Anyone any experience with wags n wet noses dog rescue?

[BettySweaty]

Just that really.

We are supposed to be adopting a dog from them soon, but I've just seen a strange review of them on line. Granted the review is from one man, and all the other stuff about them had seemed fine, but its got me thinking...

Anyone else had any dealings with them?

I wonder, suggs21, do you know Wendy personally? Funny, because you sound just like a parrot of her. I was waiting for her to send someone to her defence. A lot of what you have just stated their is the exact information they like to tell people on their public front.
So because you had a positive experience (if you are even a real adopter and not one of Wendy's shills) and others have, does that mean everything is legitimate?
The fact you have had a positive experience does not discount my experience and the experiences of many others that she tries to block and hide from her page, and the evidence that has came to light about Wendy and her sham rescue.
The FACTS are that she has:

1. Lied and manipulated me into taking my dog back to her kennels. She specifically said that she did not want to find a foster home for him just yet due to the behavioural issues I stated and would prefer to spend 2 months assessing him at her kennels in Mexborough, to be sure we find him the home that he needs!
2. Promised to keep me fully updated on the process and his progress and run his advert past me before it went live. She even offered to send me a legal contract to ensure that she divulges all of the dogs behavioural issues that have came to light to any future adopters.
3. Stated that she would give me a refund, albeit a lesser one, when the dog was eventually adopted. She stated this would be at least 2-3 months whilst she goes through the whole behavioural assessment and eventually gets him adopted. Like I said, it wasn't my main priority to get my money back, at this point I did think she maybe had made a genuine mistake in his advert, but the fact is she LIED.
4. He was collected on the Sunday by a driver. Wendy messaged me, the very last message I received from her was 'I will update you next week after assessment. x'
5. Next thing I know, she has kicked all other admins from the group chat and removed me, blocked me from her personal profile and the Wags profile.
6. A family member went onto her page and she has advertised my dog with an absolute, completely pack of LIES. I am the only person in the UK that has spent 2 weeks with this dog in a home environment, Wendy knows NOTHING about him. This dog is the opposite of what she put on her advert. He is very anxious. Very nervous of cars, outside noises. Afraid of bikes. He is EXTREMELY destructive in the house and I think this likely stems from his anxiety. Like I stated, on a short drive to the beach, he chewed and ripped through the actual lining of my boot. I noticed that the more anxious he got (if a car came close) the more he would chew. He chewed through his lead and 2 seat belts. He rips everything in his reach if you don't constantly watch him. He is VERY rough when he plays. He obviously has not learned play boundaries, from humans or dogs, as he was also rough with my cousin's dog on the beach and made him squeal. Wendy tried to pass this off as general 'puppy mouthiness', but when you have a 10 month old Labrador cross biting your arms and your hands like a 10 week old puppy would, it is not just something to be shrugged off. It HURTS a lot. Like I said, I have evidence of the bruises all up my arms and my forearms where he jumps up and bites when he is excited. If that were to happen to a child, that is really not good. Most importantly, he is AGGRESSIVE. He has food aggression. Wendy tried to tell me he is not aggressive when I told her this. I find that absolutely hilarious considering she has never ever met the dog in her life 😂 whilst I am stood there, with video footage of the dog growling, snarling, lungeing and nipping anything that goes near his food bowl when eating, she tried to tell me he is not aggressive 😂 stupid woman. She has advertised this dog, this dog she knows nothing about, as this perfect family dog. She has stated that he COULD possibly be homed with younger children but we are saying older than 8 because of his playfulness! Not mentioned a single THING about his rough play and food aggression! She has stated all of these positive things about him, as if she knows him. They're all false! She is purposely hiding his true nature to get him adopted. I found her statement on his advert that 'a little more practice and training in positive lead work will add the finishing touches to this boy' HAHA what a pack of lies!! There is going to be one very upset adopted when they realise he is the opposite of her advert! And it is absolutely fucking heart breaking because this poor dog, he is not going to get the home he needs. I understand that you have to put some positive things on an advert to try and find an adopter, but she is NOT being honest about his nature and the fact he is food aggressive, very rough, very anxious and very destructive. He needs an adult only, experience home, with someone that is willing and has the time to deal with his behavioural issues. What she is doing is completely irresponsible and downright disgusting!! Please explain, because other people have had a positive experience, how this is okay???? What would you say if the dog bites a child and gets put down? Wonder if you are all so quick to jump to her defence then!
7. Someone I knew messaged her asking about my dogs and responded to his advert. As soon as she started asking question, she blocked her. This is her standard response! Block everything and everyone that threatens to expose her lie! Notice how you don't see any negative reviews or comments on her official channels? Because she wants to hide the truth of the people that see the real person and truth behind this so called rescue.
8. You say all of the WAGS workers don't take a profit and all have regular jobs do you? Do you KNOW that? Or is that you just repeating what she has told you? Can you prove that? Funny, because she failed to send me any evidence at all when I asked for evidence of the costs I contributed towards. If she is an incorporated association, why does she not have a CACS account hmm? Why does she get paid into her personal account? There are specific business accounts for unincorporated associations. The actual FACTS are, nobody knows where this money goes. She is about as transparent as a blackout curtain.
9. I should also add, when discussing my dogs food aggression, the lady who adopted him from Romania stated that she knew the dog had food aggression and she just avoided him when eating. Wow. Thanks for put that on his advert Wendy! Instead I got told he was extensively tested around children! Would of saved a heck of a lot of heartache and expense if I had been advised before potentially letting him around a young family!

10. She posts all of the dogs on her page with these buzz words. Bombproof TICK. Child tested TICK. She knows exactly what she is doing. Her main priority is to get the dogs adopted and get the payment. She is NOT doing it for the dogs. She is doing for the money. This rescue is operating like a business NOT a not-for-profit. I wonder how she pays for her nice house is France hmm? Wonder if it is a coincidence that I found a Pinterest account online she has, where she had a folder full of large, expensive houses in France labelled 'my future French home ;)' 😂 11. A behaviourist made me aware of the fraudulent operations such as Wags. I consulted him to see if I could help my dog. He actually refused to take my money, which is a mark of an actual GENUINE person. He said he COULD help me in some way, but that it would only ever be to manage the aggression, as food aggression is not easy to remove. He actually told me that it would be best not to have a dog with this around a young family and unsafe. He told me that he has increasingly had calls for help from people who have rescued dogs from abroad, who turn out to be the opposite of their adverts. He stated that, once you have an issue and reach out to the rescue for help, they will DENY all knowledge. They will try and make you feel guilty, as if you are the one not willing to put the training in. That YOU should have seen this behaviour coming because YOU didn't do enough research. Completely avoid the fact they told you lies about a dog. Completely avoid the fact that a lot of people have never rescued before and put their complete trust in the people running the rescue to tell you the truth and have the best interests of you and the dog at heart, because, why would they? It never even crossed my mind that I could be being lied too. I was completely unaware of rescue scams. He also told me that making you feel guilty is the nature of the fraud. He told me that they play on your heartstrings. You blame yourself, naturally, for not having the experience to deal with food aggression. Wendy and her team gaslight you into thinking it's your fault and they had absolutely no knowledge of it. He also said that they want you to return the dog. They can then readvertise and get another couple of hundred pounds! Looking back over the messages, she was very forceful about having him back. She uses a lot of emotive language to make it appear that she is a very kind, helpful person that just wants what's best for everyone 'I am so so sorry about this, nobody wants this, nobody likes it when a dog turns out to be unsuitable, I can absolutely take him back, just say the word and I can get him collected for you, I could even get someone to pick him up close by and bring him to our kennels in Mexborough xxxx'. This is the type of messages she sent once she changed from the initial gaslighting techniques and realised I wouldn't fall for it. 12. There are other experiences of people that have went through the same thing as me. She has lied to them about their dogs, blocked people, tried to blame them, denied all knowledge of it. I know for a FACT that Wendy is a liar. She is manipulative. She blocks anyone that threatens to reveal this. She uses so many techniques that are actually really clever and she knows exactly what she is doing. She uses a technique called flooding when you first get an interest in adopting. She sends heaps and heaps of positive information over to you, and it all sounds great. You can't believe how well informed the whole process is. It makes you trust them even more, makes you absolutely sure this is the right dog for you, makes you trust that they are using the money as they say, despite how glaringly dodgy it all is. As my behaviourist said, you can't see the wood for the trees. When you have an issue, she most definitely uses gaslighting to make you question if you are at fault. When she realises she can't gaslight you, she manipulates you into thinking she is genuine and wants to do what's best for the dog and trusting her to take the dog back and do what's best. I don't need nobody to tell me she isn't these things, because I have FIRST HAND experience of her doing these things to me and I fell for it twice. I KNOW she is a fraud. 13. There is also evidence online that she does fund raisers that are also LIES. She posts fundraising appeals stating they need urgent cash to adopts dogs from 'kill shelters'. People have stated that they have been in contact with the managers of these shelters and the dogs are absolutely not as risk of being 'mass slaughtered'. People in those countries willing to help and rescue the dogs, on the ground rescuers, have been blocked by her from commenting! Why? Because as soon as they go there they will realise it is a sham! I completely believe this because that is how she operates! The block button is her best friend! 14. Now, of course there will be positive stories. If my dog had arrived and he turned out not to have food aggression and he didn't have the very rough and painful play behaviours, I would definetely have decided to keep him and work on his anxiety and destruction ect with a behaviourist. I would have decided this was not a big enough risk to my step children to not keep him and it would have been a success story. I'm sure there are many, many dogs that arrive with behavioural issues that are easier to manage and within a normal range that you feel capable of dealing with. If that were my case, I would of went away thinking Wags was a fabulous, legitimate rescue. I would have had NO idea of the truth of Wendys real behaviour and would have left a fab review and defended the rescue if I seen people slating it. However, the issues arise when you have a problem. If you have had a dog from Wags and had no problems with it, then you aren't going to see the truth because you aren't a threat to her. When a dog arrives that has a behavioural issue that is so in contrast to the dog you got told about and you feel incapable of dealing with it e.g. aggression, then it becomes clear that she is lying to you in her adverts. When you have an issue you experience the gaslighting, the blame, the blocking, the lies. Check her posts for yourself. You will not see any posts mention that the dog is food aggressive. You just see positive after positive. She downplays any negatives. 'he is quite boisterous and just needs a human to love him and show him the way'. You gave to understand that this rescue operates as a business. I am not saying to not offer your home to a rescue from abroad. If you want to take your chances that is your prerogative. But what I am telling you is that you CANNOT believe what you are told about the dog. You are taking a complete gamble when you get a dog from this rescue. And if you have any major problems when the dog arrives, then you will see for yourself who she really is. Also, you aren't paying to help a not for profit. You are paying for a dog like a business transaction. I have no doubt that she uses the money for these dogs to fund her lifestyle. My dog arrived very underweight by the way. I was actually told that there aren't enough resources in kennels to feed them all. I find that quite astounding considering she is advertising tons and tons and tons and tons of dogs on her pages for adoption. That is hundreds of thousands of pounds a year. She churns them out like a factory. On the face of it, wonderful. So many dogs being rescued. In reality, it is exploiting dogs and the kindness of people for profit. It is placing potentially aggressive dogs in unsuitable homes and risking injury to adults, children and risking the dog being taken and euthanised. Dogs being passed from pillar to post because nobody can deal with their aggressive and trauma and was told they were a gentle family dog with no trauma (as I was). I am leaving this here now, I've said what I want to say and you can take from it what you will. I am a genuine person that has been living a nightmare for the last two weeks over this situation. I am approximately £1000 down after paying for my dog and all of his things and even worse, I will now think about him for the rest of my days and wonder where he is and if he found his forever people 😞 ask yourself, why would I come on here and post all of this and take up my time just to bad mouth a dog rescue operation and make fake claims!? What would I gain from doing that? I guarantee as time goes by you will find more and more of these posts against Wags. The truth will come out about the disgusting woman that Wendy is in the end and I for one cannot wait.

All I can add to this is ‘why is my very good experience of wags any less valid than your bad experience ?” Just because I give a very positive review of my own experience of adopting through them, and also my very good friends experience of them, why in your eyes does that make me what you call a shill ? That’s actually very rude and confrontational when all I’m doing is the same as you. Giving a review of my own encounter with them. So to you , your experience is valid, and mine is not ? I would say this though. If the negative experiences a couple of people have mentioned above are valid then why after 8 years is wags still operating ? Surely common sense should tell you that if there is anything untoward going on then why are they still rescuing and operating ? They are governed by law just like any Uk business, charity or philanthropic organisation so if they have broken any kind of rules or laws then surely they would have been closed down by police or trading standards or even financial services authorities. And yet here they are still operating when I checked their page yesterday and still rescuing dogs. How much do you think it costs to care for their 250 plus dogs in care in the balkans ? That doesn’t happen for free. They have to pay for food, boarding, vet care and costs, parasite cleaning costs and testing and vaccines for all those dogs. How on earth do you think they pay for that ? They made very clear to me the cost to adopt and what that cost covered and it was clear I was not paying for my dog. I was paying for all the above elements including his transport from romania. My own vet in Dorset charges me over a hundred pounds just for a consult appointment for flea and worming treatment every two months for hector so how on earth do you think the rescue pays for that for over 250 dogs in their care ? Magic beans ? They have costs to cover to rescue these dogs are care for them. That doesn’t happen for free. They have costs from their vets who help the dogs and the boarding houses who look after them whilst in the rescues care. Only yesterday I saw on their page they rescued two dogs, one with broken leg and one with a broken spine, both dogs now having surgery to try to fix them. How do you think they pay for that if not through fund raising for dogs costs. They don’t just rescue perfect dogs. I regularly see them rescuing badly injured dogs and making them well again so I really can’t see how they are bad. But you have your opinion and I have mine. We are both equally entitled to our opinions. But if all you said is true then why have they not been shut down , ask yourself that. Because if everyone had your experience of them then Uk authorities would have closed them down. But yet they still are operating on Facebook. So Im sorry but I don’t believe your account. I don’t. I tend to think it’s a case of sour grapes because you didn’t like the dog you got for whatever reason and you didn’t get a refund even though they make that very clear to adopters beforehand, and you just don’t like you didn’t get your transport fee back. That’s what I think. But of course we shall never know. Because I don’t know you, and you don’t know me. But I do believe in their work, and their ethics and I will be adopting from them again in the next 12 months. Without a doubt.

Meet Sandy. We have had our "Wags 'n' Wet Noses" boy for four years now and wouldn't be without him. Wendy Feather and her team gave us very, very comprehensive instructions on how to help a dog that has lived on the streets, and foraged for his very existence, to settle into a home, domestic environment.

We followed the instructions to the letter and the transition from a nervous dog who had never seen stairs before or heard a washing machine and was petrifed of ever man he saw (including me) to a very loving family pet was amazing. It took patience (and bits of biscuit) to coax a dog who cowered under the dining table when I came in from work into accepting that I wasn't going to kick him or beat him and now he bounds to the door when he hears my car approach.

Damage? He chewed through out curtain pull cords one night, chewed a tablecloth to bits and chewed his harness and lead to tatters. We sussed it out - he was hungry and looking for something to eat, so we made sure there was a bit of kibble in his food bowl when we went out and never had any more incidents.

I would say Wendy Feather and Wags 'n' Wet Noses are lovely people with the dogs' best interests at heart. As a disclaimer, I never knew any of the ladies until we took the plunge and started making enquiries and, in fact, Sandy was not the dog we originally asked after. We asked after another dog that was being fostered in Sussex, but as soon as we mentioned grandchildren, the fosterer suggested we looked at SAndy.

The descriptions of the dogs are accurate in the sense that the behaviours have been observed in the pensions where the dogs have been brought back to health. However, always remember most of these dogs have been abused and have lived on the streets, fending for themselves. There is about a 3 month period where the dog decompresses and adjusts to his new life. Patience, love and understanding is everything - these are not RSPCA, Battersea or Dogs Trust dogs where they have had a family life beforehand - these dogs may have had a very hard time and need a bit of TLC.

Oh! One other thing. Sandy has a "resting twitch" which no one had noticed until he was lying on our kitchen floor. Wendy Feather was very concerned and offered to take him back to Hungary for the vets to sor out, but we were adamant he was our dog and we would sort him out. Itturned out to be nothing - he twitches and he twitches and that's it!

I posted on this thread a couple of years ago. I've just read the recent posts, which took me right back to the communications I had with Wendy when I was considering adopting. I searched through the old Facebook messages and from the recent posts it sadly it doesn’t seem that anything has changed regarding Wendy’s defensive, rude and gaslighting attitude.

@Msalty712 I’m sorry you’ve had that experience. Unfortunately I can wholeheartedly believe everything you’ve said having had first hand experience myself. I never got to the adoption stage itself (too many red flags for me) but I’ve since adopted 2 dogs from 2 other rescues. One came from Bosnia and one from the UK. Both rescues were registered charities, with proper websites, professional staff, a properly drawn up adoption contract, charity bank account and very thorough assessment process (which can’t be said for Wags, hence red flags). They don’t discourage families with children from adopting but they also don’t place any dog with a family unless it’s 100% a right fit. So if you do still want a dog for your family, rest assured there are good rescues out there and I hope Wags hasn’t put you off for life.

Secondly, @suggs21 its great you’ve had such a wonderful experience but it does seem a bit disingenuous that you are so committed and passionate about a dog rescue where you’ve adopted one dog from in the past. The tone of your post implies that you may have more of an interest than just simply adopting one dog? I also wonder if it is a pure coincidence that the language you use is extremely similar to the language used by Wendy in her overly emotive posts? You’ve used a lot of statements which are very similar to some of the messages I received a couple of years ago when I started asking a few unwelcome questions.

I find the reference to “philanthropic organisation” particularly interesting. Wags was registered as a limited company for a couple of years - nothing particularly suspicious about its accounts but at some point it was intended to be, and has been, run as a business. The ltd co is now dissolved and Wags run as an unregulated organisation. Of course it’s governed by UK law, as we all are, but that does not mean everything is above board. It’s certainly not answerable to the standards of the Charities Commission nor does it have any requirement to publish its financial information publicly. So we can only speculate about whether it truly is 100% philanthropic. I would however expect that a successful organisation which is so busy helping hundreds of dogs would look to become a registered charity to be able to apply for and gain more funding?
I would also expect a legitimate organisation to have a website and not conduct everything via Facebook. It should have, at the very least, a privacy policy, setting out its controls at the point of data collection (i.e. when they take all your information before asking for photos of ID to be shared to a group of people you’ve never met). However I think GDPR breaches are probably the tip of the iceberg.

I'm sure it’s possible to adopt a lovely dog and not encounter any issues with Wags. However, if you want peace of mind I would advise anyone looking for a dog to fully research this outfit before proceeding.

I give up. It seems to me that the positive posters on here are overlooked and ignored whereas the negative posters are glorified. Ive said all I will say. But I will be going back to them for another dog and I have supported their work for a very long time, donating to their appeals and kill shelter rescue every Christmas. I will continue to do so. Ive said what I needed to say in their support. Im done. I wholly support their work and always will.

Thank you @boxbird12. I completely agree with you with the language used by these posters above, it sounds exactly like the emotive language Wendy uses. I was fully expecting her to be browsing online threads to try and discount my experience anyway! Because it makes complete sense for someone to go online and waste their time making fake reviews because of 'sour grapes' not getting a dog they want. What a pitiful attempt to try and pass me off as a fake account, honestly.

Yes, she is not operating as a registered charity and therefore in a completely unregulated field. The reason she has not yet been shut down is because it's very difficult to do so. If this were such a legitimate rescue, she would have no issue with registering as a charity and making her accounts transparent. I only hope that it will catch up with her in the end and she gets what she deserves.

Also, like I said above. Wendy can send as many people as she wants over to try and give their 'glowing reviews'. You can have thousands of good experiences but none of them can deny the fact that she is a LIAR and a scammer! None of these people who rescue dogs from her and luckily have a good experience actually know her. They don't know what she does with the money or how her operation works. All they know is the front that she puts on and what they are told by her. They pay £650-£750 for their dog and have some communication with her via a social media page, dogs great, post pictures in the group, no issues, life goes on. She's a master of manipulation. She knows exactly how to use language to make people trust in her and when things go wrong she gaslights and blocks. Wouldn't suprise me if she is a narcissist.

And there you go, the narcissist above, Msalty, deploying all the means and methods mentioned above to try to discredit me as a positive commenter, when you dont even know me. I never said your account wasnt true, I simply said I personally didnt believe it because of my own experiences with Wags N Wet Noses, but heres you completely trying to discredit me, as somebody who was happy with my experience and you dont even know me. I would suggest you are the narcissist Msalty. I never ever said anything negative about you, simply that my own account differed to yours and heres you labelling me, a complete stranger, as a narcissist. Oh, I see now, thats what narcissists do, they label others narcissists and gaslighters to deflect from their own shortcomings. Take a look in the mirror my dear man or lady, whomever you are. Take a long look in the mirror. To try to defame somebody you dont even know wreaks of absolute narcissism of the very worst kind. Go look in that mirror. As I said before I shall continue to support their work as I have every faith in them.

I don't think any of us have been "sent" over by Wendy. As a matter of fact, Wendy Feather has very little to do with Wags for about two years now. She keeps what is known as a "watching brief" offering words of advice every now and again.

I didn't not refer to you as a narcissist suggs21, I referred to Wendy as one.
Also that is untrue Sterrett. She was very heavily involved in my adoption. She is the one responsible for lying and manipulating me into receiving the dog back and then posting false adverts about him on the page and misleading future adopters. She is the one responsible for blocking me and lying to me when all I wanted was to make sure my dog found a suitable home. She is the one who I have extensive evidence of her lies and manipulation. She is the one who multiple accounts keep popping up about with the same type of treatment from her. So I am not sure where you are getting your information from. Seems you have some sort of personal relationship with that level of knowledge of her position in the organisation and therefore bias and other vested interests yourself.
There is absolutely nothing stopping you from continuing to support them, that is your choice. But it does not hide the fact that there are multiple people out there (including myself) with evidence that shows Wendy to be dishonest, unprofessional, gaslighting, manipulative and a liar.
Also, to say you don't believe someone because of your own positive experience with Wags is stemming from a place of complete ignorance. Forgive me for finding it extremely suspicious that you are attempting to defend someone purely because you had a positive experience of an adoption. Also, "kill shelters" is yet another emotive term she uses to get the funds in! As she has already been revealed doing on false pretences! But, of course, there are people out there with positive experiences so we should just ignore all of this and assume it is lies and false accounts and blindly trust the woman!

I have nothing more to say other than I like the team at Wags and Wet Noses and I like Wendy and the experiences I have had with her, so I dont need to add anything more. Ive said all I needed to say. I watch their pages most days because were on the lookout for another dog and I support their work and I will always do so because they have only ever been honest and transparent with me. That is all I can say.

After multiple notifications about posts on this thread I went back to messenger to see if I could pick up on the similar feeling of messages from Wendy Feather to myself regarding the issue we had with the dog we rescued ( see my other post earlier) only to find that the old page that I corresponded with was deleted and there is now a new page that states they are an “unincorporated association of ladies”.

My thoughts after a bad experience that is brought back every time I get a notification is that the page was deleted due to negative reviews and re made.

That would be a blatant lie then because this post from December states she is still the owner/founder/manager.

Their old page got hacked by some Philippino scammer and so everythng was jeopardised so they had to start all over again as they posted on their old page and new page. They were clear about what had happened to their site and why they had to start again. There was no way to leave a review on their old page so they changed that on their new site when they started again. Many thousand of us were automatically messaged by the scammer who took over the page claiming that they had bought wags n wet noses and that they were needing donations to keep the site afloat and a few people fell for it, but wags were quick to tell everyone what had happened and not to engage with the scammers who had hacked their site. They had to start again so they have 2 new pages now, one for the rescue itself and one for the followers, supporters and interested adopters etc. It wasnt because they were closed down for anything illegitimate, they made it very clear on the old page that they were rapidly blocked from the old site but they took the time to message every single follower to say dont engage with the scammers, and dont hand over any money to any new paypal, because the site was taken over by scammers and they couldnt get it back. All their followers followed them over to the new page, those who wanted to continue to follow them of course. Me being one of them. And their work continues, very successfully from what I can see.

My final word on this from me, because frankly Im bored now. There will always be those who dont like them and who will say bad things about them and maybe those people have had a bad experience. But there are many thousands of us too who have had a very good experience, so I suppose its like anything in life. There will also be those who love a certain site and always be those who hate a certain site. I think really you just have to read the reviews on their site from genuine fosters and adopters in the past and reviews elsewhere and make up your own mind. That is all one can do. I have, and Im very very glad I adopted from them and will definitely adopt again, and very glad I support their work. But we are all different and we all hold our own opinions.

hi,
We adopted our dog from them about 4 years ago. so pleased we did.
we found the team honest and relable and love our pooch to bits.
any more questions, happy to help.

This thread has really stressed me out as I have a dog arriving in a week from them. Obviously my own fault for not doing enough research and taking things on face value but I am where I am now and really just hope it's ok.

I wouldn’t stress about it. I had a terrible experience, but I’m sure it’s only a few people this happens to a year. The odds are in your favour. Honestly if my own situation had been dealt with better from them (which wouldn’t have taken much) I too would be happily posting my success story. I just put it down to bad luck. Enjoy your new dog. It’s a great thing you are doing.

I’m so sad to read the recent negative reviews. We adopted a dog from Wags almost 4 years ago and had a brilliant experience with them. Wendy was helpful and kind. The dogs have a stressful long journey and are not them selves for weeks or months. Our dog was so friendly from the moment he arrived but our daughter who was 3 at the time chased after him while playing and it frightened him. He didn’t know us well enough and she was just a bit too excited. From then on he was really unsure of her. He got a bit growly around her. I messaged Wendy and she gave me so much brilliant advice in those first few weeks. It took time for him to trust her as she was young and unpredictable but after a few months they built such a lovely relationship and they are the best of friends now. Wendy checked in to see how things were and gave further advice when needed. She messages a couple of weeks back to ask how he is. They really do care about the dogs they rescue. I have nothing but positive things to say about Wendy and the team. There will always be a handful of negative thoughts and experiences, they can’t get it right every time and animals are unpredictable despite the vigorous testing they carry out so I don’t think any of the teams actions listed by previous posters are done maliciously. They want to get a good match as it save stress on the dog to be moved around and less paperwork for an already busy team of volunteers. Sadly, in a smaller number of cases it doesn’t work out but we’re just hearing 1 side of the story on here.
Just wanted to share my experience. My auntie also adopted from them after coming with me to the Happy Bus when my dog arrived and she had a great experience with them too.
Please don’t let the negativity ruin your excitement. I had the Best experience and would love to adopt from them again one day. Enjoy your new pup. Let them come to you and be patient. You won’t see the really dog for a few weeks or months after they’ve decompressed and learnt to trust you. Have fun! Xx

Appreciate the reassurance and hope I'll have a positive experience!

Hi
I had a great experience adopting from Wgas n Wet noses...at first. The team were great although I could always tell Wendy was a bit sharp tongued and has some very strong opinions. I got my dog Astra 4 years ago. I absolutely adored her -she was 9 and a half...and sadly passed away age 13...but anyway, she had issues. She ate walls, she was reactive to dogs which made walks difficult. However, I stuck in and gave her a great life. I deserve a medal. The team were supportive but at one point Wendy got quite nasty and said it was time I got her trained. This other woman would have had her trained by now etc...this was after 6 months. Astra had lived on the streets for years and was set in her ways and was really loving and adorable. I still miss her so much. But Wendy....hmmm...she was pretty nasty to me in the end and I cut all ties. I kept in touch with Mariana who is the one in Hungary who actually rescued Astra. This is a true account and may not help you. Basically, you should be okay.

your experience mirrors mine...the support was there until the dog had so many issues I could barely cope. Wendy was really nasty and so rude I actually blocked her. I did end up keeping the dog and I'm glad I did as she was my soul mate...in a doggy sense. Not aggressive to people though

Thanks it's helpful to know. Obviously I'm expecting a dog with difficulties who needs a lot of work, but not great to hear that the support isn't there, but a useful heads up, and I am glad you both got through it..

I can only repeat what I already said above, and my friend has a dog coming over on the next transport, so I will also get her to report back on her experience once her dog is home but for me, the support for Hector was always there and still is. They check in with me from time to time, one of the team, always showing concern and genuine interest in what Hector is doing and the whole team, all the admins have been very useful with training tips and advice on toilet training, and the support is still there whenever I message them.

I'm sorry to hear that other people have experienced the same as myself when it comes to Wendy. Glad to hear your rescue stories turned into a success though. If you have any doubts as to wether Wendy is genuine or not, go onto her pages and look for the dog Harry. The beautiful Labrador X Weimaraner. I am not sure if he has been rehomed yet as I am blocked from the page and somehow she has blocked my family and friends from seeing the page, even though they haven't messaged her! And ask her how his behaviour is, if he has food aggression, and why he is being advertised as well trained on walks, okay with kids over 8 etc. Ask if he is extremely destructive in the home. I guarantee you will be blocked. Now why on earth would she advertise him as a completely different dog!? Like I said, she told me she would prefer to spend two months assessing him before even considering to rehome him and would run the advert past me and keep me updated. It was the only condition that I would give him back to her. She's a liar 🤷🏻‍♀️