I dealt with a similar problem some years ago when wishing to book a local restaurant for us and a friend with their guide dog. Although I explained to those restaurants, about the Equality Act it was only a couple of years since they had brought the Act in so I had expected possible misunderstandings, they still refused. The fourth one allowed it because they knew who I was and accepted that I would be correct. The follow up to this was a friendly visit from me to those restaurants and a full front page feature in the local paper. The feature was a letter from the guide dog to the newspaper wishing to thank the restaurant and to wonder why he wasn't admitted to those other restaurants (unnamed). It was quite a long and humorous letter from the dog. The restaurant made good publicity out of the article and had it laminated and hung in its window.
The situation could become even more difficult in Wales where they are apparently looking at banning all dogs from certain areas to "increase inclusivity" (oh the irony) as certain groups think dogs are dirty and therefore don't visit the countryside. No, I really am not making it up.
I walked passed the cafe in the park and was surprised to see a sign in the window saying well behaved dogs are welcome. Some places realise that they lose customers if they dont allow dogs. Pubs mostly. I suppose its different for posh restaurants, but I thought guide dogs were accepted everywhere.
@pete by law, guide dogs must be accepted. That doesn't mean to say that all premises obey the law. I saw a photo recently of a sign which said something along the lines of "Dogs welcome. Please tie children to the lamp post". I can definitely identify with the latter part of that.
A set of five short radio programmes that are well worth listening to. Clever, inventive, wicked people are wandering around the world trying to find clever, inventive and wicked ways to defraud naive, trusting, and trustworthy people. Each programme deals with a different type of fraud. Today’s programme shows how easily your house can become somebody else’s house and you can’t get it back once another person’s name is listed with the Land Registry. BBC Radio 4 - Five Ways They Get You, Property And today’s is even more frightening and likely to happen to the average Joe. Five Ways They Get You - Bank Card - BBC Sounds
I have listened to a few of these podcasts and still cannot quite understand the house fraud. The criminals target houses that are empty with the mortgage paid, but it still seems crazy that they can 'take over a residence'...
They register themselves as the owner, I think. I’m not clever enough to know how they do it. I’d have to listen to it again, I think! But OH and I have been on to the HM Land Registry website and it does have a place where the registered owner can ask them to notify him/her if someone asks for information relating to the title deeds. An email is sent to the owner to alert them to this, giving them time to ask themselves why a perfect stranger may want to know about their property. We have registered for this alert to be sent to us, should such a thing happen to us.
That is a good idea, @Tidemark, to register for alerts. I hope the loopholes in the system are addressed too. One has to be so alert to scams these days!
If only these people, who are clearly clever, could put their intelligence and bright ideas to good use rather than to bad.
The world just gets weirder. Bark detective: dog trained to sniff out UK tree diseasei and Rats trained to sniff out smuggled rhino horn and pangolin scales
Really wish the training standard be locked down across the board and a certificate be obtained by owner. I raised two GSD, got obedience titles on both. I know when I see a " guide dog" if it is anything close to trained or just someone trying to get away with something, like taking dog to a airbnb.
@redstar Regulation is essential for something as important as guide dogs. In the UK you can only get guide dogs from licensed and recognised suppliers - RNIB - and similar for other assistance dogs that scent thinks like imminent epilleptic fits or similar or hearing dogs for the deaf. Anyone short-circuiting that system is a liability, whether they're receiving a bogus dog or offering it.
We had a guide dog trainer living in our road a few years ago and so saw what went into getting them ready. She asked us a couple of times if we would foster one during training but we declined because we knew we couldn't be as strict as what it needed. We have had dogs all our lives and they are extremely well trained but not up to guidedog standards. I did look after an assistance dog that was trained to help with daily tasks, picking up mail, emptying the washing machine etc, for people with severe arthritis, and we followed all the commands and training it was supposed to have had. The long story short is that it was one of the most badly behaved dogs that I've ever seen. I am 6ft and had trouble holding it when it launched at people I knew. Any training it had had was still in there but it took a lot of time and effort to get it to follow it. My point on this is that it was perfectly trained when the person got it but it had been treated more as a pet than a working animal and this meant it wasn't able to do its job properly. It was quite a common theme with the guide dog trainer as she always had at least one dog that was back for retraining because the owner didn't follow the rules completely.
