The size of the hospital I visit is roughly equivalent to a veterinary practice.
Kitty held at Vets till bills paid, 'interest' added daily. Help?
- Thread starter Mr Jones
- Start date
The size of the hospital I visit is roughly equivalent to a veterinary practice.
Permabanned
But it obviously has the infrastructure to deal with invoicing etc. Which hospital out of interest? My local vet has one surgeon and a receptionist, and they are always busy - far to busy to be chasing invoices.
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Caporegime
Really?
The veterinary practice we visit is roughly equivalent to a semi-detached house.
The practice that I go to has multiple buildings on the site inc stables etc, I've never seen one that small.
Infrastructure? It's £150 not £10,000.
Permabanned
Ahh in that case you can be forgiven then.
Not all (in fact most) veterinary surgeons have multiple buildings on site. Most around here are privately run, have one or two vets and are normally in a house or in a small shop space. Now do you see why it might be a problem?
Permabanned
So they shouldn't bother chasing the money because it's just £150? What?
No it's easy to arrange and doesn't require a team of experts to handle such a small amount of money.
Associate
- Joined
- 22 Jan 2010
- Posts
- 1,480
Get a dog.
Soldato
There are some greedy people in the industry, like in all industries, but that doesn't make them all greedy. Your view is probably distorted because you have never had a medical bill. Also, a vet as a member of the BVA has to adhere to some business guidelines, too - if you think your vet violated them, report them.
A blood test for a cat costs between £80 and £140 a time, depending on the tests needed, where the vet is located and where the lab is located. How many blood tests did the cat have, and what other tests? How much were the drugs, how much were the consult fees? They all stack up. You'd be surprised at how tight a vet's margins are on actual services rendered.
You might also forget that in a typical vet practice, the vet is at the top and earning all the money for the practice, which then needs to filter down and pay for the support network (unlike, say, a supermarket, where the workers are earning the money that gets sucked to the top). That makes a vet's time expensive.
Then she shouldn't have a cat, or should have insurance. Don't blame the vet for your partner's nativity and inability to afford to keep an animal. Keeping a pet is not a right, but a privilege that can turn out to be expensive if you care about the welfare of the pet.
They have to try and do this (then dispose of the drugs) if the drugs are controlled (which, if they asked for them back, they probably were).
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Soldato
Vet sounds fair enough to me. Why should they give you the animal without being paid for the work they've done? (Well unless they've got a good relationship with you as an existing client.) Or at the very least a deposit and a repayment plan!
£20 a day extra sounds OK. Cattery is £12 a day here so an extra £8 isn't bad for the fact that you're getting trained nurses and vets and a bit of a deterrent to stop you just ignoring it.
For the future I'd suggest two things. Firstly, don't expect the Vet to work for free. If you don't want to pay a vets bill don't take the animal to the vets. Simples. Who works for free these days? Secondly, get some insurance! http://www.petplan.co.uk/
£20 a day extra sounds OK. Cattery is £12 a day here so an extra £8 isn't bad for the fact that you're getting trained nurses and vets and a bit of a deterrent to stop you just ignoring it.
For the future I'd suggest two things. Firstly, don't expect the Vet to work for free. If you don't want to pay a vets bill don't take the animal to the vets. Simples. Who works for free these days? Secondly, get some insurance! http://www.petplan.co.uk/
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Caporegime
By way of comparison, this is no different to holding a lien over a document in the professional world. Except here the "document" is alive and it costs money to keep it that way.
Soldato
Stop being stingy. Just buy her a new cat.
give people an inch, they will take a mile.
The vet is within their rights and its exactly what i would have done.
If they let you off, they will be waiting 10 times as long for their cash. You will find the cash, and you will get your kitty back soon.
I don't excuse vets extortionate charges though.
The vet is within their rights and its exactly what i would have done.
If they let you off, they will be waiting 10 times as long for their cash. You will find the cash, and you will get your kitty back soon.
I don't excuse vets extortionate charges though.
Soldato
What makes you think they are extortionate? Do you know the typical margins an independent practice runs?
Are they just extortionate because you feel that the cost of getting a cat better is often equivalent to the cost of a new TV?
Permabanned
They don't generally, I got my cat's nails clipped by the vet for £10 and it took about 10 minutes.
Associate
That really is absurd. I'd threaten to report the vet to trading standards. If he doesn't budge, then pay him and THEN report him to trading standards.
Soldato
Why? Based on what? What qualifies your opinion that "it should not cost £200"? Do you know someone who could do the same procedure for £100? £10? £50? If so, go to them.
Fact is, you don't actually have a clue how much it costs a vet to perform an operation. I hope to enlighten you:
While the procedure may last 10 minutes, you are perhaps forgetting:
- Insurance to have the pet in the premises around the staff
- Insurance for the staff's liability to the animal
- Paying for the nurses to assess (professionally) and look after the cat before and after treatment
- Paying for assistants to clean up after and feed the cat
- Paying for someone to prep the theatre
- Paying for someone to sterilise all of the utensils and theatre equipment, and clean up after the operation
- Paying for someone to prep the cat
- Paying for a saline drip and needles
- Paying for a catheter (used in most operations, even short ones, where a cat is anaesthetised)
- Paying for the electricity for the operation, the maintenance of the monitoring machines and other equipment used
- Paying for the drugs to anaesthetise the cat
- Paying for the administrator to transcribe the vet's case notes
- Paying for the administrator to fill out the drug log
- Paying for the followup consultation
- Paying for the vet to do the operation - who while doing the operation cannot take any consults or earn any new custom for the practice - and the vet is the only person who can do this
Now, remembering that a cheap-as-chips, probably not-very-good solicitor from somewhere like leaglbrokers.co.uk start at £110 per hour (nearly £20 per 10 minutes), and that the professional is vastly oversubscribed, does that help put £200 for a short operation performed by a fully qualified surgeon into perspective for you?
It is sad for the veterinary industry that we're so used to healthcare not costing us a penny, which doesn't give people a point of reference.
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