance dog. My gripe is with Emotional Support dogs, and my friend lying because as rightly noted by others, she knew she was unlikely to be challenged due to ticket sellers/ushers not wanting to argue and cause a
scene/threat of bad review etc.

Yes it is a joke and should not be a thing. Allergies trapped in a plane with someone’s dog.

wth is an emotional support dog? The dog relies on the person, not the other way round. If someone has a mental illness, why should other ppl have your smelly, hairy, barking or worse dog anywhere at all but particularly a plane or food provider because someone thinks a dog will support their ‘emotions’!

👍

Or an alligator! https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c6py05vv81vo

If there was an actual a psychological need for a dog, then presumably the CF would have had a prescription to show. Of course she can't, because as people have noted, there is no such thing as an emotional support pet. It's all made up by (mostly) American narcissists.

One might even say that people "self-ID" as needing an ESD, so that everyone else feels that in order not to cause offence, they have to pretend that it's true. But that might open a can of worms.

Fortunately the US airlines are starting to notice that people are taking the piss. The next thing would probably have been someone with an emotional support suitcase that happens to weigh 35kg.

I knew someone who bought their whole family sunflower lanyards and cards and used them to get through the airport quicker/use the disability lanes. They said one of the children was autistic and put down others as caring for that person. None of it was true.

It makes a mockery of a system that's been put in place to support vulnerable people and anyone who fakes a disability to get ahead is a cunt.

That really upsets me. We have 2 kids with complex needs, and adaptations like this make things possible for us that otherwise would not be. I hate the hassle of securing Access cards, or the cinema ones (not that one of mine can ever go to the cinema anyway, due to the APD and SPD) but reading this, they should ask for equivalent, I think, everywhere - or at least for evidence of an EHCP or DLA, where checks are pretty rigorous.

Completely agree that these people are cunts. They make it less likely that people who need the adjustments will be regarded sympathetically.

Thank you for caring about it. We need more people to be as angry as you, to protect the access where it's genuinely needed.

@sleeponeday I was furious because my son has a disability that requires support in public places and they just saw it as a way to jump the queues. I don't know what the answer is, but the lanyards shouldn't be easily accessible to people who don't need them.

There already is. You can't access flights from the UK without the assistance dog being accredited by ADI. It's only US internal flights that have this.

It's not the law for venues though, no. And in fairness, ADI dogs have waiting lists that stretch on forever, or you have to find £15,000, so my kids, one of whom badly needs one, won't get one.

Meanwhile, people like the OP's friend squander the already pretty limited sympathy the public have for disabled people by increasing suspicion that it's a grift.

I think there needs to be a designated lanyard available with Access cards or (again) DLA/EHCPs. Sunflowers can indicate support is needed, that's all fine, but the controlled one could indicate verified high needs.

It also bugs me that you can just buy a radar key for accessing disabled loos without checks, too. How is that sane?