Tonight

Nearly half of all British households have a pet – with the favourite being the loveable pooch.

But if you’re like Tonight presenter Jonathan Maitland, whose dog Monty costs £2000 a year to keep, it may feel like the bills are excessive.

In these touch financial times, animal refuge homes are reporting that pets are being abandoned in record numbers. In the last five years, more than one and half million pets have been put down – because their owners can’t afford them.

One of the biggest costs are vet bills, and in a specially commissioned Tonight survey carried out by K9 Media – 76 per cent of dog owners said the cost of keeping their pet healthy has become too expensive.

In this programme, the Tonight team takes Monty the dog, Rupert the rabbit and Mickey the cat on mystery shopping visits to find out the truth about vet bills.

Tonight exposes how the cost of medical procedures and medications can vary considerably from practice to practice and we discover that some vets are prepared to recommend expensive treatment that is completely unnecessary.

The programme meets one devoted pet owner that has paid £15,000 for treatments for her dog (only £4,000 of which was covered by pet insurance) and we reveal how she is paying a 250 per cent mark-up on medication sold to her by her vet.

And the programme interviews the victims of a vet, and the nurse that testified against him, who was struck off after being found guilty of five charges of disgraceful professional conduct. He attempted the make false insurance claims, charged pet owners for work he never did, and evidence emerged of poor treatment.

But in May last year, the same vet was reinstated and can now practice again.

The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons has the job of regulating vets – and although they can’t dictate what vets charge – they can step in if they consider vet bills to be excessive.

The programme asks whether the Royal College is doing enough with the powers it has and if there should be more regulation in the industry.

Last edited: Friday, 6 March 2009