Pia compares it to if she had left her car at a repair shop, which fails to fix it.
- If I then go to another workshop and get the car repaired, I can request the money back from the first one, she says.
But that's not how animal care works. This is because it is excluded from the Consumer Services Act. In the legal sense, animals count as a thing, you can claim a purchase if there is something wrong with the dog - but not wrong care.
In Pia's case, it started with her 11-year-old chihuahua scratching her eyes. She was first referred to an eye specialist. An MRI of the whole body was then carried out and she underwent an allergy investigation. All this cost around SEK 40,000. Fortunately, most of it was covered by her dog insurance, but a large part of the maximum amount was used up. For Pia, the cost was around SEK 10,000.
According to Pia, she asked the vet at the very first examination to check the chihuahua's teeth, as she knew that it is common for them to have problems with them.
- She said they looked nice. I asked them to check them again the next time, when the dog was sedated, and they said the same thing again, says Pia.
When none of the examinations and treatments suggested by the clinic helped, Pia finally took the dog to the dentist.
- She saw immediately that the gums were inflamed. We had to pull out first seven teeth and then four more, says Pia.
It totaled over SEK 20,000, money that Pia did not have.
- Dental care costs are not covered by the dog insurance, so I have had to borrow from friends, she says.
Pia's dog stopped scratching its eyes after the procedures, she says.
She reported the veterinary clinic to ARN, the General Complaints Board, but was told that the case is not tried there. The only thing you can do is report the vet to the Animal Health and Medical Responsibility Board, but this does not provide any financial compensation. There the case still lies.
The law puts pet owners in a bind, states the Swedish Competition Authority in its report on how veterinary costs have skyrocketed in recent years.
Marie Wiezell at Sweden's Consumers agrees that it is problematic that the Consumer Services Act does not apply to more areas, such as veterinary services.
- We have previously suggested that it should be extended to include more services, such as beauty treatments, hairdressing services and veterinary care, to give consumers stronger protection. Now the vets have a huge advantage in knowledge and it is very difficult for an ordinary consumer to question whether a proposed and often very expensive investigation is actually necessary, she says.
Another dog owner who has found himself in trouble, albeit in a different way, is Edvard.
They took the beagle Nisse, 3.5 years old, to the vet when he started to wobble and had difficulty standing on his hind legs. Edvard suspected back pain, but the vet concluded that Nisse had probably eaten some foreign object.
- We received dietary advice and assumed that we would walk with him so that he would poo the object, says Edvard.
Later in the day Nisse got worse with neurological symptoms, they called the hospital and were told to give alvedone. The next morning, Nisse was paralyzed in his hind legs. He had a severe herniated disc and they had to carry out emergency surgery.
The care costs came to around SEK 150,000. The vet has admitted that a misjudgment was made and the hospital has offered to pay back the approximately SEK 15,000 that the first examination cost.
Edvard believes that it cannot be ruled out that the misjudgment may have worsened the condition and that the dog might have escaped surgery if it had been given anti-inflammatory drugs and prescribed rest at the first visit.
He also reported the case to ARN and requested compensation for the SEK 80,000 that was not covered by the insurance.
Here, ARN came out with a statement, because the clinic admitted that it had made a mistake. The clinic was asked to reimburse the cost of the first examination. But despite the fact that ARN does not normally engage in veterinary assessments, it sided with the vet, who considered the herniated disc to be so serious that surgery was inevitable.
This case has also been reported to the Animal Health and Medical Care Committee.
Read more:
Veterinary prices have skyrocketed: "There are often large costs added"
