>Yet he will still give me his time, often free of charge or for a very small fee

Same here.  You have to treasure them don't you?

I am very fortunate to have wonderful vets- country large/ small animal practice. Fees are kept as low as possible,don't have all singing and dancing facilities but have expertise, care and love of animals in spades. I know I can call out and get a vet who knows my animals 24/7- I treasure them!

@ Mastifflover
Actually I do know the mark up - or the 'loading' that the vets put on resale of certain meds. I have a friend who works in a local vet (not mine), and she has checked a couple of products I've asked about. I do also know that they cannot get them as cheaply as I can them online. One example...the vet purchases optimmune for £28 cost, I can get it for £23. BUT and this is the big but....the charge to buy it through the surgery is £58. Mark up of more than 100%. IMHO that is plain robbery, and the short sightedness is that they are pricing themselves out, and more and more people will look elsewhere. If they added £10 to each sale of Optimmune giving a customer vet price of £38, people may not be searching elsewhere, as the price may fall into what they consider 'reasonable'.

The cost of a vet and their expertise should be reflected in their consultancy/surgery charge (and is) for their knowledge and expertise. Handing out the relevant preparation to treat the condition shouldn't be so overtly overblown.  As to vets income, if they own their practice they are certainly not in the lower earnings bracket, and nor should they be, but I don't think for a minute that they should be considered 'hard up and needing to charge these exorbitant medication costs.

> .the charge to buy it through the surgery is £58. Mark up of more than 100%. IMHO that is plain robbery, and the short sightedness is that they are pricing themselves out, and more and more people will look elsewhere. If they added £10 to each sale of Optimmune giving a customer vet price of £38, people may not be searching elsewhere, as the price may fall into what they consider 'reasonable'.

Dont forget though that a lot of customers will have insurance that will cover the cost so wont bother to find a cheaper source of a drug. If they lower the price they will lose all that nice insurance  money. I suppose they could have two sets of prices, one for insurance cases and another for people who pay their own bills  but then the insurance companies would have proof they are being fleeced!

>The cost of a vet and their expertise should be reflected in their consultancy/surgery charge (and is) for their knowledge and expertise.

And for the upkeep of their equipment that we would all (understandably) expect to be available at any time, day or night, every day of the year. If the correct cost was put onto a consultancy charge it would be like that of the referral hospitals, where a consult charge is about £200.

Very true Jeangenie. My vet charges what I consider a fair mark up on drugs and I accept it as a part of their income-they often 'forget' my consult fee for an ongoing problem. My vets are far from wealthy!

just tagging on the end here.

Whilst I understand all the arguments about vet's deserving just payment for many years training and expertise etc, my problem is that we also have farm animals and the costs are far lower. Large animal vets train for just as long, need just as much equipment yet essentially their time is regarded as being worth less? That says to me that the extra mark up on small animal consults etc is purely because they can get away with it, not because it's justified.
We had a vet come out, about 13 miles from the practice at 11 pm and operate on our sheep (C section) I expect that cost to be under £100. (I'll check though as Im not sure) If I'd DRIVEN to the vets with my dog at that time, for ANYTHING it would have been far more.

We've had a 30kg PTS on farm for £5.  how much for a 30kg dog? It's the same drug, costs are the same (or less as usually a dog will be in surgery )

and I've never know my vets to forget the fee for anything!! especially now as they are an ever growing practice with different branches and getting more glitzy by the year, I much preferred the small mixed animal vets they were when we joined them, 30 years ago.

>my problem is that we also have farm animals and the costs are far lower. Large animal vets train for just as long, need just as much equipment yet essentially their time is regarded as being worth less?

Large animal vets are generally subsidising the farmers because farms are businesses, not hobbies/luxuries. If the farm vet passed the correct fee on to the farmer either the farm stock wouldn't get treated or the farm would go bust. Would you rather be subsidised or go out of business?

> Large animal vets are generally subsidising the farmers because farms are businesses, not hobbies/luxuries.

Thats very charitable of them! so how do these charitable vets make a living then? By charging pet owners exorbitant fees? thats hardly fair on the pet owners.

>Thats very charitable of them! so how do these charitable vets make a living then?

Yes, it is very charitable of them. :-) It's nice that someone appreciates that! Mostly they end up dropping the large animal work. farmers in my area have a very limited choice of vets they can use; 10 years ago all the pracrtices did large animal work - now it's only one within a 30-mile radius.

>By charging pet owners exorbitant fees? thats hardly fair on the pet owners.

No, by charging pet owners (whose living doesn't depend on their animals but have chosen to have them as a luxury) a realistic affordable rate.

And for the upkeep of their equipment that we would all (understandably) expect to be available at any time, day or night, every day of the year. If the correct cost was put onto a consultancy charge it would be like that of the referral hospitals, where a consult charge is about £200.

Most vets do not have anything remotely approaching the equipment or specialised knowledge the referral centres have.  That's why referral centres exist. So why would a 'correct consultancy fee' be anything like that of a referral centre. That doesn't make any sense. Our out of hours service who call themselves a veterinary hospital don't even have much in the way of sophisticated equipment, and if you have an out of hours visit, that's about £150 to walk through the door, so you are paying extra for that service anyway. My normal 'consult fee' doesn't apply other than in normal surgery hours.

I don't have a downer on vets, a good vet is solid gold. But I do see flaws.  I am amazed that treating farm animals cost so much less, I didn't know that. It's clear that small animal practice is more lucrative.

I think that there are a few people on here who have never seen a set of company accounts and have no idea of the overheads etc that companies incur. Also have no idea of costings and the decisions necessary to set charges in order to ensure that the company makes a profit at the end of the year which is necessary to pay for future repairs/renovations/replacement of old equipment etc Vets are medical professionals first - they are not trained financial experts and some may not make the best choices - but they are only human like the rest of us !

It is easy to sit and criticise - try running a company of any size first :)

(Not aimed at ChinaBlue - just tagging on the end)

I think that there are a few people on here who have never seen a set of company accounts and have no idea of the overheads etc that companies incur. Also have no idea of costings and the decisions necessary to set charges in order to ensure that the company makes a profit at the end of the year which is necessary to pay for future repairs/renovations/replacement of old equipment etc Vets are medical professionals first - they are not trained financial experts and some may not make the best choices - but they are only human like the rest of us !

This is so true. We run a business, OH is a builder with over 40 years certified experience. The insurances/equipment/expertise/vehicles/etc.. are costly to maintain.
We quote £10,000 to build a small extension just a utility maybe... OH knows the planners, knows the laws, knows what he can and cannot do. You get a good job, legal, safe and tidy..
Joe blogs who has just been made redundant and thinks himself a bit of a DIY'er set up as a builder..no insurance (Who needs it !) no equipment (Borrow some somewhere) no expertise (Don't need that its easy) Builds over a main drain, doesn't make the footings deep enough, bodged the electrics and walks away with your  (NICE PRICE £ 7000). Then the planners step in...can't build over the drain, have to move it ( Sorry builders not available ). Then the  electrics go wrong, ( House burns down).. claim off the builders insurance (Oh sorry not got any ) Roof leaks, (Nothing to do with the builders lack of knowledge ) ...
So The £10,000 we charge is actually a much better deal than the £7,000 the bodger charges.
Getting a good deal is far more then the price, expertise/knowledge /skill/insurances/equipment etc.. are what you are paying for.
My vet is worth her weight in gold. I am happy to accept that the mark up on meds goes some way towards offsetting other costs.
Aileen

My OH runs his own business and I am Company Secretary of a large organisation, so I do know a bit about costs and overheads, but to imply that a view is wrong because people dont' 'understand' business is also wrong, and seeks to justify unacceptable practises. I think most of us know what is acceptable and what is not  This appears to be a situation where we must agree to differ. My criticism is only of the mark up on medication, not expertise.

If you (as I am) are disputing the cost of medication then getting a good deal IS the price, and that doesn't reflect either way on a vets ability. I too would be happy to accept a mark up on meds, if it is REASONABLE, which it always used to be. When it isn't reasonable then I don't and won't accept it. My cherished vet moved away a couple of years ago, and I was devastated. Still am as I have yet to find another that I really connect with or completely trust, so I know the 'value' of a good vet, and the cost of meds doesn't come into it.

Sorry, I don't get the comparison to a dodgy builder, not a logical analogy.

Well there is at least one Vet who is showing concern about Fee's:

Vetsonline - Are vet surgeons unnecessarily charging clients to make ends meet?

"I am becoming increasingly concerned by the fees some veterinary surgeons apparently have to charge to make a living these days."

And the response: Vetsonline - Educate owners on costs, dont apologise for fees

"Francis E Hunter's letter (February 11 issue) highlights the commonly held view that veterinary fees are becoming excessive. This is a serious issue and I believe that rather than apologising for the cost of animal health care, we must educate pet owners about the reality of keeping an animal."

Very interesting reading :)

> £28 cost, I can get it for £23. BUT and this is the big but....the charge to buy it through the surgery is £58. Mark up of more than 100%. IMHO that is plain robbery,

A rough quide to standard mark up for a retail price is 2.4 x the cost price. £28 x 2.4 = £67.20

(I am only going on the fact that I manufacture products and the wholsale price we set is worked out on the fact that a retailer wants to able to apply the magic equation of x 2.4, the fact that I can make varying amounts between 50% and 500% per item is not their concern ;) - they just need their x 2.4)

(Just tagging on to the end)

Curious: those of you who think it is so horrible for vets to make a profit on medication, do you also think it as bad that petshops add a similar amount to the cost of dog food? Certainly when I was able to buy from a wholesaler I paid less than half of what the petshops charged for the exact same food. What about groomers? You could do the job for a fraction of the cost yourself, yet people go to groomers, sometimes just for baths. Yet it only seems to be the vets that get the bad reactions, why?

I'm sure that if vets were forced to charge less for medication all other costs would increase instead, so it would not make a difference to your final vet bill. At home in Sweden you don't get ANY medication from your vet, you get a prescription and go to the same chemist you would collect your own prescriptions from. It doesn't mean it is cheaper than here to go to the vet (or cheap to get medication), far from it.

Interesting article giving opposing views from vets themselves.

I work in a vets - I can GUARANTEE we don't make as much as you think.

We order from a distributer who supplies vets, doctors, dentists, etc. The price from this company is significantly more than the cost of buying online - but how can you guarantee the products you buy online are genuine? And are not sat in a hot van for hours somewhere? you can't - where our distributor is guaranteed to have stored all drugs appropriately.

I'm going to add, we also run a loss on all routine surgeries (meaning spays and castrations) as this is highly competitive between practices. With the exception of things such as lumpectomies, orthopedics, etc we do not profit from surgery.

For each spay/castration we need around £100 of equipment. We need drapes for surgery which cost between £3.50 and £8.00 each (and are disposed of after surgery). We use a suction machine costing £500 which needs a new filter every month at a cost of £15 each and needing annual maintenance/repairs which cost £225+VAT last year. Theres the anaesthetic machine costing around £700 with annual maintenance plus the gas itself (around £20) and the oxygen machine which is £650. The ECG is £1550 and the steriliser is £3500. Then theres the £1500 table, lighting, the actual room, etc. Plus sedative medication, antibiotics, painkillers, etc for the animal and the time the vet is spending doing the surgery (along with between 2-4 nurses and sometimes a second vet).

The equipment used in vets is on www.vet-direct.co.uk so you can see how much everything in your vets costs.

Now legally, we cannot charge any extra for insurance than a normal, uninsured client pays. This means we cannot charge less than it costs us and make the money back on insurance like people believe. Many people say to us 'but he/she is not insured' - it doesn't make a difference. Now what we can do with insurance is extra things we don't necessarily do for an uninsured pet - such as lab work on a lump to diagnose it, do more thorough blood work prior to surgery (as opposed to just a pre-anaesthetic blood panel), refer to physio or hydrotherapy, we also charge for things we normally waiver (such as the drip set & fluid, each separate medication as opposed to a combined price, the recheck appointment and stitch removal appointment) as long as the client has a fixed excess and does not pay a percentage of the bill too. Many of our clients have payed 4-5 times our prices at other practices.

We can't possibly charge less than we do, when our mark up on drugs helps to meet the losses we make in other areas. People are welcome to a prescription, but unless its an ongoing repeat we will need to see the pet for a consultation (like you would a doctor) and we are also going to charge a prescription fee. Whether the vet sells the product to you or not - they are the one finding the most suitable product, calculating doses, etc not the online pharmacy you buy from.

Not a particular add-on to any bit of this debate, just an observation: last week I got a prescription for Paige's metacam.  I asked what the in-house cost was for a 100ml bottle - £47 (which incidentally has gone up considerably form the £26 it was a couple of years ago!).  Straight away I said "prescription please!"  The vet reminded me of the £15 prescription fee, and asked if I could get the metacam cheaper than £30 anywhere on line.  He was utterly gobsmacked when I told him I can get it for £10.99 on animed and with free shipping!

>The equipment used in vets is on www.vet-direct.co.uk so you can see how much everything in your vets costs.

But that's just it.  We can't see how much it costs a vet to buy.  As you need to register as a vet to get as far as pricing.   I just searched for the main 4 drugs one of my bitches is on.  It didn't tell me the prices when I just searched. 

I spend well in excess of £100 a month on drugs for Gemma.  She's on 5 drugs, and I didn't add diuretics as she is on the tiniest amount.  But for Vetmedin, Fortekor, Libromide and Epiphen I have actually just checked on the usual sites where I buy wormers etc.

I could get her 4 main drugs for £60 a month less!!!!  Yes, I will ask for a prescription when I next see my vet.  He's had way over £4,000 from me so far this year.  :-(

When we lived up on the Herts/Essex/Cambridge borders, we had what I now know, if I didn't before!!, a super vet who although I'm sure wasn't subsidising us, did at least keep our costs within what we could cope with (and if we hit a bad patch, would allow us to stage-pay).   She also knew how to DIAGNOSE which avoided all this wheeling out the expensive equipment unless totally necessary.   Since moving down here, to the West, I've found that not only are most unable to diagnose without the equipment (or is that just an excuse to up the bill), they sure can charge.  

I'm also put off when a new vet's almost first question of me is 'are they insured'?    Does that make a difference?   If they are not, do they receive a lesser treatment - or is that just an excuse to charge a higher fee I wonder.   That's the cynic in me.    I've now recently switched to the vet in town, and had to take one of mine in this morning (he went lame, for the second time recently, yesterday and I thought enough is enough).   He charged me £19.95 consultation and £11.26 for a week on anti inflammatories - and wants to see him next week.   This is probably going to need x-ray which is when the costs to start to mount up.  

Mine are not insured (I took quotes once down to these 2 only but ended up thinking I just want insurance, not to buy the company!! - and although one is a Basset, with the problems the breed can have, the other is a Whippet which is a breed not known for many health problems)

I suppose vets have to pay for staff, accommodation, equipment and so on, but I can't really accept the high price for things that can be bought online for far less!!

Add-   I don't go by costs alone btw - if the vet is a good one, he's well worth the money.   But he has to be a good vet!!!

>I'm also put off when a new vet's almost first question of me is 'are they insured'?    Does that make a difference?   If they are not, do they receive a lesser treatment - or is that just an excuse to charge a higher fee I wonder.

No, it's simply helpful information for when/if your dog needed ongoing treatment the vet a) needn't worry that you won't be able to afford the treatment after a few months and b) they won't need to waste time asking permission to send off biopsies etc to outside labs.

>No, it's simply helpful information for when/if your dog needed ongoing treatment the vet a) needn't worry that you won't be able to afford the treatment after a few months and b) they won't need to waste time asking permission to send off biopsies etc to outside labs.

Yes but not always, our vet left his previous practise which was taken over by one of the larger groups because he didn't agree with the new directive that all those covered by insurance 'must' be treated. 

>He charged me £19.95 consultation

WOW!  It's £37 at mine.  However, to be fair I often get charged as a 2nd consult, even when it isn't.  But a second consult is still more than your £19.95.

Like you, mine aren't insured.  Crikey, I once worked out that, to insure mine would cost almost as much per month as I earned in 3 months.  So it didn't take a brainiac to work out that I couldn't afford it.

Free Consultations at Animal Trust.
Not -For - Profit -Vets.   Now that's a novelty.   Open to all don't have to be on any benefits !

www.animaltrust.org.uk

I can't see free consults down in my neck of the woods though.

No, it's simply helpful information for when/if your dog needed ongoing treatment the vet a) needn't worry that you won't be able to afford the treatment after a few months and b) they won't need to waste time asking permission to send off biopsies etc to outside lab

I wish I wasn't as cynical as I am about what's behind this question being asked, up front at that!!  And fact is even if a client might appear not to be able to afford ongoing treatment, isn't that up to the client to know?   Many will move heaven and earth to find the money to treat their pets - and looks aren't everything!    I'd expect to be in the picture re sending off (or actually taking!) biopsies regardless.

And yes, I was amazed at that bill - I've just moved from one just outside town, and for sure, would have been charged upwards of £35. for the consultation, plus the medication.    I didn't move to this one, in town, because of charges however .... there were other reasons for the move.   Interestingly I was chatting to another woman waiting in there who had just done the same!    No new car for the former vets this year me thinks.

The Animal trust now have three surgeries in this neck of the woods. Burnley, Bolton, & Failsworth.  Perhaps other branches may open in other areas. They certainly have the other vet's in the area worried.

I met a chap on a walk with his dog that told me about them, his dog had had a course of antibiotics for £16.

@ab8t
Whilst I appreciate much of what you are saying, you are listing out £500 for a machine...this is the one off cost (maintenance - new filter £20 a month). The purchase cost of equipment is a 'skewing' factor. The recovery of that cost over just a few months is achieved very quickly. The ongoing maintenance, well split that cost between the amount of customers paying for operations £20 per month divided by ? So if for example a vet did 100 ops per year - £500 divided by 100 ops = £5.00. Maintenance £240 pa divided by 100 ops = £2.40.   Personally I cannot see how it actually costs the vet £100 ' in equipment' to do every spay/neuter. I have a family member who works in a vets. I find it quite an eye opener.