Petco
Reviews and Complaints

Petco = extreme cruelty to animals + customer abuse! Once again, petco has been charged in california with cruelty to animals and swindling customers! Deja vu: in 2005, they were charged, convicted and fined over $900, 000 for horrendous animal abuses - including corporate directed freezing, starving, stomping and burning of defenseless animals to death, all to save money instead of having the sick and injured animals put to sleep humanely by professional vets - and they're at it again! This time petco decided to settle for $1.75 million dollars instead of the embarassment of an actual trial and being convicted. Why would anyone knowing petco's long and legally documented history of extreme cruelty to animals and swindling customers ever shop at this evil company's stores again? Please boycott the plano, texas petco on 15th street - where a badly trained and sociopathic employee caused the death of our family pet - and all petco stores until this convicted animal abuser is shut down for good! For thousands of verified complaints involving petco employees maiming, injuring and even killing customers' pets, please visit consumeraffairs.com, pet-abuse.com or any other legitimate consumer complaints website (Complaintsboard.com has illegally removed our other complaints about the plano petco illegally, probably because they were paid to by petco's scummy attorneys). Thank you for your help and remember: if you pass this post along to any pet owners or animal lovers you know, you could be saving an innocent animal's life!

I brought my Havanese there today to be groomed. He had some matting on his torso and we agreed that she (Sara) could cut his torso down to about 1/2 inch. I also told her to take minimum off his head since there was no matting there at all. When I picked him up (4 1/2 hours later) she had shaved his body completely. She didn't even try to using a scissors on his head. I didn't even recognize him. She did what was fastest for her since they had about 10 to 15 dogs listed for today. I take my dog to be groomed every four weeks and this is the first and last time I will ever have him cut at Petco. The only thing she said was that she had to muzzle him because he snapped at her. I would have snapped at her, too, if she cut my hair like she cut him!

Took my pug to get her nails and bath done at petco in Auburn, NY. I will never bring her back there again. The first time she went there they did an excellent job with her, she did not fight to have her nails done at all. The girl double harnessed her to the table and she was as quite as could be. This last time some young kid was working and when I went to pick her up her front paw nail was so short she was dripping blood. It took me a whole day to get to stop. Every time she walked it would bleed again. I had to take her to the vet the next day to finish her nail trim and check on the nail they cut and they said it was cut way to short that it was not a little nick of the quick. It even started to bleed again while they finished her back nails. They stated that if that happens again she mostly likely will not let anyone near her feet. I will never take my dog back there. Petco offered no explanation at all other then the quick is grown out. I have had the quick nipped on other dogs not severely cut. They where all put out because I went back in asking for a bandage or towel. I had to send another 10 to buy quick stop. They did not offer to send some with me or anything other then carry her to the car.

About a month ago I followed a friends advice and brought my pomeranian in to debbie to be groomed at petco in olympia, wa. We ended up picking him up from the steamboat island animal hospital because she cut the tip of his tail off during grooming. She lied saying it was only a tiny piece. The vet tech got the piece out of the trash and it was a half inch! He ended up having surgery to have it fixed. This was very traumatic to the little guy. I hope no one else has to suffer under this groomers malpractice and neglect again. They have not returned our calls. I'm assuming the vet bill was paid. This was a horrible experience and will never step foot into that store again.

I work at a Petco in FL. There is a manager that works there that should have been fired a LONG time ago. While closing with her one night she told me that I should allow the general manager to "touch my boob" so I can get him fired for sexual harrassment. I have also seen her, after a customer complains about her, take their PALS card number and look up their phone number. She then writes it down, takes it home and says she submits it to a website that will call the customer and harass them late at night. I have informed the general manager and the district manager of these things and since she has denied it and I have no physical proof, it is my word against hers and nothing has been done about it. As soon as I find another job I will leave this one and never look back. This manager is a horrible person and something should be done about her!

My poor keeshond was matted and needed grooming - I told the Delafield WI groomer that I knew she was matted and would need additional brushing and that I would be happy to pay for this when I dropped the dog off at 10 am. They called about 3 and said I could pick her up at 5! They shaved her tail - her britches were completely gone - I was horrified - I asked the manager why - they said she was matted - and tried to tell me the dog needed to come in more than once a year - I had been grooming her myself - but siply didn't have time - They never answered me as to why they didn't contact me prior to shaving her - They did groom her correctly 2 years ago. NEVER NEVER shave a Keeshond tail and britches & NEVER NEVER USE PETCO !

I worked for PETCO for over two years, promoted to pricing and inventory manager held this position for eight months part of my job was to mark items down to manager choice before they get donated to rescue groups, during that time they transfer over a assistant manager who was already labeled as lazy, I complained about her from the start her demeanor was racial she was always profiling the African American customers and employee's accusing them of stealing items from the store and stealing snakes when in fact the snakes were never missing she did not do a proper habitat check when I called PETCO HOTLINE and my DM all of my complaints were ignored and in January 2010, I marked down a blk fish stand from the last standing clearance price of $72.00 to the new manager choice price of $65.00 which I had the right to do so, and on that Saturday weekend before Superbowl I purchased one for that price plus my discount which I had the right to use and everyone knew about it, they waited until almost seven weeks after that when I complained again against there assistant store manager for racial profiling against an ex African American ex employee and slandering my name to lower ranking employees to say I should not have bought the product for that price and fired me and refuse to give me my unemployment, when they all know it was a lie I had been purchasing manager choice since I was first hired and while I was in the position NO-One Never Came and Said What Your Doing Is Wrong, However the assistant store manager was able to deceive PETCO return all products off a receipt that a Caucasian employee parent had purchased without their discount card then re-ring it and apply the employee discount without the parent nor the product in the store and sign forms and return $20.00 dollars to the employee dad who happens to be her neighbor: PETCO Policy you cannot get your discount without your card and proper ID, so is that not internal theft, but she is still employed, she's Caucasian, he's Caucasian and I am a person of color. If you believe in equal treatment no matter ethical profile BOYCOTT PETCO, THEY ARE LIARS, BIAS AND PREJUDICES... MAKE YOUR VOICE OF DISAPPROVAL COUNT...

I was given a 'written' rain check by a manager of the petco on south blvd in charlotte, nc for bird seed that was marked down but they were out of. I was told the come back 2 days later.. they should have more. I went back two days later and they said they didnt know if they were getting more and that they would not honor the rain check anyway. that wasnt right. oh well, I will never step foot into their stores again and as of today, I have told approximately 175 people about it. 160 at a church meeting on saturday..

I have a problem with petco and i'm wondering what my next step should be. Here's a bit of the back story.

Our dog had been sprayed by a skunk in september. It was a small spot on her chest, but as you can imagine it smelled horrible. We brought her to petco because they have a grooming service that claims to take care of the problem. A few days after she got back, we noticed that she appeared to ahve some sort of infection and her skin was flaking off over here entire body. This made absolutely no sense considering the fact that I have dealt with animals that have been sprayed before and this had never happened. It wasn't just in the area that was sprayed, it was her entire body. As I said, the skin was flaking and smelled horrible, like rotting flesh.

We went back to petco and spoke to the man that had actually given her the bath. Much to our surprise, he advised us that they had a problem with a particular product that had actually caused dogs to get infected in the past. He went on to tell us that the skin would flake off the dogs. He said that due to this, they had stopped using the product for awhile, but for some unknown reason, began using it again. We were told to take the dog to the vet to get antibiotics and petco would take care of the vet bill.

But there was an even more surprising part. This same employee also told us that they have also had problems with their spray bottles. He said that the bottles aren't washed properly and they had a problem with fungus growing inside the bottles. This could have also been part of the problem.

So we went to the vet who confirmed an infection. When we tried to bring the vet bill back to petco, we had a difficult time reaching the manager. Each time we visited, she was either in a meeting or mysteriously unavailable. When she was available and we were able to speak to her, she twice denied receiving any fax from the vet, despite us knowing that the vet sent the fax. When she finally made sure she received the fax, the manager said that they would not pay the vet bill. She then said that there has been no other reported incidents in the past and there has never been any issues with their products or with their bottles.

We ahve tried several times to get this resolved with the local store, but that got us nowhere. Eventually we called the toll-free customer service number. Several times, we were promised a call back. And each time, we would wait 7 - 10 days. And at the end of the 7 - 10 day waiting period, we would call back and were again promised a call back.

We finally received a call back from the district manager today who simply said that thy have "protocols" in place for cleaning the bottles. She didn't address the issue with the chemical that caused the problem as well. When I informed her that we have good evidence to show that those procedures weren't followed and we were made promises, she said she could not do anything about it and would have to have someone from "risk management" (Or something like that) call me back.

I am thinking about taking this to district court to get them to pay for the vet bill as promised. We have the statements from the vets to help our case. But on top of that, we also have the conversations with the employees on audio tape. We have the employee talking about the fungus in the bottles plus the product that caused the same exact issue in other dogs that have been taken to petco for grooming. We also have the manager denying that there has ever been any problems in the past. We live in a "one party consent" state so I know there are no legal issues with the recordings. If this does go to court, we will also be able to use those items in court. And since this is a civil case and not a criminal case, we really only need a preponderance of the evidence.

I feel we have a really strong case, but was hoping to avoid having to go to court. We have tried addressing this by every avenue we could find but it seems like we have reached a dead end, and it seems like we are just being strung along with promises of calls that never come. Is there something else we should do or should I just go ahead and file the paperwork for court?

I bought a 2 month old female rat on 12/16/09 with a 15 day guarantee. Her name was Alice by the time we got home, and she was very sweet. I fell in love with my precious new baby instantly. The night we got her home, she perched on my shoulder, peeking her head out through my hair just to check what was going on. The sweetest pet I have ever owned. By the time I got to work 12/18/09, my roommate was calling me to tell me something was wrong with Alice. When I got home, her left eye was bulging out of her head, her whole left side was paralyzed. Working for a neurologist, I see stroke patients every day Mon-Fri, and my poor Alice showed the same signs of having suffered a stroke, as a human does. Taking her back to PetCo, I was there arguing with whom I assume was the manager. The treatment this poor rat, and myself received was beyond poor, I was disgusted. Alice could not move her left side, her left eye was bulging out of her head, and she could not move her head well. The assumed manager was also rude and snappish to the employee helping out, who was also a vet technician for fours years, agreeing with me about it being a stroke. Being talked down to by this manager, I felt like a terrible person for bringing Alice back to them. I had even said, I don't care if you don't return my money, just seek medical help for her, put her down. A stroke is un-fixable, there is no way to repair the damage that was done to this poor baby. An hour and a half later, I signed a refund slip, and the nice employee at the cashier volunteered to clock out and take Alice to the vet right then, instead of letting PetCo wait to do it at their convenience.

Calling this morning to check in and see what their vet said, PetCo told me she had suffered internal bleeding and had been put down, stating their vet found it to be because of "improper handling." I do believe I handled Alice quite like I would a newborn infant - with gentle hands and a careful eye as I put her back in her cage. Also, internal bleeding, whether it be a human or an animal, would not have shown such signs if they were internally bleeding, unless it was a bleed in the brain (a hemorrhage stroke.) To say the least, I will never buy another animal or pet product there, EVER. I will also discourage people from shopping there, as well. The service was insulting, and the misery that poor rat - that I had had for only two days - suffered by the manager in that store - save for the sweet cashier who clocked out during her shift to take Alice to the vet - wanting to argue and blame me for state of the rat was despicable.

I can only hope this note reaches enough people, so they are warned against shopping for pets at PetCo.

PETCO has been a nightmare. A simple problem has taken 7 months with little result. PETCO promises a free bag of dog food after ten purchases.

Mine was due last May! The corporate office in San Diego refuses to connect customers to anyone but their out-sourced customer service line in Philippines.

By calling extensions at random, I've only reached Accts. Receiv. staff..Very nice people, but they received little help from their C.S. staff.

I did receive a letter with no return address or logo, with a "gift card." Missing were the two food coupons promised for the exhorbitant time I've wasted trying to resolve this minor problem.

Suggested a local vendor simply be allowed to provide the two bags so corporate could reimburse the store.

Nope. Local managers aren't allowed to call corporate. This is one of the most poorly managed customer service experiences I've encountered in my life. No wonder they aren't traded publicly.

I took my my 3 yrs old son to this vacaville, ca Petco store.. my loves animal and he was so xited to see all the animals and bird.. he wanted to take few pictures with the animal so took 3/4 pictures and here comes the manager and telleing me they dont allow taking pictur inside the store..I saw 5 mints before kids taking pictures ith birds...so I asked him to have a sign next time, and how abt thoes kids taking pix? his answer was my 3 yrs old son was disrespectful to the store..I just didnt get the point..I guess he is not used to seeing diff kinda ppl in the store..never going back to this store again...avoid

Brought my dog to be groomed at Petco in Edwardsville Ilinois.It was his second time there. The groomer I had previously took off that day and cancelled my appointment. The sub took my dog. I had the most expensive treatment Best of Show and Shedless.She said the shedless treatment would be an extra 25 minutes. The first time I was there it took two and a half hours. This time I saw the groomer out in front of the store smoking after an hour. My dog was returned to me wet, dazed and unfinished. I also had to pay first. Never again.

Have a gift card, better use it fast, they will take your money $2. per. month. Don't ask to check your balance, with an attitude they tell you to call 800 #. This is what service has come to. Poor! Hidden damages on merchandise. Poor selection! Have taken my business to Petsmart, friendly, customer is respected, with a smile, thank you for shopping at Petsmart. We have both stores, guess the Petco won't be there long. Good for them, won't miss them at all. This was not always the case, they joined the scam card, poor service club.

On 9/01/2009 I went to Petco in Sterling ( store number 1892). I purchased some bird treats for my birds. When I got it home and tried to feed to my flock, they all wouldn't touch it. I did have a strong odor about it. I looked on the back and it had expired about a week .

on 9/03/2009 I went to another store in Herndon Va to exchange my product. That ws fine. I went back to the area where they had the bird items and found my same product. I looked around a bit and noticed that there was a large container of Laubers that had expired 7/26/09. OMG. I looked around and found 5 more problems with expired stuff. I told the manager and she said that the stuff shouldn't be on there. I shared my concern that is that why those items are put on a managers special. She said no, the mangers specials are done well in advance and the date has nothing to do with that . If an item isn't moving then a sale would occure. She seemed a little bent out of shape.
I asked her was Petco wanting to make as much as they could no matter what quaility issues they were having . She told me she would personaly go back and take it off the shelves. Like a dummy, I believed them.

I called the survey line and didn't give them a glowing report card. I even had to state what the issue was ( I still have not heard back from that. I was so mad that I called the customer service line to voice my complaint. They did seem very concerned and wanted to get all the information and names and places and everything a good note taker should do. She called both stores and talked to them and about the food issue. She came back to say that both stores agreed with her to take everything off the floor that was not good. I got some excuses that if they took it off the shelf then there would be no product to put in it's place. I also got the answer that it may be a training issue as it might not be understood that birdfood does have expiration dates on foods and treats. The lady told both stores that I would be coming back to the stores to assure that my request was fulfilled. I ws told that with cats and dogs, they get e-mails and screen reminders to have certain foods rotated. I was told that since the bird food doesn't have a rep that goes to the store, the bird food it sent from the warehouse with a amount that is requested by( have no idea who). J ust because there are people out there that do not have a cat or dog.. why does it seem they are saying that population isn't as important to them as it doesn't bring in the revenue like the dogs do. Mind you the small animal area takes up about only a 1/4 to 1/8 of the store.

Yesterday I went back to the same place and this time I started in the Ferret isle. This is where my blood pressure started to rise and stayed that way for about 2 hrs. In those 2 hours I got a cart and pulled off the shelves 25 accounts of expired food or treats. There were ferret seed bars of some sort.. they had a manager special tag on it for .93 cents. Every one of them was expired with a date in July and Aug. It was like that in the rabbit section, the hamster area, mice food, pigg food.. etc... including some more items I found in the bird section( a new managers special) And sure enough there it was, the large conainer that had the july date on it still on the shelf.

I went up and very calmly explained what I was doing and that I took it upon myself to help them by taking it off the shelf. the guy was understanding, but he went off on a tangent that there were only two people in the store and that he had to stay in the front of the store of he would be fired. He also stated that Petco hired someone to go to several stores and do rotating and take product off the shelves if it was past date. He also said the best person to talk to was the GM for that store as he would be the only one who could do anything about my complaint. I got his name and number and called him today.

As soon as I got into my car last night I called the customer service line again and registered another complaint. Again, this woman seemed very good and concerned and she would get to the bottom of it. As I was talking to this lady she seemed to get a little terse with me and said it will be taken cared of. She did call the store and they told her the same thing about someone else who comes in to rotate the food. I was assured that this third party would be addressed as they were not doing there job. Is there anything else I can help you with tonight? ummm no... I thanked her for her time... knowing that it MIGHT be on deaf ears in the end

I called the GM today and explained the whole thing. He was not told by any of the employees about my complaint and I guess customer Service doesn't route calls to appropriate people. It ws the first time he had heard of it. He did tell me that they do get reminders about the cat food and dog food... and a rep from that brand would come in and rotate their product... hmmmmmm just a little different then what the guy told me.

I was understanding that Petco hired someone to do the checking of foods and taking expired stuff off of the shelves. If a rep is doing it, birds do not have reps nor do the small animals. The GM did say that he would go and make sure that there was nothing like that and it will not happen again. He did say that he probably shoud pay me for the two hours of work I did -- only in jest . He even said he would give me some free stuff gift card since I did take the time to take stuff off of the floor and bring it to his attention. I will go see him tomorrow so I can make a appearance.

I told him that the average consumer would think that if they are having trouble and do not check dates or the quality of the food... one might think that there are other parts of the small animal area might have issues-- like the live animals that are there. lizards, snakes, mice, parrots, ferrets and so forth that their care may not be as aggresive as it should be. The GM stated they are very wel ltaken cared of. Well I do know they have a bird that is for sale has gone to different stores because he is a bit aggressive.. I think she said 3-4 stores... no wonder they don't deal with change like that .. this is a baby too.

If a customer saw the same product that was expired and saw one of the small animals eating it... one might think they are eating outdated stuff.. they already have proven to me that they do not rotate items nor check so how could they say ..." oh now we don't do that "..;. how would you know people?
Their prices are rather high as compared to the other stores. So the best way to get toys or things like that is if it is in the clearance section. none food items. In a pinch I go there for my back up food when I am waiting for my oganic stuff I order off line to come in.

I'm not sure what I will say to the GM, but if I have his word and I go in there and find one more thing.. that would tell me ... it's really all about the cash and nothing else.

Anolther thing I told them is that the bags had a lot of dust on them and that was a sign that they don't move foods. The GM stated that most of this clietel are for smaller birds rather then big ones.

If grocery stores are suppose to take things off the shelf if they are outdated to protect humans, why is it such a hard concept to do the same for animals.. that is what they are to do... take care of animals.. that is what the business they are in right?

Not being accoutable for leaving old food and treats on the shelf, I call this a passive aggressive abuse to the small animal community. They will act all concerned and as soon as you are out of site.. they go right back to putting manager specials on expired food. Hey, if those stores need to pare down, then do so... be proactive to know your shopers and your client base...

I will be back to share any updates. Though I am wondering if I made this a more public argument ( like the press ) would they want to cover the A holes, because to get a paycheck one just needs to spit out what corporate says...
But I think corporate is the main problem... they rake in tons of cash.. act so concerned and then call you a bad word once they get off the phone with you...

Hello, thank for calling Petco.. were the pets go... how can I help you?
Ummmm sure you can help me... stop selling your products and acting ignorant to fact that you are in the business to feed and care for anmials.
But so far the only thing I see is a cash cow that really doesn't want to go the extra mile to protect their name and the lives in which we g o to them to help us nourish our family memeber who happen to be our beloved pets.

I can't turn my back on what I think is right. Petco... Please have your stores in perfect working order. cuz I will come to your store and if I find something out dated.. it will go way beyond a GM... I assure you.

I generally like Petco. I had to buy some styptic powder the other day because I was out of my bottle that I had for a few years. This is because I don't quick dogs nails very often but the bottle spilled. I like to have it "just in case". The only styptic powder they sell is in a tiny tiny vial, manufactured by Bamboo. It comes with a useless nail file on the side and the powder it self is in a little baggie inside the tube! The texture of the powder clings to the inside of the baggie and will NOT COME OUT! As a professional groomer I can assure you that it is frustrating trying to open this tiny baggie and pour the contents out when you have quicked a single nail. With the larger bottle, you can grab a "pinch" of styptic powder and press it to the nail easily. Thus less discomfort for the animal (and that's my goal). Bamboo makes this vial shaped mess with a toenail "cup" for the cap. Yeah that's really easy to press this tiny cap into a dog's quicked nail. The powder spills while the dog is jerking. (and jerking is how the dog got his nail quicked in the first place - so don't cry "animal abuse" because accidents happen, and are less likely with an experienced professional like me than you people who don't know what you're doing - no offense) Anyways this complaint is for Petco and Petco only, please bring back the tubs of styptic powder. It's way less ridiculous than that tiny baggied pointless nail file and nail cup on the end piece of crap you sell now ...oh and for ten bucks!? rip off. i used it one time for one nail. had i been using the old styptic powder I could have taken care of the quicked nail and caused the dog to be in discomfort for less time than to fiddle with bamboo's piece of crap. Again I generally like Petco over Pmart even though the neon tetras you sold me all died immediately when the other fish are fine. God Bless whomever reads this unorganized and pointless rant! ;P