I was in the Petsmart in Salem MA earlier today. I was there to purchase some small fish for my daughter. I have a larger tank at home but was going to keep the new fish in a bowl just for a while so my 5 year old could care for them and call them her own. The person selling the fish would not sell them to me because the bowl I was buying was not big enough. I tried to explain to him but he still refused. He was arrogant and rude. He was in his late 20's or early 30's with dark hair and glasses. he may or may not have had facial hair ( I can't remember.) First of all, I am an animal lover. I have a 14 year old diabetic dog that requires 2 shots of inculin per day (a rescue from Northeast Animal Selter.) I have a 19 year old cat (rescue), a 2 year old cat(rescue) and 3 fish one of which is 4 years old. I have several friends who laughed when I told them this story because they buy feeder fish and one has a snake that is fed small rodents. While I would never have an animal that would have to be fed live creatures, I still had to wonder what this guy was doing. I have always shopped at Petsmart because it is closer to me. I left there so angry and insulted that I will never go back. I went a little bit out of my way to the Petco in Peabody MA. I spent $87.00 this trip and found the employees in this store very helpful. I do understand wanting to do everything possible to prevent animal cruelty, but I think there is a fine line that was crossed by your employee.

A few weeks ago, I took my baby boy Angelo, a 14-week old Welsh Corgi, to the groomers at PetSmart. I give him regular baths at home and I follow professional grooming manuals to the letter. However, I wanted him to get his nails done and his ears cleaned. We made an appointment and got the Puppy Package for him. I dropped him off and the girl there was rude and cold to me and to an elderly couple who was picking up there Chihuahua. We handed Angelo over and went out to finish our shopping. Mind you, this was a Sunday and they weren't that busy. We got a call at 1:30 saying he'd be ready for pickup in about 20 minutes. When I got there, she still had an attitude as she brought him back to me. I had to ask for the bandana they were supposed to give me for free, but that wasn't the issue. After sending my boyfriend out to pay, they finally handed me my dog. Problem one: as he scurried to get away from her and to me, he clawed my arm. As I was carrying him out, I checked his paws and saw his nails were UNTOUCHED. They hadn't even TRIED to file them. Problem Two: He hadn't been washed, at most he had some water dumped on him because his undercoat was coarse and dirty feeling. I've owned enough dogs to know when they've been washed well and he had not. Problem Three: His ears were still filthy. They hadn't done anything except leave a redness in his right ear which I wrote off as a poor cleaning job that had maybe irritated him a little. We tried to dismiss it, but we were livid. On 4/1/09, we had to take my baby to the 24 hour hospital because the redness was worse. Not only that, he began mauling his ear, shaking his head and crying loudly. The vet swabbed him and he has a yeast infection that we'll be treating for 7-10 days and hope it doesn't become recurring. My point: not only did the woman NOT do her job, she hurt my puppy. The vet says we can't prove she did anything since infections are so easy to catch, but he's never had one before. She says what may have happened is they may have poured or gotten water in his ear which, as any REAL groomer will tell you, is a HUGE no-no for Corgis. The poor little guy is still suffering, but hopefully he will improve. I want back the amount of the grooming, the amount of the vet bill for the tests and the medicine and I want that woman fired. The third thing is the most important because nobody should hand over their baby to an inept teenager with an attitude problem who doesn't do her job and manages to harm an otherwise healthy dog. We will never enter PetSmart again.

I was told there would be caring people monitoring my pet at all times. As it turns out, once the store is closed, there is ONE person in the hotel responsible for all the animals. ONE person watching hundreds of dogs and cats. And they aren't even allowed to touch the animals, or clean up if a dog messes in its cage. Of course they're so busy cleaning and doing other tasks that its unlikely they'll even notice if your pet needs attention.

If you don't pay extra for play time, the only time your dog is let out of its cage is a brief walk once in the morning and once at night. Your dog is walked with many other dogs and has to keep up to their pace, and gets no individual contact with people. They won't even take your dog outside to go to the bathroom. Instead they have to go in the 'elimination room' which most dogs refuse to do because they are house trained.

If you do pay for play time, don't expect your dog to actually play. The workers monitoring the dogs generaly just stand there with a spray bottle and ignore the dogs unless they need to clean up a potty accident. They do nothing to prevent fights or humping, don't interact with the dogs at all, and sometimes leave them unattended. The play rooms are tiny and very overcrowded which makes the dogs scared. Most of them spend their 'play time' trying to hide in a corner or fighting off the attention of another dog. My dog left a playroom with an obvious bite on his neck, and I was told they were not responsible for it. The vet bill was over $300.

Make sure you go in back and see what the cages actually look like. If you're not paying extra for a suite, your dog is placed in a cage just big enough for him to turn around in. And remember if you don't pay to play time, that box is where he stays for 23 hours a day.

I give my dog vitamin supplements, but he couldn't have them during his stay because they weren't prescribed by a vet. He also enjoys Busy Bone treats but couldn't have one because nobody would monitor him while he ate it to make sure he didn't choke, and they wouldn't let him have it without supervision.

I measured out his kibble for his stay in indvidual ziplock bags so he would get the correct amount, yet they told me he ran out of food and they had to give him their house supply of Science Diet. So were they overfeeding him, or did they lose the very expensive premium kibble I supplied?

Best of all, the employee at the hotel desk assured me my dog had a grooming appointment set up with their salon during his stay, but when I picked him up his hair hadn't been cut and the groomers I talked to had no idea what I was talking about.

A few weeks ago, I took my baby boy Angelo, a 14-week old Welsh Corgi, to the groomers at PetSmart. I give him regular baths at home and I follow professional grooming manuals to the letter. However, I wanted him to get his nails done and his ears cleaned. We made an appointment and got the Puppy Package for him. I dropped him off and the girl there was rude and cold to me and to an elderly couple who was picking up there Chihuahua. We handed Angelo over and went out to finish our shopping. Mind you, this was a Sunday and they weren't that busy. We got a call at 1:30 saying he'd be ready for pickup in about 20 minutes. When I got there, she still had an attitude as she brought him back to me. I had to ask for the bandana they were supposed to give me for free, but that wasn't the issue. After sending my boyfriend out to pay, they finally handed me my dog. Problem one: as he scurried to get away from her and to me, he clawed my arm. As I was carrying him out, I checked his paws and saw his nails were UNTOUCHED. They hadn't even TRIED to file them. Problem Two: He hadn't been washed, at most he had some water dumped on him because his undercoat was coarse and dirty feeling. I've owned enough dogs to know when they've been washed well and he had not. Problem Three: His ears were still filthy. They hadn't done anything except leave a redness in his right ear which I wrote off as a poor cleaning job that had maybe irritated him a little. We tried to dismiss it, but we were livid. On 4/1/09, we had to take my baby to the 24 hour hospital because the redness was worse. Not only that, he began mauling his ear, shaking his head and crying loudly. The vet swabbed him and he has a yeast infection that we'll be treating for 7-10 days and hope it doesn't become recurring. My point: not only did the woman NOT do her job, she hurt my puppy. The vet says we can't prove she did anything since infections are so easy to catch, but he's never had one before. She says what may have happened is they may have poured or gotten water in his ear which, as any REAL groomer will tell you, is a HUGE no-no for Corgis. The poor little guy is still suffering, but hopefully he will improve. I want back the amount of the grooming, the amount of the vet bill for the tests and the medicine and I want that woman fired. The third thing is the most important because nobody should hand over their baby to an inept teenager with an attitude problem who doesn't do her job and manages to harm an otherwise healthy dog. We will never enter PetSmart again.

My friend called me up on the phone in tears. She said her store manager had a talk with her about how she's not finishing her work on time. My friend has been talking about this problem for months and she says she has repeatly asked for help at doing her job better but her superiors only want to complain about how slow she is a her tasks. Her managers are always comparing her to other employees and how they are better and faster but they ignore her requests to be trained with these other emplyees. I'm am very angry. I have been training employees at my job for 20 yrs and enjoy helping and employee improve.