Hacker News Reader

Comment by cgriswald | Hacker News Reader

The thing Wag screwed up was its total lack of empathy in trying to buy silence.

> a couple thousand maximum

Maximum? Many pups cost more than this and you'd be paying to replace at least. You might also be paying for any amount of vet bills if the animal isn't killed on the spot. If you hit a service or working dog, be ready to shell out tens of thousands for replacement due to the unique tasks performed (not all dogs can do them) and specialized training they receive.

In any case, Wag and its walker are probably not at fault. I'd be after the driver.

Of course, I don't like the idea of a stranger walking my dog anyway. Even a kennel isn't ideal, but at least then I can build trust with a particular business. Wag just puts my dog in the hands of random people I'll probably never see again, opening me up to liability and my dog up to risk.

View on HN

> In any case, Wag and its walker are probably not at fault. I'd be after the driver.

Not sure how you can jump to that conclusion. A driver can probably assume that a dog being walked by a person, even near the road, will be controlled appropriately by the walker.

The only time a driver could not reasonably assume this is where the dog is too large to be controllable by the person (kid or small adult) who is walking it.

Without any facts, we can't presume the driver is at fault. Also, we have no way of finding out who that person is, except through Wag. So it's sort of pointless to pin our hopes on them.

Lastly, if the driver really were clearly at fault, it would be more likely that the Wag walker would have provided information to this effect. The fact that he/she has not is more consistent with it being the walker's fault.

It's almost like people with an agenda have come here to comment. The GP blames the driver and another blames the dog. Without knowing any details. This is very fishy.

But being Amreica, someone has to be to blame. It can't just be an unlucky accident of circumstances.

The author wrote the post because of the company's post-accident behavior, not because there was an accident. His point is that Wag isn't sharing information about what happened, or what parties are involved. Without this information, the author is completely helpless. And the only way to get anything from Wag is to pre-emptively forego all recourse, including sharing his story. This is the primary focus — not on the mere fact of the accident.

Can't object to that. My point was more in response to the following sub-discussion which had become a blame-assigning process.

That's what is so fishy about all of this. And, my comment was immediately downvoted, then got upvoted a bunch.

I don't agree: I'm not from the US and generally think everyone is over reacting with constantly (threatening) to sue everyone else.

But here the problem here isn't that the dog died, it's how Wag has handled the problem afterwards, and how their (poor) communication suggests that they didn't really do their due diligence in vetting the walkers.

EDIT: a similar thing happened in my country (the Netherlands) where an Uber driver hit (and killed) a young woman after driving around in circles (a technique used to get more clients apparently, instead of parking somewhere), and Uber immediately pulled the "he is not an Uber employee and he wasn't with an Uber customer when it happened, so it's not our fault card". which resulted in public outrage[1]. They could have just send some flowers to the family, now they got a PR crisis instead.

[1]: https://www.volkskrant.nl/nieuws-achtergrond/een-uber-chauff...

I think the incentives in play force companies to act callous. It seems to me that companies are wary to act with empathy lest they get sued and the court takes it as an admission of guilt (or at least evidence of culpability, or something the jury will pay attention to). It's like that old advice where you should never say "sorry" after a car accident (as a Brit, apologising is a natural impulse even when not at fault) because it can be taken as an admission of fault.

as a Brit, apologising is a natural impulse even when not at fault

Someone explained it to me as when an American says "sorry" they mean "I'm sorry I did a bad thing to you" and when a Brit says sorry they mean "I'm sorry a bad thing happened to you". Which also explains the not uncommon American response to "sorry" of "Why? It wasn't your fault".

Yeah that's it, though many Brits also share that reaction.

If I do something bad to a person I say sorry and it means "I'm sorry I did something bad to you".

If something that's out of my control happens to someone I might say sorry and mean "I'm sorry a bad thing happened to you".

I'm British and find that sometimes I think similarly to another person who is British, and at other times I think differently to another person who is British. It's wild.

This is a non-issue in this case. As I stated, liability in the case of harm to pets is extremely limited by law.

Pets are treated as simple property by US law and the liability is strictly limited to the cost of replacement. There has never been a civil judgement in the US beyond that. There are CRIMINAL issues involving treatment of animals, but none of those are applicable here.

This is pure incompetence by WAG's legal and customer-service departments.

Someone does have to be to blame even in the case of an accident. When you drive a multi ton machine at high rates of speed you are accountable for it.

Likewise when you take money for a service you are accountable for not letting their dog run into the road which is usually pretty easy for an animal on a leash.

What did wag do wrong that we know?

The walker wasn't the person on the profile. They are withholding information regarding the incident. They tried to force the victim to agree to be legally silenced in order to pay for direct costs incurred.

This is 1000 times worse than paying nothing.

A car shouldn’t be within leash distance of a pedestrian. As long as the walker is behaving appropriately as a pedestrian and the dog is on leash the driver is going to be found at fault. The same is true even in cases where that is not the case.

Obviously we don’t know in this instance but in most cases fault goes to the driver if the dog is on leash, and given that this dog did not belong to the owner I’d be surprised if it was off leash. It might have been a flexilead in which case the outcome might be different depending on jurisdiction and circumstance but in any case the owners are going to have a better time going after drivers.

Neither party in this case involved the authorities or contacted any of the affected parties. The walker was already doing something they might not want Wag knowing about (having a third party walk the dog). I don’t think you can make any conclusions there so I’ll stick with my “probably”.

Do you believe it's likely the driver is at fault given the lack of evidence?

When I imagine a pet getting killed by a car I image it becomes free and running out in front of a car, not a car breaking a law and encroaching on the pets leash space. Perhaps there are some counter-intuitive stats on this I'm not aware of :)

Further, there are a LOT of places where a person on a sidewalk would be within a leash length of a car legally driving 30+ mph.

No matter, this incident in particular is still a drop in the bucket for Wag. Wag knew the dog was dead. All they needed to do in order to look good was pay for the cremation, maybe the cost of the dog, and be supportive. Instead the did the opposite and came off looking greedy, dismissive, and insensitive.

I’d be more sympathetic to Wag if they made it possible for the pet owner to pursue the drivers.

As it stands, it sounds like they have not provided enough details to identify the walker, let alone investigate the driver (if there even was one). So I’d say Wag is just as culpable as a maybe-existing-driver.

In terms of going after the driver: My parents showed dogs semi-professionally; however, when I learned to drive my father taught me that if an animal darts into the road you can slow down, but you don't swerve to miss it since that can cause an accident.

It's certainly possible that the driver was at fault if they were speeding or driving recklessly, but like another commenter mentioned I don't think we know enough to say.

>Maximum? Many pups cost more than this and you'd be paying to replace at least. You might also be paying for any amount of vet bills if the animal isn't killed on the spot. If you hit a service or working dog, be ready to shell out tens of thousands for replacement due to the unique tasks performed

Still a limited and insignificant amount as far as compensations go (which could reach tens of millions in other cases), which is the parent's point.

Parent was putting it forward as a matter of policy. Risking $250-20,000 per $15 walk by people you’ve barely vetted and hoping no drivers whom you have no relationship at all with won’t make a mistake seems neither limited nor insignificant.

The law is not on the pet owner's side here as far as vet bills. Pets are treated as property, so the max amount due is the cost of replacing the dog.

The law is not super relevant to whether or not dog owners trust your dog walking service. Wag should probably be trying to go well above what they're legally obligated to do in this situation.

Citation...

My understand of civil liability would be whom ever caused the harm is responsible for the actual damages done, not simply some raw actuarial table, so if I have vet bills, actual hard costs, then whom ever caused those costs would be responsible for them.

I have a hard time believing any jurisdiction would simply toss those costs as unreasonable because the dog is only worth X by some subjective analysis of dog bluebook

Your mistake is in assuming vet bills constitute actual damages. In US law, dogs are simple property. If you wreck your car and it costs more to fix the car and replace it, the insurance doesn't pay to fix it -- they pay to replace it. Liability is whichever value is LESS.

Dogs work the same way under the law. If someone injures your dog, they are liable to either pay 1) to fix the dog or 2) replace the dog, whichever is less.

The key here is INSURANCE which is a contract I have with them that limits the amount they pay out.

However in the case of an auto, if I had a rare car for example, and someone caused damage to it, I could, in fact, sue the person that cause the damage and prove the actual damage even if it was above the replacement cause. Their insurance may not cover the difference but that would not absolve that person of the liability

> I could, in fact, sue the person that cause the damage and prove the actual damage even if it was above the replacement cause

No you couldn't, and I challenge you to find a single case where liability for damage to simple property has ever exceeded replacement value.

You won't find it.

The closest you'll find is where the property was fundamental to some business and there was lost income that contributed to the damages. This does not apply to pets (though it could apply to say, race horses or some show dogs).

How about Burgess v. Shampooch Pet Industries, Inc in Kansas...

Where the Pet Owner was awarded damages even though the 13 year old dog "negligible market value" given its age.

Summary of the Case:

This Kansas case presents an issue of first impression as to the proper measure of damages recoverable for injury to a pet dog. The plaintiff's dog, a 13-year old dog of negligible market value, suffered a dislocated hip after being groomed at defendant's establishment. The appellate court found the lower court's award of damages based on the veterinary bills was proper where the bills were not disputed and represented an easily ascertainable measure. Specifically, the court held that when an injured pet dog with no discernable market value is restored to its previous health, the measure of damages may include, but is not limited to, the reasonable and customary cost of necessary veterinary care and treatment. The court was unconvinced by defendant's "hyperbolic" claim that such an award would lead to a floodgate of high-dollar litigation on behalf of animals with low market values.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com