Huge bill after cattery stay

dhooper8

Hi all

Hope you can help with this one...

Back in August, my two cats stayed in a local cattery for 2 weeks while we were away on holiday. Our usual cattery couldn't fit us in so they stayed at a place we hadn't tried before.

On the day we returned we collected them immediately. As soon as we got home it was clear that both cats were very unwell. They were dirty and dozy and has a good dose of V & D. We called the cattery but they were closed. Like all pets, V & D is not unusual so we sat on it until the next morning.
The next day they were taken to our local vets to be checked over. The vet was concerned with both and they were given treatment and we were asked to return the next day. On returning, the vet was happy with the progress one of the cats had made but concerned enough to admit the other into a veterinary hospital for an overnight stay. Long story short... £750 bill for the lot. Our cats were not insured at the time.

I have been in contact with the cattery over the last few months to get this sorted. Copies of the invoices for all treatment were sent to cattery as well as their medical records.

The cattery are refusing to pay out. Their stance is that one of the cats was taken to a vets 3 years ago following a stay at a different cattery because he was unwell. This was not serious and the cat was simply a little dehydrated from a hot spell. They are claiming that our cats get unwell each time they go to a cattery and it is not their responsibility. Our cats visit the cattery a few times a year, usually for a 24/48hr visit. The medical records say nothing about any other visits that has resulted in illness.

Where can I go with this?

Please help

HampshireH

The bills sound comparable to otherd who have had pets in the hospital.

You should have had insurance. This would have covered both their stay and their treatement.

I don't think you will get very far with this to be honest

tacpot12

Did you have a contract with the cattery? Do you have anything with their terms & conditions written on?

I think you might have a claim in that if your cats were ill before you collected them and the cattery did not notice or did not take any reasonable action. You decided that the V & D did not need immediate veterinary attention and I expect the cattery also thought that the cats were not ill enough to need immediate attention (which you would have had to pay for), but a good cattery would have told you that the cats were under the weather and that they had thought about taking to the vets but decided they were okay until you returned.

Is your vet prepared to put in writing that the cats were so ill that this should have been apparent to the cattery 24 hrs earlier?

You need some evidence of what the cattery did wrong and that this wrongful act increased your costs significantly. You can refute their allegation that the cats are prone to illness when they stay in a cattery, and point out that they have no evidence of this.

If the cats had been treated by the cattery's vet, you would have been liable for the fees, so you are really arguing about the difference between the cost of treating them 24-36 hrs earlier. You will also need your vet to estimate how much the treatment cost was increased by the cattery's delay.

If you have any evidence that some other failing on the cattery's part cause the illness, e.g. a lack of hygiene, care or design of the cattery, you can work this into your claim. You need to write a letter to them setting you what you thing they are liable for and why. If you want to make this a "letter before action" you can, but I would probably just ask them to call me within 48 hrs to discuss, and only then sent a letter before action. I would give them another 48 hrs to think about it in the letter before action, before starting a money claim.

KiKi

I think the issue is whether or not the cattery played a part in them being unwell. Was it, as another poster suggested, poor hygiene? Treated badly? Not fed properly? Litter trays unclean? Mixing them with cats that have an obvious infectious disease?

If not, I'm not sure you can get any compensation for the vet bill. It could have been stress from being somewhere different, an airborne cat illness that wasn't obvious in another cat, a bad case of GE from eating a different food etc.

You'd need to prove it was down to something they have / haven't done, and the only way to do that is to get more info from your vet on the actual cause of the V&D (which the vet may not be able to tell you anyway), and work out whether the cause could be the cattery. If it could have been food - then that's just really bad luck. Some cats have extreme reactions to food which causes bad GE.

Forget trying to argue with them over your cat being ill from a previous visit, don't get caught up in that. Just be really clear with them on *this* issue: the vet has medical evidence that the cause is x, and x could only have been caused by poor hygiene etc. If you can't be that crystal clear, then I can't see you have a case.

One other point - it *might* be possible that there's some truth in what the cattery have said (even if you don't want to hear it!). You said your cats usually go to a cattery for 24/48 hours. Perhaps not long enough to pick up germs from other cats, not long enough to get really stressed that they don't regulate their water intake properly, not long enough to create gastro issues through food. This was two weeks. It's possible, therefore, that the length of time played a part in it. And as one of them was dehydrated from a cattery trip before it's possible that for longer cattery trips your cats get more stressed and don't drink enough. I know you're excusing it as a hot spell of weather - which maybe is the case - but actually, perhaps visits that are longer than 24/48 hours are causing your cats to stop regulating their water intake or creating more stress.

I know it's a lot of money, but try and look at it this way: had your cat died from it (and some do from bad V&D because it so quickly leads to dehydration), you'd be desperately wishing it had only been a £750 bill.

KiKi

As an aside, one of my cats gets very mild cat flu every time she goes to the vet. Every. Single. Time. After the vet trip, I know that three days later she'll start sneezing. She's vulnerable to it because of her history, and it's airborne - nothing they can do to stop it. They are the most hygienic vets I know, absolutely clinical about it, but poor S's URT can't cope!

The point is, it happens, and it's not always someone's fault - but this is where good insurance can be a lifeline!

Glad your cat's well now.

Vet

KiKi wrote: »

As an aside, one of my cats gets very mild cat flu every time she goes to the vet. Every. Single. Time. After the vet trip, I know that three days later she'll start sneezing. She's vulnerable to it because of her history, and it's airborne - nothing they can do to stop it. They are the most hygienic vets I know, absolutely clinical about it, but poor S's URT can't cope!

The point is, it happens, and it's not always someone's fault - but this is where good insurance can be a lifeline!

Glad your cat's well now.

This may be cat flu signs secondary to feline herpes virus. Much like cold sores in people, the clinical signs become apparent during times of "stress" e.g. going to the vets. It lies latent within the body, so is always ready to become active during these stressful times.

You can have a swab performed to prove the likely cause, however, it provides little benefit as a very large proportion of the feline community are carriers of the disease.

The international cat care website discusses this in much greater detail if you're interested.

KiKi

Vet wrote: »

This may be cat flu signs secondary to feline herpes virus. Much like cold sores in people, the clinical signs become apparent during times of "stress" e.g. going to the vets. It lies latent within the body, so is always ready to become active during these stressful times.

You can have a swab performed to prove the likely cause, however, it provides little benefit as a very large proportion of the feline community are carriers of the disease.

The international cat care website discusses this in much greater detail if you're interested.

Hiya - yes, I'm quite certain she's a carrier of the calicci or herpes virus because she was very ill with flu when she was found, and was ill for 6 months after that. She definitely has a compromised immune system, bless her heart - she has other issues with her mouth and allergies and skin. The vet offered a swab, but it's not going to change what we do with her in terms of treatment for her ailments so I declined. I'm very certain she's a carrier, though, given what she experiences. As you said, it's a dip in immunity after the stress of the vets. Thanks for the link as well.

elsien

I would ask whether their insurance could potentially cover any bills.
My first dog became ill and died while in kennels. It was something that she'd had before, but not something that was expected to recur. And she was old so not as well able to fight infections off.

The kennels said they would run it past their insurance but weren't sure if it would be paid or not. Their insurer accepted the claim and the bill was covered.
I have no idea of the ins and outs of this because I would have paid the bill without any issues if I'd needed to. It wasn't the kennels fault my dog became ill, it was just one of those things.
I suppose the question for you is whether there is a clear causal link between the illness and the specific cattery, and how easy that would be to prove.

As an aside, there are more stringent licencing conditions that have recently come in so if you are unhappy with the standard of care provided perhaps you could contact the relevant council.