Being told to pay vet bill

[majesticallycurvy]

Long story short, we accidentally hit a cat through no fault of ours and the cat unfortunately passed away. We offered our condolences to the owners and are sorry for their loss, but they are hounding us to pay their vet bill.

It's a no from us but we're being slandered over it...

Wwyd?

Half is probably at least 2k

2 - 5 thousand pounds

Feels like the very least you could do if you’ve killed their family pet!

What! Do they put them in gold lined coffins or something? 2-5k to look at a smashed up cat and put it out of its misery? Goodness, we used to just wait for them to pass and put them in a shoebox and bury in the garden.

Cremation costs I expect

@TheUndoing it was an accident. When I hit and killed someone's much loved cat I felt very sad but I didn't feel responsible. I was travelling at less than 20mph, it was dark and the cat came out of a hedge and straight under my wheels. I had no time to brake, swerve or do anything. The owners, whilst very upset, were lovely to me about it.

Sadly, if you have cats that are allowed to roam, that's a risk you take. We have cats, I would be very upset if one of them were killed on the road, but I'd rather they were allowed to roam than be kept indoors.

A pet they loved SO much that they were happy to let out and play with the traffic.

And the crazy cat people wonder why drivers are so reluctant to stop and deal with dead/injured cats which they have hit through no fault of their own. Because the crazy cat people expect them to foot the bill for treating injuries or putting to sleep. And if they don't, or if nothing can be done for the cat and they are just informing the owners out of courtesy, they are shamed online.

If you have a cat it is YOUR responsibility. Nobody else's.

Quite. If (some) people are going to go nasty and aggressive, publicly blaming and shaming and even demanding money, when their cat runs in front of a car, the result is not that people are going to stop driving altogether or drive 3mph everywhere; they will just not bother not try to find the owner in the first place.

It very much falls under the category of 'no good deed goes unpunished'.

A similar principle might be if you were walking down the street and happened to notice that a house was on fire. Most half-decent people would knock to see if it was occupied and to alert any occupants and call the fire brigade - but if you knew that, by doing so, you would be blamed and shamed for starting the fire and thus demanded to pay for the costs of rebuilding and repairing all damage, would you be so keen to do the right thing, or would you just ignore it and keep on walking?

An adult who doesn't understand the basics of cat behaviour really should not be allowed to have a cat in the first place.

I have had 4 cats run over, and 3 of them were on a driveway as the driver slowly reversed on/off.

Cars and animals don’t mix, and you accept that when you have a cat and let it outside. OP not responsible. Cat owners should have been insured but sometimes a shitty insurance plan won’t cover this kind of thing so you suck it up and pay. Vets will usually allow you to pay over 3 months.

I mean that’s for the funeral part surely. Cost us £250 to put a dog down, then took it home and burried it.

That’s because owners of dogs are responsible for the damage they cause so it was your mum’s responsibility to pay. Cats are different.

Sorry I meant 2 - 5 k to fix a cat if it had broken bones or injuries from a car accident.

Probably more like £200 to arrange a cremation for a cat killed outright.

£400 ish if a cat comes in injured and gets put to sleep and then a cremation is arranged.

It's a few hundred so not thousands at all.
But yea cat ran off, didn't know where too. Didn't actually know if it was hit at the time or if it was a near miss.

But honestly thank you for all your responses I definitely feel a whole lot better as their behaviour has been upsetting.

Nothing to stop you telling them you'll report them to the police for harassment if they don't fuck off.

This happened to me. Deaf cat sat behind my passenger wheel as I pulled out of a parking space. I had my name plastered all over Facebook by the cats owner, and had trouble for months after (sometimes still to this day). Please do not pay this bill. Out of the kindness of your heart you could offer to pay for cremation, but as a cat owner I wouldn't expect this if someone was to hit my cat. It's just what I would do because I'd feel so awful.

So sorry this happened to you. I'm sorry sometimes it still pops up again for you, I'm really hoping it's forgotten about soon but I too feel it will always be around. I'd be tempted to move house but I love it where we are. Did you do anything in the end?

Did you get out of that car to look after you hit the cat? Or did you just drive on and that's why they're shaming you on the Internet?

They're shaming her on the internet because they're entitled twats.

We look back at medieval times and think how could someone possibly think someone is a witch and get the whole town running around with pitchforks, but current behaviour on Facebook like this incident really shows you how. We haven't fundamentally changed at all. This is just the 21st century equivalent of Salem.

Not necessarily. There is a big difference between hitting a cat and driving on then only offering condolences after being identified on FB, or hitting a cat then getting out to look for the cat and the owner.

I've been in both scenarios. A woman killed my cat, knocked on doors until someone could tell her where I lived then she came to my door. I was very grateful.

An other time, a different cat went missing. He crawled home 5 days later with his jaw hanging off and his rear leg dragging. I still think of how much that cat must have suffered. If we'd known where he'd been hit we might have been able to find him.

I've been in both scenarios. A woman killed my cat, knocked on doors until someone could tell her where I lived then she came to my door. I was very grateful.

Did she actually kill your cat or did the cat die through misadventure which involved her car?

If a person wanted to die by suicide and jumped off a railway bridge right in front of a train, we wouldn't blame the driver for 'killing' them, would we?

It might just be semantics, but I think it fuels the assumption of blame and hatred, and sometimes entitlement, of people like the ones that OP is dealing with - when a cat choosing to dart right in front of a moving car at the very last split second and sadly dying as a result is framed as 'the driver killed the cat'.

Yes it will be something I will never forget, and the first few months were horrendous! We didn't end up doing anything because anything we did do caused more fuss and trouble. I spoke to a policeman, who's a friend, and they suggested calling the police with all the evidence. I felt this would cause more problems so I just kept all the evidence. I really hope things get better for you, it's a really horrible situation to be in xx

Cats don't tend to be suicidal. And using "killed" is very normal when something or someone dies from non-natural causes. For example, "Child was killed in a road accident." No one's fault, but a child still died as a result of a crash. So, yes, someone accidentally running over your cat with their car did kill the cat.

Maybe you're thinking of murder.

Yes, necessarily. They're kicking off because she won't pay the vet bill for an animal they chose to allow to roam, and that she has no duty to do. They're entitled twats. They have no business expecting any contribution towards the vet bills.

Nope. They were kicking off before they asked the OP for money. Hence, why I asked about the OP's actions after the cat was hit.