Unless you run 1-1 sessions & escort every client to & from their cars, chances are people & Dogs are going to meet from time to time.
I have people come to classes with rescue Dogs they have just acquired . Many of them are not prepared for the Dogs reactions to new experiences & cannot yet "read" their Dogs behaviour..so I'm constantly reminding them to keep a safe distance. ( In my opinion I shouldn't have to as they are only with me for an hour a week, so need to be aware themselves)
I don't go into deepest details over the phone, as people tend to veer of subject & talk for ages about their last Dog. I take a name & contact number (in case I need to postpone them) brief Dog history & ask each one to come for a 15 minute chat before class. After this I can decide if my class is suitable for Dog & owner. After that I give them the enrolment form. Which includes what they want to achieve , any known vices etc.
Dog & handler are insured ANYWHERE, if under my instruction. To minimise risks to everyone, I put up signs about door manners in the entrance hall & reiterate verbally,
All Dogs are to be kept onlead, unless doing an exercise under my supervision.
I'm very lucky as I have some very sensible regulars who set a good example, have steady Dogs & welcome new members (I tell them we're expecting somebody new) if they arrive early & I have a class in progress.

Of course, totally agree.
And trainers, when dog training, can advise them when they arent doing something responsible

Ok.
Their are many way to interpret things, everyone is different.
You are entitled to yours, of course.

I wrote to the club outlining my points as regards accepted practices and asking why they didnt have them.
And concerns as to the way they dealt with my mother afterward.
This letter arrived after everything I have reported, by the way, including their responses to my mother's phone calls.

None of my points were addressed, they just said nothing to do with them as they are volunteers, insurance doesnt car park, and its because the dog was from a rescue centre.

Considering they have been running since 1978 and run the KC Good citizen scheme, i was quite shocked by all of this.

So i decided to start a thread giving an outline hoping people would give me their feedback.
I wished for this feedback to be objective, so did not wish to influence or prejudice people's responses.
So i worded it carefully.

I have done the same elsewhere without explaining the incident in advance.
What you accuse me of never crossed my mind, but if that is how you wish to see things, its nothing to do with me....or the point of this thread

Exactly what im referring to.
Great post, yours is a club that is definitely sensible, professional, and responsible.
It sounds fanatastic.

U worded the first post in this thread TO influence people.

i welcome your view

have a great day with all your dog walking in the sunshine

im just off to do the same

As I stated previously, when we enrolled Max at his training class, they didn't want much info on the phone, we just turned up with Max. However, the first thing the trainer did on seeing what a large, strong dog we had was to study his collar and lead before we went anywhere near the other dogs.

A bit late to the party...

Sounds ok to me, discuss details by phone, do paperwork later (provided client is open and honest). Chances are instuctor can get more detail from client verbally than client will offer on paper.

As already mentioned, sounds like many a class taking place in church halls etc.

Don't know about the insurance, but owners will have to take some resposibility for their own dogs - otherwise how will they manage for the other 6 days and 23 hrs of the week?

Again, owners must take responsibility for their own dogs.

I'd rather see problem dogs included rather than excluded.

If an owner has a problem dog, their first port of call will likely be a trainer. (Whether or not a trainer should offer behavioual advice is another thing).

If the dog's collar broke, sounds like an accident out of the control of the instructors.

I complelty agree with this.
However, if they had followed a correct pre assessment procedure, the dog would not have been adjacent to a class of dogs in the first place to attack them under their watch if the collar were to break. And they would have spotted the loose collar and corrected accordingly.
Not to mention, of course, the 2 trainers did indeed see the dog rearing up aggressively to puppies with the collar working loose and an old man strugling to hold him.
Then they didnt act upon this - they sent him outside to be around a group of dogs then sent the puppies outside to where he was without checking the coast was clear first.
I dont believe you need to have any experience in the dog world to realise why that was bad judgement.

sorry claire i didnt see your post earlier.
he was asked to pay vet bills.
however, the club even cocked that up as they had never bothered to take his address, so they could not post my mum's vet bill.
(the vet, by the way, was quite shocked at how the club went about this whole thing).
predictably he never answered their phone calls.
however, they had his relatives number so rang her.

However, they did not do any of this until 1 week after my mum called and repeatedly asked them to do so.
For 1 whole week the husband of her committee contact kept teling my mum she couldnt come to the phone due to health problems (fair enough) but instead of referring her to another committe member spoke on behalf of the club and was unhelpful saying they will have a committe meeting in a few weeks and they "might" decide to pass on my mothers bill!
This whole week he gave my mum the impression he was connrected to the club, turns out he wasnt.
After 2 weeks of my mum having to ring them all the time (not one club person rang her or even rang to ask about her dog) she finally had a chepque thru the post from the owner.
earlier on, he had written a letter explaining he got the dog from a resuce because he was lonely and he turned to the club when he realised he had a problem and he never got a dog so it could maul another dog, he was very shocked and sorry. He "got rid of the dog".

I totally agree with you that the man came to them for help.
I feel strongly that the club have let him down as bad as my mother.
Their was no fight by the way, just an adult dog severely attacking the first puppy it saw.

My dog behaviour head also tells me that this was a severely dog aggressive dog so shouldnt have been mixed with other dogs, so when the trainers saw him reacting aggressively toward the pups when the owner intruded into their class, they should have surmised the puppies reacting to him defensively would have tipped his over-aroused state over the edge and he would have focussed all this aggression on the doorway awaiting the pups to come out.
I assess this correct also because the 10 minutes between him being thrown out the hall and the pups leaving he ignored the adult dogs.
During this 10 minutes ths dog was so strong for the elderly man that he hadnt managed to get him in the car yet.
The first pup he set eyes on he finally bust his collar, ran across the car par behind a car and set upon it.
Which happened to be my mum's dog, and my mum's dog was not even one of the pups that had reacted in the hall.

**** does indeed happen.
However, if you are a sewerage engineer and have been given some warnings, you know what you need to do to avoid being hit by said ****


my mum has no intention of going back to the club, their arent really others, she lives the middle of nowhere.
the club invited her back then couldnt understand why she didnt want to go!
this club runs the KCgood citizen scheme and has been going 30 years!!