Venting...Another trip to that petstore.....

[My Kiwi]

One of my dogs has renal (kidney) disease so I have to feed her KD by Hills Science diet, nothing else. For some reason all the vet offices local to me are out of it. I imagine whoever delivers is out it as to why, strange really. Everyone said they would have it next week. I need it now. So, last place I call is Banfield at Petsmart. Here we go again. I ask if they carry it and the woman says yes. So I go over there on lunch and they ask for my prescription card at checkout. I am like "huh", Why didn't the lady mention that when I called? I asked if she could call my vets office. She says "no, we will need them to fax us her medical records". I tell her Sammy has renal disease and actually I have had her there before last year for a bladder infection which turns out was a result of the disease. I cannot feed her anything else. I need it today ! She looks it up, still says No, thats not good enough. I am thinking ...what does she think I am going to do with it.....smoke it or somthing ??? It's not like doggie downers or anything. So I get back to work and call my vets office. "Sure, we will fax it right over". Cool ! Nope, I call about 1 1/2 hrs. later. No fax. The girl says (different one) we don't keep paper faxes, whatever that is supposed to mean, "well I can just call over there for ya" !!!!
So I go over there later and she says my office just keeps putting her on hold . Fine ! I will just go check out the birds while she tries again.
While I am over there, I feel a "whoosh" and see somthing out of the corner of my eye. It's a cute little finch loose in the store ! I go tell an associate and she says "It's been out for about 3 1/2 weeks now, we can't catch it" I look up at the very high ceilings.....
I can just see it now....pecking holes into all the bags of birdseed and treats. It looked very well fed ! I sure do hope it is okay....just that mental picture was funny to me.
I did finally get the food, with no records faxed. She says I will need to bring Sammy in again within 6 months to use the rx card. With clock out time from work, it cost me $30 plus the overpriced food and no lunch. Customer service seriously sucks nowadays. There and everywhere else it seems. Oh....and I was #11 in line as there was only one register open as usual.

[Irish]

Sounds like the local Banfield in the PetSmart near our house. When I first moved here, I used them for the woofmeisters 'cause I didn't know of anywhere else. Their money-grubbing attitudes, long waits for service, uncaring checkers and overpriced services and supplies quickly convinced me to look elsewhere. Thankfully, we found a wonderful vet not too far away, and he and his small office staff give wonderful, caring service. We're so thankful that we no longer have to put up with Banfield's typical corporate attitude.

BTW--your next bird should be a blue-headed pionus. That way I can live vicariously through you. I love those pretty, sweet little things! LOL!

[jimpierce7]

Hey ya know who has great Customer service? The best I have ever seen since my Grandma Shoestore retired from the shoe biz some 40 years ago.......................no kidding either................a brand new, just opened its doors Home Depot. Ok, I can here you laughing but it was true!!! There was a rep at every isle waiting to help and actually ASKING if I needed help...............yeah it lasted 3 days then went to like all other Home Depots.

[birdsnthings]

All for dog food? I am amazed! Would have been pretty pissed too but amazed.
Alice

[The Outlaw]

Usually, when dogs are put on special diets, it involves lamb and rice formulas. I would have simply cooked! You could have saved yourself a lot of craziness and had a better product for less.

Lamb and rice are used because of the early slaughter time for lambs. They don't live long enough to ingest toxins from the food chain. Rice is highly digestible and easy on systems.

We have gotten so used to everything being done for us that we rarely think of alternatives. I would, in the future, simply note the ingredients in the prepared foods and replicate it when the product isn't available. JMHO

[My Kiwi]

Great idea ! I checked the ingredients. The first ones are brewers rice, pork fat, dried egg, & flaxseed. I suppose I could of cooked her ground turkey, brown rice, & egg beaters !

Originally Posted by The Outlaw

Usually, when dogs are put on special diets, it involves lamb and rice formulas. I would have simply cooked! You could have saved yourself a lot of craziness and had a better product for less.

Lamb and rice are used because of the early slaughter time for lambs. They don't live long enough to ingest toxins from the food chain. Rice is highly digestible and easy on systems.

We have gotten so used to everything being done for us that we rarely think of alternatives. I would, in the future, simply note the ingredients in the prepared foods and replicate it when the product isn't available. JMHO

[My Kiwi]

Yup. Sounds like our Home Depots. They switched to a new computerized inventory/ordering system and now they are always out of stuff. We usually have to go to 2 of them for whatever project we are working on.

Originally Posted by jimpierce7

Hey ya know who has great Customer service? The best I have ever seen since my Grandma Shoestore retired from the shoe biz some 40 years ago.......................no kidding either................a brand new, just opened its doors Home Depot. Ok, I can here you laughing but it was true!!! There was a rep at every isle waiting to help and actually ASKING if I needed help...............yeah it lasted 3 days then went to like all other Home Depots.

[My Kiwi]

BTW--your next bird should be a blue-headed pionus. That way I can live vicariously through you. I love those pretty, sweet little things! LOL!

Sounds good to me Irish !

[Irish]

"The first ones are brewers rice, pork fat, dried egg, & flaxseed"

When you think of it, that's a pretty poor showing for a high-priced dog food! Brewer's rice is leftover from the ale-brewing process, and who wants to feed their dog that crap? I agree with Nancy. Cook up some brown rice and lamb, add some egg and oil (the flaxseed--pork fat is probably more for flavor), and your dog will be much better off. Bet you'll notice a nice, shiny coat before too long, too!

If you want decent-quality store dog food, look at the ingredient labels. The first couple of ingredients should be the protein source. After that, rice. There shouldn't be a lot of other "junk" in there, and there should never, ever, be corn. Remember that the pet food industry isn't regulated like human foods are, and they can put all sorts of inedible and disgusting stuff in there (from leather to euthanized dogs). Watch the ingredient list, or make it yourself. Some good brands are the "Dog Lover's Soul" brand, Canidae, etc. Any high-end dog supply store should have good brands, and Costco's own Kirkland brand dog food is pretty darn good, too (and a lot cheaper). Those other brands will run you about $1/lb., which is definitely no more expensive than what you're paying for the Science Diet stuff. Making your own food for them is actually less expensive. Also, check out some of the really good canned foods from high-end stores. Many of them are human-grade, and meat only.

Beautiful woofies, btw :-).

[FeathersNFur8]

If you want decent-quality store dog food, look at the ingredient labels.

I went back to feeding raw. I have small dogs, so it's all ground, even the bone. No matter how high the quality of kibble, I just ran into too many problems. The dogs do so much better on raw, or some people refer to it as BARF.