Animal Samaritans

Dear Ms. [redacted], I received your letter regarding a complaint from Ms. [redacted], complaint #[redacted]8, and have spent the morning looking into it.   This is what my phone records, emails, and staff discussions reveal:   Monday, October 31: Ms. [redacted] brought in Spanky for a pet exam...

with one of our veterinarians. During the exam, the doctor reported that on the left cranial abdominal nipple there was a small mass.   Also, Spanky had some dental tartar.  Otherwise, the doctor determined Spanky was healthy.  The doctor’s treatment plan included a level 1 removal of the mass on Spanky’s nipple and a dental cleaning. We have four levels of mass removal;  level 1 is the simplest level of mass removal.  The owner stated she wanted the mass removed but not the dental cleaning.  She said she would call to schedule an appointment.   Following Spanky’s exam, Ms. [redacted] asked our front desk employee if she could schedule a surgery appointment for her dog.  The employee informed her that all surgery appointments go through our scheduling department, as our veterinarians often have clients booked several days out in advance (just as when we humans need a doctor’s appointment, and our surgeon does not have an opening as soon as we’d like).     4:32pm.  At 4:32pm, our scheduling department received a phone call from ###-###-####, which is Ms. [redacted]’s phone number.  The call was a hang up; the caller did not leave a message.   Tuesday, November 1: At 7:45am, our scheduler reviewed Ms. [redacted]’s estimate form for Spanky, and saw that Spanky was approved for a level 1 mass removal.   7:49am, our scheduler called Ms. [redacted] to schedule an appointment for Sparky’s level one surgery.  Ms. [redacted] did not answer her call, and our scheduler left a message for her to please call us back to schedule an appointment.   12:31pm: We retrieved a phone message from a caller at ###-###-####, which is Ms. [redacted]’s phone number.  The caller did not leave her name or her phone number.  Our scheduler reports that on the voice message the caller (Ms. [redacted]) sounded very angry and was rude. She stated that she is at work and cannot be on the phone all day trying to get ahold of us, and we are not to call her while she is at work. She also acknowledged that we had called her in the morning, but stated that she didn’t answer our call because it was from an unknown phone number—and it was our fault she didn’t answer our call because we called her from an unknown phone number.  *We have no control over what caller ID services she might use, or why her phone might say “unknown caller.”   12:41pm: Ms. [redacted] sent us the following email through our website: “Is there a reason why you don’t have anyone that answers your phone? I have been trying to schedule a surgical procedure all morning of my dog that needs to be taken care of ASAP and I cannot get through. This is unacceptable. I’m taking my business elsewhere.”   12:45pm: Our Scheduler informed our Clinic Manger of Ms. [redacted] voice message and email, and our Clinic Manager Called Ms. [redacted].  Ms. [redacted] did not answer this time either. Our Clinic Manager left a voice message with specific days and times for Ms. [redacted] to choose from for Spanky’s lump removal.  She even left Ms. [redacted] her direct phone number.   Ms. [redacted] never returned her call.   We did our best to reach Ms. [redacted], initiating the phone call for her pet’s level 1 surgery appointment; both times we called her she did not answer.  Both times Ms. [redacted] called Animal Samaritans, she failed to state who she was, what her phone number was, or how to reach her. She told us not to call her at work, but did not tell us when or how best we could reach her.  She hung up the first time she called us, and the second time she yelled at us and blamed us for calling her from an “unknown number.”   She also said it was our fault she didn’t answer her call.   [redacted] Animal Samaritans, CEO ###-###-#### animalsamaritans.org