Vets - why do they do it! + flea/bedding question.

murphydog999

RIP extra flea spray 600ml vet wants £23+ sells everywhere else from £9! Why do you ALWAYS get the feeling they are ripping you off!!

By the way, if I've washed all the bedding, hoovered mattress etc etc, what do I do with the duvet? Way to big for washing machine, dry clean? Are fleas going to get inside the cover??

Merlin's_Beard

When Amazon buy in quantities of 1000, and the vet buys in quantities of 2-3, who do you think is getting the better price? Especially when the vets will be buying through a distributor because they physically can't liaise with every single company like a large conglomerate can, so there's an extra company to take a slice of profit.

They can't sell things to you at half the price they're buying it in for, and remember, your vets pay their UK business tax and Amazon doesn't!

(Not to mention that when you buy flea treatment via a vets there's an option to talk to someone who can give you advice on the product, and Amazon don't need to pay for 2-3 years of nurse training to provide that...)

sheramber

the same way Tesco can charge more than Asda and Waitrose will charge even more.

My husband had a specialist retail shop.

A local competitor could sell one product at a profit for a price less than mu husband could buy it from the manufacturer. The competitor had a much bigger turn over and could buy 40-50 at a time where my husband could only buy/sell one or two. So there was no point in him buying in any as customers would buy where they were cheaper.

tyllwyd

You could take the duvet to a dry cleaners or if there is a laundrette local to you that might be cheaper. I don't think a duvet cover would be sure to stop fleas unless it was in a fully enclosed duvet cover, but it should slow them down a bit.

teddysmum

My vet once told me that one of the meds I was buying online was only 1p/tablet (costing nearly £1) more than they paid the wholesaler.


It s annoying though that they charge £3 per item (eg bottle of tablets) to dispense, even if it's just a case of reaching to a shelf with no measuring or counting.


I found this out when they only had 2/3 of the tablets needed for a prescription and asked me to collect the rest next time I was in .I was expecting these to cost half of what the 2/3 cost but the price was nearly the same. Query brought the result that it was because of the standard dispensing charge per item and I argued a refund as it was their fault over stocks, that I had two packs of tablets.

sheramber

My friend's dog was prescribed epilepsy tablets. When she got a repeat prescription she was charged a dispensing fee for them to pour some tablets in to a plastic scoop which automatically measured how many tablets there were in it and them pour them into a bottle. They didn't even have to count the number of tablets.

doodle-bug_2

One of my cats tends to stay outside in summer, lodging with hedgehogs! He comes in with some fleas from time to time, even if he is regularly squirted with the good flea stuff - sometimes they jump ship and you see the little blighters.

I don't like using chemicals and find that a steam cleaner sorts them out (the fleas - definitely not the cats)! I wouldn't hesitate to steam clean a duvet (perhaps spread on the kitchen floor) then hang up to air...

Owain_Moneysaver

Put it in the freezer for a few days.

http://fleascience.com/flea-encyclopedia/life-cycle-of-fleas/adult-fleas/how-long-do-fleas-live-for/at-what-temperature-do-fleas-die/

atrixblue.-MFR-.

I bath my lot in fairyup liquid original, that kills em, then I fea treat house with the jhonsons household flea spray, Bed linen on boil wash and duvet steam cleaned, homebargains and aldi are doing pretty cheap steam cleaners that will do the job. I also put 2 dog flea collars in my upright bin, or in a henry bag if you have one that way if you suck up the little blood suckers at least you get a fighting chance of killing it before it escapes the vacuum.

murphydog999

Owain_Moneysaver wrote: »

Put it in the freezer for a few days.

http://fleascience.com/flea-encyclopedia/life-cycle-of-fleas/adult-fleas/how-long-do-fleas-live-for/at-what-temperature-do-fleas-die/

Easier said than done with a super-king size duvet!!

murphydog999

I've got a steam cleaner, I never thought to use it on the duvet. I don't think the cat would like it much!

The suppliers of the RIP spray were not Amazon, I understand the volume principle but theres a BIG difference between £23 and £9. I don't know whether that says more about the product/producers than the retailer. (I got Indorex in the end anyway)