£12.50 Charge For Perscription From Vet

simontheiceman

BTW £100 (inc VAT) OOH includes the consultation fee so the actual OOH fee is £78 (inc VAT) (Consult fee £22).

simontheiceman

If I'm in the building and its just past the end of surgery and I am not "called back" then I charge £35 for an "emergency consultation". I also charge these to clients who can wait a bit e.g. I will batch a few and see them on a Sunday morning for instance (collecting the saturday evening and sundary morning calls in one go). In my experience I am far more likely to get paid if I dont try and be greedy. I would far rather have some money for definite than the promise that I might be paid.

MrsE_2

simontheiceman wrote: »

"Going rate" for OOH is about £100(inc VAT) for late evening / early morning in Northwest England and I cant see me going up from this in the near to medium term future, as it is already quite large. My experience and knowledge would suggest that the OOH fee varies little across the country. There are practices who charge much less and much more (the SPVS fee survey bears this out as does the data I get from my accountant.).

This fee does go up for calls at "stupid o clock" (to £140 inc VAT) and I have no problems with a stupidly large fee at that time, as the vast majority of calls in the small hours should have/could have been dealt with hours earlier. I did get a call at 4-20 the other morning for a HBC cat - now that was a real emergency and about the first silly hours call that has been genuine / necessary for the last 5 years or so. The outcome was not good but at least the cat is at peace.

Whats a HBC cat?
Is that what Ted died of? Affecting the heart?
TBH I'm not bothered about the money, I would have paid 10 times (& more)that to have him here with us now.
I just think they charge well, they should have given us some dignity. For £120 I don't think 10 minutes would have been too much, as it was I got about 5 minutes before the cleaner started mopping around me.

~Chameleon~

MrsE wrote: »

Whats a HBC cat?

Hit By Car.

simontheiceman

MrsE wrote: »

Whats a HBC cat?
Is that what Ted died of? Affecting the heart?
TBH I'm not bothered about the money, I would have paid 10 times (& more)that to have him here with us now.
I just think they charge well, they should have given us some dignity. For £120 I don't think 10 minutes would have been too much, as it was I got about 5 minutes before the cleaner started mopping around me.

The cleaner thing is disgraceful and very unprofessional. Staff would have to answer for that kind of action if it happened here.... As I said earlier it is important to be very diplomatic around pets that have passed away - quite often the majority of complaints arise from these times as well as the most compliments. I am staggered by how often clients say thanks for how we handled the last minutes. In the same way I am surprised that they rarely acknowledge work that ended up with a live pet!
It would be easy to underestimate the impact the death of a pet has on a family and I would equate this with the loss of a member of the family (not v v close), and taking this in mind affects how you act around the client at these times.

missbargain

QUOTE: "I am staggered by how often clients say thanks for how we handled the last minutes. In the same way I am surprised that they rarely acknowledge work that ended up with a live pet!"

Perhaps it is because most people, including myself, expect from vets to keep their pets healthy and, hopefully, alive. After all, that's what we are paying them for. Having said that, I always say "thank you", it was just the way I was brought up.

And the reason why people profuselly thank you (or any other vet) for handling the last minutes, is because people like to receive a bit of sensitivity and compassion in those moments, and, perhaps you might be surprised, but not every vet (doctor, nurse, etc, etc, I am not singling anyone in here) has the kind of personality, awareness or manners to give them such respect and sensitivity. I have friends whose parents forced them to study to be doctors, dentist etc., but in reality, they would not have chosen to do that, so they don't neccessarily have the type of caring personality that anyone in caring profession should have, in addition to the skills and knowledge to look after the patients.

Just how many times have I met doctors, nurses, one vet, pediatricians that have such sensitive, caring and gentle manner, I would think that they would have been beter suited to a job in stonemasonery than to the caring professions.

I don't know you, but you sound like an emphatetic person, but not everyone is like that, and that's why people thank you, because they recognize and appreciate your sensitivity in, for them, very difficult moments.

missbargain

P.S.
Also, I completely agree that the cleaner has acted highly inappropriately in this sad sitation. However, most cleaners I know of, lead pretty tough lives, and their first thought is to finish their cleaning and get out of there. And, lets not beat around the bush, cleaner or not, some people just don't have the kind of awareness and sensitivity that was the paramount in this situation, as discussed in my previous post.

What I am trying to say is that it is the Vet practice in question who should have instructed their cleaner, and all their staff for that matter, as what is the appropriate conduct in these situations. After all, the practice probably has sad events like this happenning on a regular basis, so for them to fail to instruct their staff as what is the expected standard of behaviour, is plain wrong and out of order. Yes, some people need to be told/tought, better to be safe than sorry, like in this case.

God knows what background the cleaner comes from, perhaps he/she really had no idea that they had done anything wrong. Actually, it is obvious that they think they did not do anything wrong, otherwise, they would not have done it in the first place.

I still think that it is the vet practice who bears the ultimate responsibility for what has happened here (they were probably too busy counting MrsE's money to care) and should apologise to MrsE and send some nice flowers, IMHO.

MrsE_2

simontheiceman wrote: »

It would be easy to underestimate the impact the death of a pet has on a family and I would equate this with the loss of a member of the family (not v v close), and taking this in mind affects how you act around the client at these times.

I got to disagree with the bit in red, it really was only second to my DH or DD going, I know that may sound odd to some & would have to me before I got Ted.
My DH is a big very butch bloke & he broke down crying when we got home after the cremation. I've seen him bury relatives & not react like that.

I'm reading it again, do you mean it really is like loosing a family member not even close too, but really is or its like loosing a not very very close family member?

MrsE_2

missbargain wrote: »

I still think that it is the vet practice who bears the ultimate responsibility for what has happened here (they were probably too busy counting MrsE's money to care) and should apologise to MrsE and send some nice flowers, IMHO.

My neighbour (who has a mini zoo) won't use them, she goes to one in the town. But I thought it handy in case of emergency to be with the village one, but in the case of emergency I had to go to the bigger branch further away anyway.
I never did ask her why she wouldn't use them.
Thanks for the thought, I don't want anything from them except for them to show the next person this happens to a bit of respect & dignity in their loss.

missbargain

I agree MrsE. Most of us would like to have a nice, caring practice locally, both for the cases of emergency and also, the practicalities of daily life.
I hope that, when they get your letter (flowers aside), they take a look at their conduct and make sure they don't do it again to the next person in the same situation.

Funnily, I also wanted to point out to the "v.v.close" member of family in Simon's post.
I don't have any children, and my Zebs is my child, the same as Ted was to you. I am not implying that loosing a cat is the same as loosing a child (God forbid), but they are still v.v. close part of our family, they are very deeply loved and cared for, and I hope that all vets bear that in mind.

MrsE, I forgot to tell you, I showed Ted's picks to my husband last night. Now, he is quite a cool character, not excesivelly gushy or soppy. But when he saw Ted's picture, his face got so soft and he said : Ooooooh, very cute!!! What a beautiful cat!! Look, he is a little Crab (a star sign, I tought him about that). Then he saw the post and said "That is so very, very sad...Poor Ted".
So your Ted is still turning heads and winning hearts, even from the other side:A