A question:

Why are you still taking your pet to Banfield to begin with? My experience is that they are incredibly overpriced for EVERYTHING when compared to a regular vet.

An Internet Friend in the vet business also tells me that, when treating a problem, they have to go through a cookbook of steps to diagnose the problem. Where a regular vet with experience would go straight to the problem, a Bansfield vet, so I am told, has to go through _X_ tests, before they do _Y_ or _Z_.

My Consumerist horror story with Banfield, which was some years ago, was when my cat wondered into the street and got ran over. I took them the body of my dead cat (in a doubled trash bag) to dispose of. But the all-too-well-meaning receptionist was convinced that I had abused my cat to death and killed it myself. She kept calling my family's number over and over (when I was not home) with questions in her attempt to get me prosecuted over her own cat rescue fantasy. She really added insult to injury, and I hate the place ever since.

The woman still works there to this day.

That cat looks just like my cat. Now I'm sad. Also, Banfield sucks.

If the contract they sign says that they have to pay even if the pet passes away, then it's OK to break the terms of a contract if they don't suit your liking? I hate to say it, but a contract was signed by Sarah. Just as Banfield honored their end and provided services as outlined in the contract, so does Sarah.

I get the fact that they don't want people lying and saying that their pet died to get out of the contract, but I think that if the pet is euthanized at Bansfield, they should make an exception. Granted, I'm biased (my dog was put to sleep 2 years ago tomorrow at Bansfield and I had to continue paying for the contract), but it just adds insult to injury.

Also, in my experience, I tried 3 different vets and the people at Banfield were the nicest and, even before the pet plan, the prices were comperable. I've heard I was very, very lucky in this regard, though.

@GitEmSteveDave:

At the same time, if the purpose of the contract was specifically to keep said animal healthy & it died shortly thereafter....

I'd really like to see the actual wording of the contract.

So could he get a new cat and put it on the plan?

Here's an example. I joined a "buyers club" for 29.95. I have the option to cancel the membership anytime I want during the year it's good for. They will just give you the difference minus the months you have used. BUT, if the total savings you have saved exceeds the 29.95, you don't get any money back.

Sarah rang up over 350.00 worth of bills due to her cats illness. She is paying 273.40 for the contract. She saved nearly a hundred dollars due to the plan. Did she expect that she wouldn't have to pay the vets bills if her pet died w/o the coverage?

This is another example of financing something then being upset when you no longer want/need it. No different then financing baby furniture for a child you were adopting and the adoption didn't go thru. You still owe for the contract.

I've heard way too many stories of animals leaving Banfield in worse shape than they went in, some even dying after routine procedures. I would not take my cat to the vet at all before I took it there.

Same thing happened to me when my dog passed last August. We only had to pay 3 more months and they never debited the last payment, no big deal. Not solely because of this, but we take our new puppy to a private vet. We actually are spending less and receiving much better service.

Hey, you realize this means that Banfield can actually kill your pet early in the contract so they incur no further expenses, but hold you to the full cost of the so-called "insurance"?

I guess their wellness plan doesn't work very well.

I can empathize with the loss of a family pet, I took my daughter's cat to the vet last week because he was having trouble peeing. They quoted me $1000 to tune him up. I didn't happen to have a grand laying around and unfortunately opted to have the cat gassed. Amazingly, upon hearing this, the vet offered another treatment option for $300; we got the cat tuned up and he has been fine ever since.

I thought about getting insurance to make sure I was never forced to make such a difficult choice in the future, but the cost of insurance is more than I paid for the treatment. I have a dog, two cats, two gerbils and a fish. Insurance on the lot isn't cost efficient for me.

On a side note, if you want insurance, go to google and conduct a search, there are a lot of companies that perform much better than PetSmart.

@Jaysyn: According to the article, the cat was diagnosed with epilepsy last year, and they put her to sleep in October. So it seems as though it was for about a year, and not shortly. Also, we don't know the details of why they put the cat to sleep. I have known people who have put their cat to sleep due to diabites, and they could not handle all of the extra duties in order to give the cat a semi-normal life, and did not want the cat to suffer. I put one of my cats to sleep after she was stepped on by a horse. The vets could not insure that she would survive all of the procedures, and they would have had to taken her out of shock just to clean all of her wounds. She was not in pain due to the shock, so we decided that the most humane thing to do was to put her to sleep, and avoid any future suffering.

@MDSasquatch: I had the same thing happen with one of my cats who was bitten by something, and had a abscess on the underside of her tail. I went to the Emergency vet(discovered the wound on a Sunday of course) and they quoted me a high price for amputation and a slightly lower price for cleaning. I was not employed, and I said, I'm gonna have to put her to sleep because I could not afford it. Price dropped a little after I said that, and I still couldn't. The vet then told me that the cat would live and be fine for the next few days, enough for me to "shop around". I went to my normal vet the next day, and for about $300 all together there, she was better.

Thanks for posting this. We were just about to sign up my girlfriend's dog with Banfield. Now we know they are the "Best Buy" of the pet care world.

Hey look, it's another "companies should do whatever we say and not hurt our feelings no matter what the contract we signed said" story.

She knew what she was signing. I have no sympathy for her whatsoever.

Oops, that post above was supposed to include sarcasm tags referring to typical Consumerist readers. Sigh.

@joeblevins: Here Here. If I finance the car, and part of that includes routine maintenance, and also dealer repairs, and the car catches fire after a few months, can I stop paying the dealer, and keep all of the insurance money? I think not. I signed a contract. It didn't provide health care for the car, just preventative maintenance, which WILL make both a car and a pet healthier in the long run.

We made the mistake of taking our Siberian Husky, Tonka, to a Banfield once. (This was before I started reading the Consumerist. heh.) It was one of the most horrifying experiences I've had in my life.

And by horrifying, I mean that the vet tech couldn't find our dog's vein. After waiting about 45 minutes for a simple set of shots, we finally got an inept vet tech that seemed surprised that we fed our dog beef or chicken every night. Yes, a bit too much, but after the pet food scare, we decided it would be best for Tonka. After she went through some automated touch-screen questionnaire, which confused her any time we answered the question with something that wasn't on the screen, she left the office for ANOTHER 15 minutes, then came back. She was able to complete one test, the one where they test their feces. After that, she tried two times on his right front leg's vein with no success. Then, she tried the other front leg once before we stopped the whole visit. Tonka is by no means a small dog (45 lbs.), so it is not hard to find his vein. We paid for the one test they were able to pull off and left. We were there for a total of 1 1/2 hours, and there were no customers ahead of us. We never even SAW a vet, nonetheless received help from one.

We will NEVER step foot inside a Banfield again. We received poor customer service, and the techs didn't really care for the animals, just their paycheck. One bright note: we found a really great vet after that event. She saw Tonka that day, and the whole process took about 30 mins. And she can find Tonka's vein. :)

RTFC

And here we learn the very important lesson of READING A CONTRACT.

They may make it sound as if they are doing that out of good will for your pet but they don't. Their job is to make money off you. Sheesh.

I have always gone to neighborhood vets, and always received excellent, personal service. Any company that has to rely on a contract to insure your continued patronage is guaranteed to be an uncaring, in-it-for-the-money ripoff.

What services does the contract require from Banfield? Perhaps you could request one of these services. When the services cannot be provided since the animal is deceased, you then have a breech of contract situation.

I have no experience with Banfield but I recently moved and asked my current vet for advice on who to go to in my new area. They gave me a magazine/brochure and said anyone in this book...that isn't Banfield. 'Nuff said.

@mightypen: Yea, but that takes time and effort.

Once this cat owner has taken his bloody revenge on the Banfield rep, he should continue on with the rep's family, then friends, and so on. It's only fair and right.

@GitEmSteveDave: You'd have your cat pts for a minor tail injury???

Serves them right for signing up a CAT for a WELLNESS PLAN in the FIRST place. Jeesh people, waste money much?

Banfield is the devil. I took my cat there for 6 years because I liked PetSmart and thought Banfield was going to be good by association. They misdiagnosed my cat's respiratory problems for years as "that's just how Persian cats are, it's genetic." I never owned a Persian before so I believed them. When his breathing became raspy, I took him to a real vet who took xrays (what a novel idea) and discovered fibrous tissue throughout the cat's lungs. At this point, there was nothing that could be done and the cat had to be put down. Several Banfields in 3 different states all failed to take the extra step of xraying my cat. I wish I would have been smarter. And yes, after I had Jonze put to sleep, Banfield demanded I continue paying on his "Wellness Plan".

Banfield marketing practices are borderline deceiving and definitively unethical. All of you "you signed the contract" defenders forget these companies have tricks to fool you into a contract. These fools are the people who keep these crooks in business as there is real pet insurance that actually costs the same.

I've personally never had a problem with Banfield and I've been taking my dog there for the last 2 years. The reason I went in the first place was because a friend recommended a particular vet at one of their stores (the vet was awesome, wasn't big on the whole "banfield" thing, and made sure animals were treated properly without upselling, etc). For the first year it was worth it (for the $200, plus $20/month you got all the shots, spaying/neutering, and all the appointments you can handle) which worked well for this being my first dog on my own. The vet moved, and so did I, but it was very easy to move from one Banfield to another.

My only complaint now is that it takes sitting in the office for 45+ minutes even though I have an appointment. But usually the vet techs are very nice/have a clue, and the new vet is great (I'm in a college town, so the vet techs all seem to be pre-vet/vet students at the university)

Since the dog is a bit older, and I really only take her in for her vaccines, I will probably take her off the plan when it runs out this year.

In my opinion, it's like finding a doctor/dentist/etc: shop around. When you find someone you like, stick with them.

News flash: Your pets do not need wellness plans and insurance. What a total rip-off and really all it does is make the owners feel better about their little snowflake angel pet that they treat like a family member or child. Take your pet to the vet every year (or two!) to get checkups and shots.
The vets want you to do it way more because they make a lot of money off it.

Both my dogs go to Banfield. We signed up with the Wellness Plan because it saves you money. If you start off with a puppy on the first visit, you pay $350 total for one year's worth of care. That's all the puppy vaccines, dewormer, etc. and a neuter/spay. This is a great deal and I'm glad they have it. For my older dog, this plan paid for itself in a few visits.

I have no sympathy for this woman because she didn't read the contract.

@adrock75: It's well worth it if you have a puppy. They need shots every three weeks for a few months and that's expensive.

@GitEmSteveDave: First of all, it's "Hear hear," not "Here here." Second of all, a car is not a living thing, but if your car did catch fire, you would (or should) have *insurance* to help you pay for the incurred damage. Furthermore, she didn't finance the cat, she financed the *insurance* aka "payment plan."

@GitEmSteveDave: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But if this provision of the contract weren't buried in the fine print, chances are nobody would agree to it. That's why Consumerist and the Chicago Tribune are providing a service by exposing sleazy provisions like this. It's too late for the family with the dead cat, but I hope that this story will do at least some damage to Banfield's sleazy business model.

Never have pets, waste of money.

I have sympathy for this couple because they lost their beautiful cat. The money lost is secondary, and perhaps was unavoidable; we would have to see the parameters of the contract to discern that with any confidence.

Pet insurance, on the whole, is probably a moneywaster for 99% of pets; however, in my situation it would probably make sense. One of my cats is asthmatic and requires an inhaler once a day; the inhaler itself cost $50 (one-time) and the medication is human medicine (Flovent inhaled steroid) and I get dinged for $150 every other month. If pet insurance covered that, I would consider it.

Then again, in that scenario, my cat would have a better health plan than I do, as I have to satisfy a huge deductible before my Rx co-pay kicks in.

Sympathies about the cat.

The issue of the contract payments all depends on whether they mislead you on what the contract entails.

I don't think that its categorically wrong to charge you after the animal's death if this was really a "payment plan" and not a monthly insurance service.

"It says monthly payments could be required "if the total amount of services rendered by Provider prior to cancellation (valued at Provider's full retail prices) exceed the sum of monthly installments retained or recovered by Provider."
"

The company shelled out $350 in veterinary bills, and looks like he's just being asked to pay for it in installments.

If you take out a loan to buy a car, you certainly have to keep making the payments after it's wrecked.

WHEW!

I'm sure glad I clicked the actual article to read, because for a second I thought that picture was of Sarah Harper! YIKES!

Banfield is the worst!! At the end of one of my plans they scheduled an extra appointment for my dog. When I came in I asked specifically if it was covered under the current one. They said yes and I went ahead. After that I tried to cancel my plan and they told me since I accepted the checkup it automatically renewed 2!!! months earlier than the normal renew date.

I just got the Petsmart link! I took my dog to Petsmart once to get groomed. When I went to go pick him up, he wasn't there - he was at the Vet (Banfield)! Appearently, my older dog had gotten so freaked out that he got a nosebleed and they had to take him to the Vet part to get sedated. They didn't charge me, fortunately, but I never took him back. He'd never done that before, and he'd been groomed at our neighborhood vet several times (and afterward, with no ill effects).

He's since passed a couple of years later, I fully believe due to complications with the heartworm shot they pulled from the market a couple of years ago.

@hn333: Gotta disagree with you on this generalization.

@GitEmSteveDave:

Agreed. An agreement is an agreement.

Yes, if you take out a loan to buy a car, you certainly do have to keep making payments after it's wrecked, but you don't have to keep paying for insurance and tuneups if the car is totaled and sitting in the junkyard. The CAT was paid for.

I like the ideas some of the Tribune readers suggested: keep the dead cat in the freezer and take it in once a month for a checkup until the contract period is over.

I have a story on Banfield: one of their vets diagnosed my dog and gave him a medicine. his symptoms just got worse and worse, until the dog started pooping blood and having seizures. when I came back, they upped the dose, and it almost killed him. when I paid for a real vet he immediately realized that my dog was prescribed a medicine that was used for other symptoms, and it was overdosed to boot. The Banfield doctor was fucking killing my dog.

Sucks that your cat died. However...

con·tract Listen to the pronunciation of contract
Pronunciation:
\ˈkän-ˌtrakt\
Function:
noun
Etymology:
Middle English, from Anglo-French, from Latin contractus, from contrahere to draw together, make a contract, reduce in size, from com- + trahere to draw
Date:
14th century

1 a: a binding agreement between two or more persons or parties; especially : one legally enforceable b: a business arrangement for the supply of goods or services at a fixed price.

The whole reason that the "contract" idea came into being is the fact that people (like you) would make an agreement at noon and break it at two if thats what was what you wanted.Hate it for you,but pony up,big guy...

BTW -thanks to Websters Online for the clarification.

@causticitty: They wanted $1400.00 dollars to treat the wounds and ~$1700.00 to amputate the tail. I was un-employed, and had NO access to that amount of money, and the same vet had turned me down 6 months earlier for a $200 loan when I didn't have any cash on me at 1am. It was an open abscess under the tail at the base and was around ~1.5 inches wide, and you could see the bone. As soon as I said that I could not afford it, and I would have to put her down because I couldn't, that's when they started changing the prices. I was a little emotional at the time, and there was no way I could have treated it myself. Like I said, I went to my local vet, explained my situation, and they took care of me for a good price. They also gave me the tools+knowledge+drugs to continue taking care of her after I left, so it was good.