Customer ReviewsforARCH Veterinary Services

Even after reading their reviews and seeing the offensive responses to those reviews on Yelp, I decided to try this vet for my dog who has epilepsy. I regret not taking those negative reviews and negative interactions more seriously. The woman answering the phone there tonight was rude, disrespectful, and dismissive. By this third visit, I find no reason to take my animals here again.
While much more expensive than other vets, the initial visit was pleasant and the male attendant was polite and friendly. We know we need a 24-hour vet for when our dog he has serious seizures and wanted to take him here for regular visits so there would be consistency with his care. By the second visit, I began to get wary as even before my dog was taken into the office, the vet came out to tell me about the need for my dog to have a full nutritional assessment given we feed him homemade food. Even the vet who recommended my dog be placed on homemade food did not make this recommendation. It was obvious it was a full sales pitch, as the vet later came out and said she was new at the location, nutrition was her interest, and she was trying to build this up to offer at this location. Pure sales pitch to generate money. My old vet informed me there is no need for a full nutrition assessment unless my dog was showing signs of difficulty with the diet, which I never reported.
And tonight took the cake. I phoned in a request for a refill of my dog's epilepsy medication the day before. The person answering the phone said it wouldn't be a problem to get the medication by the next day and said they would probably be able to have it ready later that day. Fairly standard information that matches my experience with previous vets. I never received a call so I stopped by there late the next day. When I called and informed her that I had called in the day before but hadn't heard back, she repeated my statement about not hearing back as a question and placed me on hold. She came back to tell me that my prescription wasn't ready and that they weren't able to complete any portion of the refill, despite my statement that it would leave my dog having a seizure without it. She said the prescription hadn't been approved, without explaining who had to approve the prescription, and didn't answer when I stated that it had been approved and provided by the vet in the past month. She said that they request that clients give them 24, 36, or 48 hours to refill a prescription, and that they sometimes recommend up to a week before being able to pick up medication. She also said there were no techs working or available at that time. When I stated no one had ever told me that information at any other time, she repeated herself, saying, "That's why we always inform everyone to give us 24 to 48 hours," to which I had to repeat again they had failed to ever inform me. She either was not listening or did not care, never taking any responsibility or consideration for their failure to inform. She also said they ask for at least 24 hours, and when I informed her that I gave them more than that amount of time and that she didn't give just one timeline to expect medication refills but 4 different possibilities, she again took no responsibility and said there was nothing she could do. I asked if she could speak with someone to get a few pills approved. Her response was, "No. If you had contacted us earlier in the day when the manager was here, then we might have been able to." So much for being a 24-hour vet. Then she said, "We are very busy today. Did you look around and see that?"
She never once tried to extend understanding and definitely didn't care, and her interaction intensified our frustration, with her failing to deescalate or attempt to utilize any form of customer service at any point during the call. I understandably got frustrated and said I saw no reason why I should have to pay when they are forcing our return for emergency services due to their lack of communication and lack of accountability. She then said, "That's not the way things work, ma'am." Her rude and condescending speech was offensive.
After I hung up, I called back to request her name. When I said we had just spoken, she acted as if she couldn't remember our conversation from just 5-minutes before, asking for my dog's name and not answering the questions I was asking, just like our previous conversation. She played stupid until I stated they had refused to fill our prescription and she stopped playing stupid, stating they hadn't refused to refill the prescription. I asked her for her name and she asked why. When I asked her for her name again, she said, "No." When I clarified that she was refusing to give me her name, she again said, "No, I'm not giving it to you." When I asked for her manager's name, she paused before giving me a name, making it evident that she didn't want to. I soon after found out they have a posting for an office manager on their site, so they don't even have one. Not sure I trust the name she gave me as being someone above her, as she exhibited no ability to hold accountability to begin with.
About 20 minutes later, after I had returned home, the same woman called back to say they had 5 pills they would be able to provide tonight and they would have the rest available the next day. When I asked what caused the turnaround in their providing the medication, she stated that a tech suddenly became available. Hmmm, suddenly. When I informed her that I had already made an appointment with another vet, she smugly and rudely said, "Okay, you can do that. So you saying you don't want to pick this up."
She was obviously only accommodating in trying to meet our needs after I asked her name, after she knew I was going to complain about her rude behavior. If she had demonstrated even a modicum of caring to provide even a few pills like she did when she felt I was going to complain, then we wouldn't have even needed to continue the offensive conversation to begin with. I would have been more than willing to wait awhile, and I would have been more than willing to take just a few pills home and come back, as that was what I had requested to begin with. I also would have been willing to phone in our prescription request earlier than any other vet has ever requested before in all my years of having animals, as up to a week is purely ridiculous for an onsite pharmacy, but she argued and refused to be flexible, and she refused to acknowledge this information was never provided. And the cost of the medication indicated that I would be paying $40 more a month for the medication than I have in the past, even at another high-cost 24-hr vet.
I have little faith that this review will matter after reading the responses to other critical reviews. I can see why the office staff is rude and I don't trust my animal or us to be treated with respect here if there is an emergency. Condescension abounds here. I gladly went to another vet.

Owners reply, proving my review correct.......
And the owner proves my review correct with this response he posted on Google. Quite the show of how he "loves all of our clients" as he is so angry he is unable to spell or speak in complete sentences. Talk about a pattern.........
Response from the owner an hour ago
****** did you really want me to not give you my "offensive" response. I would not want to leave you out. You have 1 **** of a chip on you shoulder. Adobe lols like did you wrong. Let's keep it short. If you actually read this narrative please go visit Yelp. Why so negative all the time. 5 Yelp reviews 4 negative. So how can we trust it. Anyways Yelp at archvet people go read. We love all of our clients. Let make it a fun deal for all that refer to this review will get a free mail trim. Curious how many people read this.
Peter Rasta and associates 1 star
Adobe 1 star
Blue jay lodge 1 star
All moving systems nice job 5 stars.
Starting to see a pattern

My reply to the owner:
Yes, I am a business owner and have also worked in customer service and management for most of my working life. Despite what you said on Yelp in response to my review, being under stress doesn't make verbally attacking another person, being rude, dismissive, or being verbally abusive an acceptable response. You moved beyond a response to me over to a personal attack, as demonstrated by your reply on Yelp. Blame-shifting is not a response, it's an attack. Learn to control your anger. It's unprofessional and yes, from experience and business knowledge, word of mouth can affect your business. Business 101. Just because you get some "mail" trims due to mentioning this review, it doesn't mean a thing outside of you manipulating some people who may or may not tell you whether they agree with my review or not in order to get a freebie. That's called bribery. How often was that done to influence those positive reviews? Again, thanks for proving my review correct.