The following is a letter/feedback we sent to Wags Dog Club after our dog was injured within their…read morecare. In reply to our letter, Wags responded questioning if the injury even occurred on their property.
To the staff and management of Wags Dog Club ,
In the last few months since Merlin's injury that occurred while under your supervision, we've stressed over and analyzed all avenues to which has led to us sending this letter to you and your team. As many of you are pet owners, we know that the last call you'd ever want to receive would be like the one you gave on January 5th.
My husband and I would like to think that since Merlin started attending your daycare that we as pet owners were laid back and didn't ask too much from your staff. We didn't push back when we paid for his nails to be trimmed, only to see that they weren't. We can count more than a handful of times repeatedly asking if his nails had been trimmed and we were assured they were, even though you could see that not even the tips of the nails had been touched. We didn't push back the time Merlin came home with teeth marks on his abdomen. You said you didn't notice, so we took your word for it. We weren't upset when Merlin came down with a slight case of kennel cough. Even if that meant your team wasn't cleaning properly. That's why we keep our pets vaccinated, right? The pictures you took of him dressed up for special events/holiday, where you could tell the staff hastily threw the outfits on him and his face was always covered in gunk. We never complained and always paid for each picture. We also didn't complain the time your staff brought the wrong dog out to our car. Even after telling the staff that it was the wrong dog, and them insisting they gave us the correct dog, we still trusted you and your team.
With all of that being said, when you called on us January 5th to tell us there was an incident and Merlin would need to be seen by a vet, we would have assumed you would have been honest with us. We would have assumed that you and your staff even if Merlin wasn't one of your favorite dogs would have followed up to see how he was doing. Instead, between your understating how severe his wound was (saying he had a gash did not begin to encompass the gravity of the situation), to telling us that you have no idea how he was hurt, and that he never cried out in pain, make your actions even more disconcerting. The fact that it's a lie you were comfortable telling us, shows that we 100% misplaced our trust in your staff. By you telling us that you have no idea how Merlin was injured tells us that you were not supervising the dogs. Which would make us wonder, how long did our pet run around with a hole in his shoulder? The thing is, there would have been blood, even if Merlin had managed to get caught on some sort of equipment, the hole on his back would have bled a lot. There is no way that someone was randomly petting him and just happened to notice he had a wound large enough to need stitches and a drainage tube. But we know as well as you, that the injury came from another dog. Besides his larger wound you could see where the other dog's teeth scraped his skin.
Truthfully, had Wags been upfront about the incident, telling us that "Dog B" attacked Merlin, the only thing that would've changed is we would have asked moving forward to no longer place Merlin in that group and to keep him and the other dog apart. We get it, this is something that could have happened in our own backyard. What we don't get is why you weren't honest. Or that no one from your staff ever called to check on him. Which further showed us that our beloved pet was only a number to you and we cannot trust you.
My husband and I are all for helping small/locally owned businesses (one of the reasons we loved sending Merlin to your daycare) and we understand that leaving bad reviews can be detrimental to small businesses, much like yours. But as the months have gone by and we've had a lot of time to reflect on the situation we decided to send you a letter to let you know just how much your lack of care affected us. Because of this, we will be sharing our story/feedback with others, for anyone that is interested to know what type of business ethics you uphold.