Last month I brought my cat in to have her teeth cleaned, with they did not to. So this month I took her back and they cleaned her teeth. Went I went to pick her up I got into a long conversation with the vet. I left not paying,they called the next day and I was not home , they spoke to my husband and he informed them I would be in to pay, this was Friday. I could not get in till Sat. and was informed when I arrived they had turned me over to collections. The problem is that I have been a client of theirs for over ten years and have never failed to pay them even when my bill ran $1000.00 . It is not like they have on information on me, they have a computer full. I am very upset about this. Since it is Sat. I can not get a hold of any one to help with this problem.

I bought the wellness plan for my 3 month old kitten, sophie and soon regretted my decision. It is a scam, and once you sign up, you cannot cancel unless you pay for the overpriced services that were already received, which come out to more than paying for the rest of the plan.

Among the many problems were: given the incorrect meds to treat ear mites, the vet in surgery for my scheduled appointment resulting in a 1.5 hour wait. And the worst offense, we were not told she needed to fast before her spay surgery. If we had not called to ask about fasting, I cannot imagine what would have happened to her. They give shoddy care and are mainly concerned about selling services and of course their wellness plan.

We purchased a puppy on 12-21-07 and within 24 hours we noticed that she was having some problems with diorama. I went on line, performed a fair amount of research and discovered that this is fairly common problem with puppies. Potential common causes were stress due to leaving mom or littermates, changes in food or drinking water and eating random things off the ground, which this puppy was prone to do. We decided to monitor her, continue feeding her and giving her bottled water (which we drink ourselves).

After about 24 hours the problem had not resolved itself. I researched on line and discovered that several reliable web sites recommended that ½ teaspoon of Pepto-Bismol be given for ever 10 pounds and as she was only 2 pounds we gave her 2 to 3 drops out of a dropper every 6 hours for 24 hours. They said if she wasn’t better to take her to the vet.

We took her to Banfield Pet Hospital at White Oak in Garner NC, which is located in the Pet Smart at the White Oak Shopping Center in Garner on Christmas Eve.

I took the puppy in, requested an appointment and described to the receptionist her symptoms (diarrhea, not eating and difficulty drinking). The receptionist told me to hold my pet on my lap, not to let her down on the floor or touch the walls because the symptoms I describes were associated with Parvo which was highly contagious. She could hardly answer our questions or provide any level of service because she kept calling other customers on the phone to remind them of them of wellness appointments…like literally kept calling and talking to them right in the middle of talking to me. This didn’t make me think they were very concerned about my puppy or very customer oriented.

In any event I had to sell an expensive piece of personal property for practically nothing to raise the money to take her to the vet so when the nurse came back with a long list of testing to get me to sign up for I very politely explained to her that I had managed to scrape together $200.00 and wanted us to work together to prioritize testing and treatment options to try to help my pet as much as possible with my limited resources. I must admit that she was NOT very supportive of my plight, stated that “people come in here all the time wanting us to help them with their pets and have no money” and she was not helpful in terms of helping me prioritize testing and treatment on a limited budget.

We ended up testing the puppy for Parvo and for parasites. The office visit and testing ate up over half my $200.00 budget. The puppy was negative for the Parvo and positive for a large number of parasites. The nurse explained that for her to have that number of parasites she might have contracted worms in vitro from the mother. She was only 8 weeks old, weighed a little less than 2 pounds and had been de-wormed on 12-18-07.

The nurse came back with a long list of further testing, blood work, IV Therapy, Medications, Vitamin Supplements and Special Pet Food the cost of which was total beyond my reach. I once again explained that I had worked hart to come up with money I did bring and that I could not afford all the things they were recommending. I asked for help deciding how to prioritize. She was pretty stubborn and I eventually decided on the two medicines, a subcutaneous IV to get some extra fluids into her, the vitamins and the special puppy food.

I told the nurse that I used to work in an emergency room and that when people came in with similar problems the usual course of treatment was to give them something to treat whatever was causing the diarrhea (in this case the two kinds of medications), give them an IV to temporarily get some fluids into them (I opted for the subcutaneous IV) and then give them something like Donagel to combat the diarrhea itself (which was not given as an option). The nurse tried to convince me for a second time to leave my puppy there and pay several hundreds of dollars, which she knew I didn’t have for pet IVs to treat the diarrhea. I asked if there was anything like Donagel for puppies. At that point she refused to talk to me further, brought my puppy back to me and asked the vet to come in and talk to me.

The vet was very agitated, seemed upset and I very politely explained to her that I was not trying to be difficult but was just wondering if there was anything like Donagel for puppies. She stated, “you have to be very careful with the medication you are talking about because she is a small puppy... that medication is out of date and it is illegal to dispense out of date medication…we are not allowed to do that”. The vet again tried to talk me into leaving my puppy there and paying for over a thousand dollars of IVs and other testing. She told me she could not help me prioritize care because she might get sued if something went wrong. She further stated that if there was a bad outcome here they could not be held responsible because they had “offered” me additional testing and IV therapy, which I had refused (simple math equation: limited $ = limited medical care). It felt like there was little hope for my pet so they made up a long list of testing/treatment recommendations totaling over a thousand dollars (which few people I know could afford to pay in cold hard cash up front) specifically so that if anything happened they could blame it on the fact that the pet owner “declined” some of these services.

Let me just say that in people land if a doctor or hospital does not have the medication to save your life they are required by law to obtain it from another pharmacy or hospital. Banfield is a national chain with multiple locations in my local area and in retrospect they could have referred me to pick it up at another location. If I had gone to another location they would have charged me another office visit (I called another Banfield about 30 minutes from my home). Also in people land doctors and nurses are caring compassionate individuals who are actually interested in saving your life. This is apparently not so for the staff at Banfield who appeared to be more interested in monetary issues and avoiding being sued that whether or not my puppy lived. They seemed actually angry that I would not come off some credit cards and just charge up thousands of dollars in care for my pet. They did not even send me home with a pamphlet on purchasing pet insurance or their infamous wellness plan. In retrospect I realize this is because they did not expect my puppy to survive. Putting her down was an option I never got.

To be quite honest if I had that kind of money or charging capabilities I would have spent it to save my pets life because I loved my pet more than my money. I spent every single cent I had to my name that day at Banfield, they refused to let me pay them 3 days after when I got paid, I was treated very disrespectfully for merely asking for an anti-diarrhea medication and my puppy died the a day and half later.

I believe in their over zealousness to avoid doing things that might get them sued they failed to provide the minimum quality of care necessary to keep my pet alive. I believe that they should have made the medication I requested to combat the diarrhea available for me to purchase even if they had to contact another Banfield rather than suggesting I pay money I didn't have to keep her IVs for days on end or purchase vitamin supplements and special food when I had already told them she was refusing food. All she did was puke that all up anyway. Something to combat the diarrhea would have at least given us a fighting chance. If we could have controlled the diarrhea she may have began eating again. Also their attitude was really out of line. I have worked with nurses and doctors all my life and never have seen or heard of anything like this. Why in the world the nurse just stopped talking to me I will never know. In human land we have the right and responsibility to ask questions about our medical care but apparently at Banfield this is grounds for the medical staff to get antagonistic and refuse to continue talking to you. Also when the nurse stopped talking to me and sent the vet in I could actually overhear the nurse angrily talking to another staff about me. Can't tell you how unprofessional that is! I was actually nice and respectful when talking to their staff and unfortunately can't say the same about them. Who has the responsibility to be professional and courteous the customer or the healthcare professional? They actually seemed insulted that I walked in the door with limited amount of resources. I told them point blank that I was not expecting miracles but just some help prioritizing care because of limited resources. The impression I got was that they were actually insulted that they were being asked to provide medical care for only $200.00. I guess the sky should always be the limit because once you set that standard everyone understands that once you have a sick pet the money in your wallets and bank accounts will grow wings.

The kicker is that my sick puppy was seen on Christmas Eve in a store located in a Pet Smart and the lines were long. When I was given the medications the vet gave me a little card and told me to “give it to them up front and they will get the food for you”. I went up front, waited in a long line, gave the cashier the card and she looked at me like I had two heads. She sent me back to Banfield and the receptionist there showed me where the medication was. I then drug my sick puppy back up front, stood in the same long line all over again and was finely able to check out the food she never ate.

Sorry for the ridiculously long e-mail but this whole experience was ridiculously long, tedious and the really difficult part was watching my pet die a slow painful death on Christmas when she probably should have been put down. She was 8 weeks old, weighed less than 2 pounds, had an excessive number of two types of parasites and received de-worming medication again prior to the recommended time frame. What do you think her chances of survival were? Would you have at least given me the option of having her put down? She whined off and on all of Christmas day, we spent all day holding and cleaning her. It was pretty pitiful. Almost as sad as seeing the big pile of Christmas presents we bought her... the ones she never even had a chance to play with. The message I got from Banfield is that only wealthy people willing to spend hundreds or even thousands on their animals should be pet owners.

I need to give you a little history first if you don't mind and I'm sorry, but it's a tad long. My 6 year old cat Dusty was losing hair, not eating or interacting with me and just seemed lethargic. I noticed that she had sores on her stomach mostly, but all throughout her body. I saw fleas and attributed it to the fleas. I bought an over the counter medicine (Seargents) and put it on her as well as my other 2 cats and 3 dogs. After 2 weeks, her sores were getting worse, and she just slept all the time. I took her into the PetSmart Banfield clinic on 10/20/07. This was the one in Glen Burnie, MD. After waiting more than an hour to be seen, they weighed Dusty (still in her cage) and the tech took us to a room. After taking the temp (normal) and asking why I was there, the tech started playing some video thing on their computer about allergic reactions.... I thought to myself, strange, they haven't even seen her, and already they diagnose allergic reaction. At any rate, the doctor came in and started typing on the computer, hadn't even looked at Dusty at all. Then he proceeds to look at her rash glances quickly at her mouth and says he must do 4 tests. I asked why, he said he wanted to find out what it was by doing scrapings of the scabs on her skin. I told him that I thought it was fleas and told him of the history with the flea medication. He seemed to change his mind all of a sudden and said he was going to do only 2 tests. He said he was doing a scraping for fungal infection and bloodwork. He said to wait in the waiting room while they drew up an estimate. The estimate they gave me was $190.00. That was a little rough and figured, ok, so we eat a little leaner this week. So I signed the paper. They took Dusty in the back. I heard terrible cries from Dusty coming from the back. I asked what was going on. They said they were just doing the scrapings and that they had given her a shot of an anti-inflammatory. When they brought Dusty back out, she was terrified. They then hand me a bill for $296.00!! I nearly had a heart attack! I asked them why it was so much when they said it was only going to be $190.00. The tech proceeded to tell me that they don't add the medications or any extra tests they have to do on there till after they do the initial tests. I argued with them saying I can't afford this. Had I known it was going to be this much, I would never had signed anything. At any rate, they proceeded to give me 2 bottles of anti-biotics and some kind of shampoo after telling me she had a fungal infection. Ok, red flags going up everywhere, I asked them why Dusty needed the anti-biotic when they had just told me she had a fungal infection. At first they tried to tell me it was for the fungal infection, then when they realized I knew a little more than what they were telling me, they switched to "she has a secondary bacterial infection." So they tell me I have to bring her back in 2 weeks. Within a day Dusty is doing better (even before I give her the anti-biotics). So I'm wondering if she really needed the anti-biotics, but give it to her anyway, just to be sure. So I bring her in today, 11/3/07. After being put in a room, they take Dusty's temp, 104.5 (high), which seemed strange since she just got off anti-biotics, but they start the video again, this time it was about fleas. Hmmm... so they think it's fleas now? After the video goes off, I see in the list of things for her, the vet had put that he did a dental exam. I couldn't believe it, he barely glanced in her mouth. Beside the dental exam, it had that she had tartar build-up and that I refused treatment! What??!! Now I'm really starting to get ticked. The Vet comes in carrying a small petri dish with what looks like black mold everywhere (hard to tell, he flashed it before me before tossing it in the trash). He tells me she has a fungal infection and that she needs more medicine. So I'm wondering, why they played the flea videa instead of something about fungal infections. He says that with the high temp, he has to give her more anti-biotics, so he proceeds to give her a shot. Then says I have to put her on flea prevention from their office, because the over the counter stuff doesn't work... huh? He also tells me he's putting her on a fungal medication. A lotion that I need to apply to her stomach twice a day. With all this that is going on, I never got an estimate, they just assumed I was going to pay for it all. So after all is said and done, I end up with flea medication, (that frankly looks just like the over the counter stuff, just costs more), a bottle of what looks like eye drops saying "apply a drop twice daily" (huh?? 1 drop does not equal a lotion I'm supposed to apply all over her stomach) and smells like rubbing alcohol and a still very sick cat. Oh, let's not forget the $194.00 bill and NO receipt of what I was paying for because their printer was broken!! And another appointment in a week??!! I don't think so. I feel like I've been ripped off. I will be going for a second opinion, because I don't believe it. I think she had an allergic reaction to the fleas, and that the steroid was all she needed. The temp being high could have also been caused by the inflammation from the fleas. Plus, I want to know why after all the anti-biotics and shampoo I so desperately had to buy to "cure" her, she is still sick. I also was approached about the "wonderful health care plan." But decided to wait on it, and I'm glad I did. I will never go back here again. I can't wait to see what the other vet says, because if I am right and I was scammed, I will be filing suit.

I was just searching Banfield online when I came across these complaints. Suddenly, I feel very validated in what I had already been thinking about the company, and now am wondering how I can cancel my existing plan.

I am young, a first time pet owner, and don't have many friends who are pet owners. I have a lab/boxer mix named Mac and love her to pieces. Since Mac is my first pet, when I first got her I really didn't know how to find a good vet so I did what I thought was smart and went to the Petsmart down the road and asked if they could recommend a few vets in the area. At that point I thought Banfield was for emergencies. They recommended Banfield and their Wellness plan seemed ideal since I am on a fixed income. At first everything with them was fine, I appreciated their guidance as everything was new to me. However, soon they started making me feel like I wasn't a good pet owner. Mac is just a year old and is a large dog with lots of energy. They aren't very good at handling her, yet always seem to make it my fault. They charge exuberant fees for handling her every time I go in. I asked if I could just help because I use a technique to make her stand that I learned through obedience class they refused and often sedate her, also another charge. They made it seem that edation is rather normal with larger dogs. It seemed weird to me that a "vet" couldn't handle dog - isn't that their job?

I have also ran into problems with trying to schedule her regular check ups . Once I was told that if I didn't have any concerns we could just skip it. I was taken aback by this and said that since everything seemed normal I guess that would be okay. But after I got off the phone I thought it was very strange and all of their paperwork that I was given stresses the importance of these check ups for prevention. So I called back and insisted that since I was paying every month for it anyway I would like to schedule the appointment and the same nurse sighed and explained they were very busy, I insisted anyway and took Mac in.

I guess all of this should have been enough for me to know they do not provide quality care but I tend to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Just last month Mac became very ill. She refused to bend forward, lay down, play, eat or drink. I waited a day to see if she would improve and when she didn't I became very concerned. I was out of town so I cut my trip short to take Mac to Banfield. Mac and I waited for quite awhile to see a nurse and I explained what was going on. It was obvious that Mac was under duress as she was falling asleep sitting up but refused to lay down and shedding profusely. I had spent most of the night up with her and was stressed out myself. It was the end of the month and I knew my money was tight. I had let them know this up front, too. After the doctor saw Mac he suggested xrays and said he would have the nurse come in with an estimate for me as I was worried about the money. The nurse came back with an estimate close to $700. I nearly died, I immediately began crying because I love Mac and she was so miserable but I didn't have anything close to $700. There were several charges on the estimate that seemed ridiculous - like a handling fee for every xray of like $30. I asked if they knew what was wrong with her - they had no clue. I asked if they had any kind of payment plan - absolutely not. I said I didn't understand that since they have been deducting money from my account every month for over a year. But I was informed they do not work that way. They made me feel bad that I was even thinking about not having the xrays done - but what they didn't seem to grasp was that I didn't have the money. I asked if they knew of somewhere else I could take Mac that would work with me. They didn't think it was likely. I left there feeling horrible and like the worst person. I looked online and found the VCA. I called them and they were willing to work with me aso I took Mac there. They were wonderful with her. They let me help and calmed me down. I left there with having everything done that was on Banfield estimate but having only paid $200. Mac was back to normal within a week. I don't understand how there can be that much of a difference in price.

I wish I would have found this site before signing up for Banfield.