My Vet bills are killing me!

My vet bills are costing more than my training fees!

I have been involved in racing for many years but vet bills are spoiling the sport for me and now and i am considering cutting my losses, they really rip you off.

My last bill was bigger than a months training fees and my trainer is livid.

He says it’s all stuff his team have done for years usually without cost to me.

Owners really need to force action on these rip-off artists!

I could not agree more. If only we had a PROPER representative body we could as owners put a stop to this scandalous practice.

Not good and understand the frustration.

If not mistaken the problem stemmed from pressure from NHRA
Its a bit like a close shop or protection IMO
Strict rules to make sure that experienced trainers who used to brush the teeth with Colgate, now its a call out fee to supply floss and Listerine only imported from the outer Hebrides.

Bottom line is the owner who is already under pressure has to pick up the tab.

I am sure a few of the trainers/owners who post can give proper inputs rather than my 2 cents worth ?

Majmu - your TRAINER is livid? How can he be livid when he would have had to ask for / approve the work the vet(s) did (and enter it into the veterinary register to boot).

I accept that he may not have been aware of the exact line costs, but if he is mandating similar treatments week in and week out across other horses in the yard (and most trainers own shares in at least one horse in their yard), he must have some idea what things cost?

Either way, owners are in an invidious position - once you've signed an Authority to Act, your trainer can sign off more or less anything he wants for your horse and you'll (usually) only know once the bills arrive at the end of the month....

When I still had horses in training, I found this very hard to swallow and agree that it was certainly one of the factors that spoiled my fun as an owner. At one point I made work of following up on all veterinary work done on my horses and was particularly annoyed when contacting the vets directly to ask why a horse was treated in a certain way or with certain medication and was told 'We can't tell you unless you have permission from the trainer'. FFS!

:blink: :blink:

MAJMU wrote: My vet bills are costing more than my training fees!

I have been involved in racing for many years but vet bills are spoiling the sport for me and now and i am considering cutting my losses, they really rip you off.

My last bill was bigger than a months training fees and my trainer is livid.

He says it’s all stuff his team have done for years usually without cost to me.

Owners really need to force action on these rip-off artists!

the trainers are livid because the rules have changed.

this is a silly example but only a matter of time before the grubby vets get their hands into it


A trainer is allowed to bandage his runners. He might buy 1000 rolls of bandage from china for R15 a roll.
cost to owner R20
New rule comes in that ONLY vets are allowed to bandage.

Now this is how things go and why trainers are livid

Vet Bill
transport to stable
R30
Bandage R90
Tape on Bandage R13.50
Bandage pressure monitorization R78

that's why we are pissed off.....some tasks that we're allowed to be undertaken by our trainers have been removed to the parasites.

When i hear the word "livid" it always reminds me of the classic Alas Smith and Jones sketch , where they interview the educated gorilla named Gerald
" when the professor captured you, were you wild"?
To which Gerald replied " i was absolutely livid"

Getting back to thread, yes trainers do have the authority to act however in my experience i have always had a call before to explain everything possible has been done in house, however due to restrictions i have to now bring in a vet. I am telling you up front they charge an arm and a leg but my hands are tied.

So i dont blame the trainers i blame the system.

I recently met the vets at a stud farm and when introduced i said " i thought you would be wearing balaclavas"
I am sure went right over their heads , no pun intended

Costs are ridiculous. If necessary, I will elaborate with facts and figures.

Just to put Robin in the picture, from my side, I am not complaining about intra articulate treatments etc etc. My gripe is that my hands are completely tied as a Trainer, in that I am not allowed to treat or have the meds to treat, in my possession. Yet, when the vets treat, they leave the rest of the treats with me to treat further. So, it is not about my competence, but about the source of the meds.

In all of my years of Training, I had meds on standby. If a horse got urticaria, I would treat immediately. I would NOT charge the Owner, as this was, to my mind, stable meds. Nowadays, the poor Owner gets a bill of about R1000 ... and maybe another R1000 a week later.... as urticaria can recur.

And now the NHRA have out of competition testing. So, if I did treat the horse and they came to test, I would be guilty and have to plead guilty and would be subject to a big fine... so I dare not do this.

Same with Traumeel. You can buy it over the counter but you may NOT have it in your yard, unless it is dispensed by a vet. Why ? Maybe it is too much competition for the scheduled drugs, which only a vet can dispense?

The bottom line is that Owners in SA do not have anyone or any Body looking after them. The RA ? Please show me their efforts in this regard. And in KZN ? No Owners body. Trainers talk to their Owners all the time, much more than any Association can. Trainers are also all Owners. So, where is the Owners and Trainers body in SA ???

Over the jast 15 years, as the population of Racehorses has decreased, the amount of Equine Vets has increased.....makes you think a bit....

We are standing on the brink of Owners saying "no more". Without Owners, we have no Racing. The gravy train will grind to a halt, then...

One final thought - when I go to my Doctor with flu, he examines me and prescribes meds. He is paid for his examination. I can buy the meds where I like, with his prescription.

Now let's look at the Vets. The vet pops in to your yard and asks if you need anything. I must stress the point, that the Vet is already there, of own accord. You ask the vet to flush the tearduct of a horse, whose eye is weeping. The vet goes to the vehicle and fetches the necessary. Here are the costs of that conversation and procedure -
Vet opinion - R582
Travel shared R43
And then the meds, labour etc, which add up to another R800.
20 minutes later and the Owner is in for R1400, to drain a tear duct !?

Now, I ask you - what shared travel? What vet opinion?

And lastly, after all of the "opinion" costs and unlike my Doctor, they still charge a 100 % mark up on the meds which they dispense !

This must stop or Racing must stop. The Powers that be have a lot more to think about than Handicapping and potential Punter complaints. And they had better get a move on.

Louis makes a very important comment above .

"One final thought - when I go to my Doctor with flu, he examines me and prescribes meds. He is paid for his examination. I can buy the meds where I like, with his prescription."

Because only a vet may administer a S4 drug , you are at their mercy to what they charge..

and the S4 drug they prescribe for a viral infection is (probably) an antibiotic

Louis is absolutly correct, but why is this procedure in place?

Because the Vets have canvassed the NHRA and Vet council to put these rules in place.

Flu Vaccs and Horse sickness is an example of how the vets rip owners off.

Horse sickness 1 and 2 cost the vet R150. They charge at least R500! Profit at least R350, and they do this to 1600 in Summerveld so R500k per year pure profit.

Now do the same with Flu vacs and you will see how much the vets are making on 2 necessarry vaccines.

Trainers can buy these vaccines from the manufacturer but are not allowed to administer them,
And now they are precluded from buying them.
But stud farms are allowed to do both.

MAJMU, I have felt your pain, herewith some of the things I found out and some of the things I changed.

When involved with the Owners association the first people we approached were the Vets. We had a few heated discussions and ultimately realised that the Vets servicing Summerveld and Ashburton basically have a monopoly which is unchallenged.

1. Scheduled medicine should be marked up at 26% or R26 over R100 but the Vets believe that this does not apply to them. I have checked the wholesale price they buy at and some mark-ups run into the hundreds of %.
2. The above is irrelevant as they have pricing systems that will just adjust the consultation or administration fee to ensure they end up at the same rand amount anyway.
3. They use the regulations only to suit their pockets and the favourite one is making sure no Vet from outside of the immediate area does any work in their area especially when they charge up to 25% less. The local Vets will never write a script for a product as they want the mark-up on dispensing. Something I am working to change so that owners/trainers can buy the meds from a pharmacy in Hillcrest at a reasonable mark-up.
4. There is no will to change anything from the owners side unfortunately, many believe that one or two people will make all the changes for them. The training centres could easily employ 5-7 Vets with a dispensary and it will cost a fraction of the price but the owners would have to pay a flat fee monthly.
5. The current billing system adds in the bad debt and write offs so you are paying for owners who do not pay. Vets complain about bad debt but none of them are yet to go out of business.

Changes I made;
1. Trainer needed to sign off every invoice and has had to inform me when any of the horses were being treated.
2. If the trainer did not sign off the invoice then no payment would be made, Authority to Act actually means that the trainer should really be invoiced and then claim from the owner. I found my bills reduced when the trainer signed it off.
3. Vets enjoy the fact that the owner is not present for the treatment and the trainer is not present for the invoice.
4. Any horse needing treatment that would keep the horse off the track for 90 days had to be sent to the farm and treated there.
5. Any horse not running for 90 days had to be sent to the farm or farm rates charged for two of the months.

Racehorse & Sporting Horse owners need to get together and contract with some up and coming Vets that are able to make a decent living without ripping off owners that pay.

Hope that helps bud.