Vets - do you shop around?

[MollyintheMoon]

My new cat needs his boosters soon so I've been asking around for a vets to take him to. The one closest to me is very good, by all accounts, it's also very expensive. They charge around £50 for booster vaccinations, whereas one much further away only charges £18 for the same thing.

Is it usual to 'shop around' for the cheapest? Surely they all use the same vaccinations and have equally qualified vets on the premises.

I have always taken mine to the closest, but shopping around is not a bad idea.

But I would be less inclined to shop around on price and more on service: who would you want to take your lovely pussy cat to when he is running from both ends and clearly in pain.

After one such incident I nearly did stop using our closest vet because the bloke was so uncaring about the whole thing. But he did fix the cat - and they are the only vet in the village, so I didn't in the end.

Well I didn't used to. I thought it was like the doctors and once you were there you stayed. More fool me!

It dawned on dh that we ought to be shopping about. We have two cats (gets pricey) and their flu boosters were due last Oct. On investigation we found another vet who was offering two for one. So yes, def shop around!

I also got the flea drop prescription from the vet. I think it was about £7; then went online and bought them cheaper there. Before I'd always religiously trotted off to the vets for those too. Doh!

There seem to be more 'drop in' type places about now though.

I have recently transferred to the one in Pets at Home, due to them being open 7 days a week. I have been really pleased so far.

I ended up 'shopping around' because the closest vet I was seeing at Animed was unable to find out what was wrong with my cat, kept charging for repeat visits where she didn't know what was wrong, and was rude.

I found a smashing vet who sorted everything out, and whilst not cheap was cost-effective because he cured the problem.

My boys have only been to the vet once. They were denutted and chipped. I chose that particular vet because I knew vaguely where it was and, since I didn't have a car needed as cheap a taxi ride as possible.
The next thing they'll need is boosters. They are due around June so I"ve plenty of time to look round.

We don't all use the same vaccines, but we should all be qualified vets. Make sure you are comparing like with like so cats are vaccinated for just flu and enteritis and others for flu, enteritis and leukaemia (viral disease in cats) so make sure both practices have quoted you for the same thing. There are also older and newer vaccines, the newest vaccine does give superior protection against flu and has many fewer side effects than the older vaccines, but it is more expensive. This new vaccine is Purevax.

That's good to know Lizcat, much as I dislike one of our cats, I'd hate to think that I wasn't given them optimum protection.

We use a lovely local practice that cares for most of the pets in our street, they were maybe 15% more expensive than Pets at Home who are a bit futher away but who are open 7 days a week so a cheaper backup to ooh which starts at £130 for consult.