Kevin Bryant: NZ Veterinary Association CEO on the rise in 'nasty' behaviour from pet owners over prices

More vets across New Zealand are reporting a surge in poor behaviour from customers, particularly over billing.

New reports claim staff in customer facing roles are experiencing pet owners trying to emotionally blackmail vets over rising costs.

NZ Veterinary Association CEO Kevin Bryant says costs are going up everywhere, and customers are taking this out on staff

"There's a huge amount of confusion in the public arena between the fact that we have a heavily subsidised human health system and a totally unsubsidised animal health system, and I think that's definitely part of it."

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
That's say that they're facing emotional blackmail from customers who
don't want to pay their bills. They are complaining of
a riz and nasty behavior. Kevin Bryant is chief executive
of the New Zealand Veterinary Association and.

Speaker 2 (00:10):
With us Hi Kevin, yeah, hi here, how are you good?
Thank you?

Speaker 1 (00:14):
What kind of emotional abuse are you guys going through?

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Well, it's really a case of, you know, we've got
a situation in the country where everyone's struggling a little
bit with hard times, and what our vet clinics are
seen sometimes all too frequently is situations where clients are
coming in with an animal needing treatment and when it

(00:39):
comes to sorting out the bill, they're hit with the well,
we can't afford to pay that, and you shouldn't be
charging us. You're too expensive, and you know, you should
just look after our animals for free.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Do you think it's an expectation that because if you
take yourself to edy, your treatment is free, Therefore if
you take your beloved animal it should be free too.

Speaker 2 (01:00):
Well. I think there's a huge amount of confusion in
the public arena between the fact that we have a
heavily subsidized human health system and a totally unsubsidized animal
health system, and I think that's definitely part of it.
And people, I think drawing comparisons between the two.

Speaker 1 (01:20):
Are people surprised at how much it costs to get
an animal seen to Yes, is the short answer.

Speaker 2 (01:26):
And I guess if they had the real information in
front of them about what similar treatments might cost them
in the human field, if it wasn't subsidized, they probably
would think it's a really good deal.

Speaker 1 (01:40):
Now this is only going to get more expensive, isn't
it because there is a huge number of vets who
are going to drop out of it.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Well, we've got a shortage of veterinarians and vet nurses.
We've always had a shortage, but that hasn't gone away.
And we also have an aging workforce, so there is
Whilst we've got an increase in the number of people
who have been trained in MASSY, which is great, we
are also seeing people exiting the exiting the industry for

(02:14):
a lot of retiring and unfortunately some are leaving because
of the stress caused by some of these interactions with
the public and they leave clinical practice. Some more often
than not, tune up working for somewhere else in the
industry supporting the veterinarians, but not in clinical practice.

Speaker 1 (02:34):
Okay, Kevin, listen, thanks very much for talking us through.
That's Kevin Bryant, chief executive of the New Zealand Veterinary Association.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
For more from Heather Duplessy Alan Drive, listen live to
news talks.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
It'd be from four pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio.