Petco
reviews and complaints

Well, I can see that Im not the only one in Mtn. Home who is fed up with our local Petco store and their horrible service. I went into the store again after several months of not visiting and had an even worse experience than last time.

I went in to the store in September 2010 to get assistance in the fish dept as I do a few times a month. I usually deal with Wesley, but he was not available so Laurie asked me if I needed help. When I told her yes, she was very rude like I was inconveniencing her and she told Barbara to help me. Barbara did not know anything that I was asking about, so I asked when Wesley was scheduled to be back in. Barbara left to check his schedule, and Laurie returned to me and yelled at me that I had no right to ask Wesley's schedule and she said that she wasn't even sure that he was coming back. I was very tired of Laurie's attitude by then so I asked to speak with the manager. She said that she was the only manager and if I needed to complain about her, she's the only one I can complain to so no one is going to do anything about it. I left the store then and I called back a few times during the weekend and the following week to speak with Wesley to get my questions answered, and no one will tell me when he may be available.

3 different associates avoided answering this simple question when I they have given me this info previously. I made my complaint on Petco.com and I received an automated response that it was being investigated, but I never heard anything more from them. If I had only looked on here sooner, I could have found out what happened to him since he has made complaints too along with another store worker! That is so pathetic that a current employee can't even be heard by their employer and has to sneak around anonymously reporting them to get anything done.

I had to suck it up and visit the store again recently because it's the only place that my son can buy a mouse for his snake now. Petco caused all of the mom and pop stores in our community to shut down.
I just wanted to get in and out with the mouse, and I had trouble finding an associate to help me. When I told my son that we may need to come back another time, a woman who did not appear to work there came up and asked if I needed help. I told her that I just need to buy a mouse for my son's snake, and she said "oh, you can't do that". I asked who she was and if she worked there, and she said "I'm the manager's mom, but I know that they won't sell mice for food". I told her rather sarcastically "Thanks for the info, but we have bought mice for food here before". She said, "Well, my daughter is working today, and I can tell you that she will NOT sell you a mouse." I asked who her daughter was, and guess what she said? Yep, her daughter is Laurie.

I walked around the store a few times looking for Laurie and found her huddled in a corner with stickers and making sure to avoid all customers. By the way, as I was looking for her, I looked around the fish dept. and it was in despicable conditions. I must have counted at least 60-70 dead fish floating in tanks. The tanks also all have this gross algae all over glass, and I saw several fish that were very sick with ick or other obvious diseases.

Anyways, I approached Laurie and told her that I need to buy a mouse for my son's snake and that her mom just told me that I can't buy one. I don't know if she recognized me from our issue in September, but I did not remind her. Laurie told me, "That's true. If you didn't say that it was for the snake, I could sell you one, but since I know that it will be food, I am not allowed to do that." I told her that was absolutely ridiculous, and that I want to buy a mouse as a pet instead then. She said that she can't since I already said that it was food and she knows that it won't really be a pet, and she suggested that I buy frozen mice. I told her that his snake will not eat the frozen mice that have been offered before, and it should not be any of her business what our intentions are for this mouse. She said "Sorry, but my hands are tied. I can only sell you frozen mice."

Well, that just did it for me. I had to walk out of the store before I kicked her teeth in. I am by-passing telling Petco anything more about this incident since they didn't help me before, and I am so angry that I want to take the to the Better Business Bureau.

What a horrible store with horrible employees. I beg everyone to stop shopping there so that they will shut down and move out of town. They don't do anything positive for our community or even offer any full time jobs for anyone in our town - only the managers who aren't from here, and the whole place just needs to disappear so that our well-loved mom and pop stores can reopen and stand a chance.

Husband dropped off our small Pom, Ting and they said how do you want him trimmed and he said just short and please none of that lions mane that the last groomer left him with. We have taken our dogs there many times with great success and this time we felt no reason to be concerned as they have been great. Well, I left them a Pom and picked up a mutt that looks something between a chihuahua and a rat. maybe a drowned cat too. The poor little dog has no hair left except where they chopped his tail until it is hardly one at all. I went and spoke with the store manager who admitted that the dog did not look like a Pom or any other breed that he knew of either. Sure he gave us a total refund but I want more. I want that poor excuse for a human being fired. There is no reason why a so-called professional groomer would ever do this to a Pom. What an idiot!

Recently, my mother went into this Petco to get me a set of grooming clippers for my birthday. She went over to the case and called over an employee. It took her several minutes of wondering around to find someone to help her. When she finally found someone, it was a groomer who helped her find a store associate. When she got the male employee over to the case, she started to ask him about which clippers to buy for me. She said he was very pleasant and knowledgeable. When she decided to buy a set, he had to find someone with the key. After waiting 20 minutes, he returned to say that the manager had gone home and that they did not have the key to open the case. He said that she would have to come back another time. She planned on giving it to me that night, so she settled for a gift card. She told the employee that she wanted to get a gift card for the amount of the clippers set that she wanted to get. He told her how much the particular set was and she got the gift card. She shared this story with me that night because it upset her and she thought it was inconvenient that she couldn’t get the item she wanted and had to leave with something else.
This is a continuation of a previous complaint. After my mother told us the story of how she ended up with a gift card instead, I was very hesitant to go to back to the store. My boyfriend and I went just a few nights later with a description of the clippers set that my mother got the gift card for. (Reminder: the employee got the gift card amount for how much the exact clipper set was) We walked over to the closed and locked case with the grooming clippers in it. There were only three boxes in there, but one matched the brand and description and was sitting under the price tag that matched what we were told. We walked around for several minutes trying to find a store associate to open the case but we could not find one. I had to walk to the front and wait in line to talk to the cashier to get him to come help us. Finally he came over and showed him which item I wanted. He went and got the keys pretty quickly and got the item for us. I am not sure of his name but he was blonde and very helpful and very nice. He took us to the register and rang up the set of clippers which my mother was told by the employee were around 78.00. (the amount she got the gift card for) The same clippers rang up for around 160.00. We explained the situation and so he agreed that it didn't sound right. He called over Jodi. She came over and confirmed that it was rung up as the correct price. At this point we started to get a bit annoyed at all the trouble we went through and it only got worse.

This is yet another continuation to a previous complaint. After we were told that it was the correct price, we explained the situation and nicely expressed how upsetting this was that we have put a lot of effort into just getting a single item. She understood and went to find the clipper set that matched the price we were given. When she came back she stated that they only had the around 160.00 ones or the around 20.00 ones. At this point my boyfriend was very aggravated with the whole situation and explained that we don’t want to settle for a cheaper one and that it was very irresponsible for the store to have a locked case that only employees can get into with products placed under the wrong price signs. At this point she said with an attitude "What do you want me to do? I can't discount a 160.00 item to 78.00" My boyfriend in reply said, "We should get something since it’s not our fault that your employees marked this the wrong price and told her mother the wrong price" he then asked to see a manager. Her response was "We don't have a store manager, you'll have to call corporate." At this point her attitude really got to me, who was quite this whole time. Finally I burst out, "Fine! We'll come back with my mom to return the card and we will go to Petsmart from now on!" as one last word, my boyfriend asked them to make sure nothing was charged to the gift card because it had been swiped. After all this, I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt and tried using the gift card online. Low and behold there was no money on it! When my mother returned to the store, they gave her a hard time about returning the gift card saying that it showed it had already been used.

I recently purchased an item at Petco In middletown new york. When i returned home the item did not fit my dog. I went back to exchange it for the right size and was told Very rudely by the manager) i needed the receipt and he could do nothing! I looked up their return policy and it said with out a receipt i was entitled to an even exchange or a gift card! I called the main office and was told the complaint would be filed I waited three days and heard nothing. I called them back and was told to go back to the store and ask for the general manager Anthony (who by the way is just as rude as the rest of them)! MILO the manager who refused to help me NOW refused to page the GM! Home i went very upset and called the main office ONCE again. The GM refused to talk to me he said i said nwegative things about the store YES I DID I was never treated so poorly in my life by anyone ! Petco needs to reevaluate their employees and hire people that WANT to help the customers NOT give them a hard time! There are lots of people unemployed BUT That particular store DOES not care about the customers they just want a pay check! For all your Pets needs DONT GO TO PETCO!

Never again will I recommed petco to anyone. We have always had our dog grommed at petco (10 yrs plus). I called to make an appointment and was told by a very rude person that they did not take animals 14 yrs plus. I first went there and had a wonderful groomer and then she quite after 10 yrs. And now a very rude person answers the phone and tells me this. After reading some of the horrors of petco, I feel I have been lucky for 10 yrs. I found someone else who went out of their way to groom our dog. Petco gooming is bad bad bad, rude rude. Never start with them.

I am a former Petco employee. I am an animal lover and I was the only person that DID care about the animals in the store. Sick animals would be neglected, and the healthy animals would be forgotten about and sometimes go more than 2 days without food or water if I was off during those times. The reason that I was fired was because another employee fed her own mouse to her own snake in the store (neither of which CAME from Petco), and because I was the manager on duty, I got fired for it. Their reason was breaking company policy because you can't use live animals for food. The snake nor the mouse was Petco's, and there is NO policy against that. The worst part is that the person that did the feeding was not reprimanded one bit.

I have taken legal action, especially since Petco is not paying me unemployment, and my lawyer expects to win this case with flying colors. Any advise on fighting this case would be appreciated also. I don't want to work there again, but I know that I deserve to receive unemployment.

10/10/10
Today my boyfriend and I dropped off our 6month old Coton De Tulear to be groomed. It is the second time he has been to this store for a grooming. When we dropped him off the groomer told us we did not need to leave the picture of the cut we wanted, since she had a good idea. She insisted we take it with us. Since our first cut there went well we left. We dropped our puppy off at 12 and were told to pick him up at 4. When I walked through the door at 4pm our puppy was just getting onto the grooming table and was BEING SHAVED! This is completly not what we asked for. I asked the sales clerk if she could ask the groomer why he was being shaved. When she went to ask the groomer, the groomer seemed agitated. I was told he would be done in a half hour. I called my boyfriend to meet me at the Petco.When he got there our dog was still not half way done. We were told it would be another half hour ( an hour extra in total).
When we went to pick our puppy up he had the hair style of another breed completly, a poodle. When asked why he was cut this way the sales clerk made us wait fifteen minutes till the groomer was off the phone, then she simply danced around the questions we had. When we showed her the picture again she tride to tell us the cut she gave him was an inch long, as in the photo, when it really is less then half an inch. We were not offered an apology or any form of compensation. We will not be shopping at, or taking our puppy to get groomed at Hudson, MA's Petco on Washington street again, and I strongly advice that anyone who has a dog with hair, rare breed dog, or who cares about having the services they asked for done correctly and with a smile, please consider shopping/grooming elswhere.

I have called numerous people in the corporate offices, pet hotline, bbb, peta, even emailed 2 news channels. And petco is still not doing anything about it. I am feeling helpless. These snakes (The ball pythons) are covered in mites and no one has done anything about it. I quit because my gm would not let me clean the reptile section, he said I had to shock dog toys or dog food instead of cleaning the snakes which I offered to do. When I told him well what about at petco animals always come first, and then he cut me off in mid sentence and said well if you dont like our policy you can leave, so I quit right then and there. I never quit a job before. I am not going to sit back while these poor snakes are dying. They are not feed properly either. Their cages never have been cleaned. The entire reptile section is infested with mites and no one cares but me. Maybe because a lot of people hate snakes, but they are beautiful creatures that are misunderstood. Me being a huge snake lover, this makes me insanely mad. I am going to keep emailing and calling everyone I can about this. Please help them. Like I said. I will not stop until this is fixed.

And, when I recently went in to get my last check, the gm told me I over reacted, and that no snakes had mites, they were"little black dots".. Yeah, little black dots. Hes obviously covering his own # because other employees told me he knows I reported him. The store also smells horrible because no one wants to clean the ferret cage.

Also, other employees told me they never cleaned the snakes, so the gm lied to me. I hate petco. They should not be allowed to sell animals. They sell animals knowing those animals are sick. This has to stop. A vet doesnt even come in there to check on the animals. They dont even call the vet when an animal is sick. The back room, the "wellness" room, is fully stocked with sick neglected animals. All they care about is dog food, since dog food is 50% of their sales. Screw petco. Animals do not come first.

I went into the E. Virginia Beach, VA to purchase some outfits for my 3 dogs. I found a clearance rack marked 75% off. The sign was balanced between the center of the 4 way rack and you were unable to read any writing below the 75% due to the fact it was covered. There weren't very many outfits on it but found 3. I also found other things in the store. I went to the checkout and they had a dog trainer ringing the register which was new on it. One outfit ring the correct price and the other 2 did not. She stated oh these are 75% off too but I am not sure how to fix it, let me ask someone. Another employee came and told her she would have to have the manager to do it. At this point, I was waiting 10 minutes. The manager comes to the register and the cashier informed her of the problem. She never even looks at me and states oh those aren't listed on the sign and walks away in the direction of the rack. The cashier says oh she is going to check on it. She passes the rack without stopping and heads to the back of the store. I and the cashier stood there for 5 minutes. The cashier states she doesn't know what happens and calls the manager back. As the manager approaches she said "What is the problem?" with all I can say is a snotty voice and a bob of the head. The cashier says what did you find out. "About WHAT" store manager says. "The outfits?" cashier responds. "I SAID they aren't listed on the sign!" The cashier starts to point at the rack "But they are all on that rack." " I said they aren't LISTED!" The manager finally turns to me and said "DO YOU WANT THESE OR NOT, WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?" I have to say I fell back on my heals and with wide shocked eyes said "Yes, but I would like them for the 75% off, you can't see what is written on the sign. It's covered." The manager with a bob of the head and a flip of her voice "I am NOT doing it" At this point, I believe I was done. I asked her for her for the manager she said she was the manager. I asked her for her district manager's information. She informed me that they don't give out the district manager's name or number and does not give out the corporate headquarters number. After asking her 5x she finally said they had a customer care line I could make a complaint on. I asked for it. She went in the back, came back out with a business card and throw. Let me restate that THROW it on the corner in front of me and said "GOOD LUCK".

Now at this point, while in the store, I called the number. It clearly is a India Call Center. No one could speak English well. The man was trying to be nice, but informed me he didn't have any numbers but the store number and I could call and make a complaint to the same store manager I just dealt with or he could leave a message with the direct manager and it would take 48 hrs before he could get back to me. He couldn't give out thecorporate headquarters number or give me the name of whom would be calling me. I even ask for his boss. She was nice but same story. I ask if she could just call him and tell him to call me. They had no phone numbers they just send emails.

This is the worst customer service I have ever dealt with. I shop Petsmart all the time because of their service. I have had complaints about small stuff and it is always resolved or an apology. I spend about 500 a month on food and supplies for my 6 animals. I thought I would give Petco a try. NEVER AGAIN. I will stay with Petsmart.

Shoppers BEWARE!

On july 26th our pet fish "dorthy" that we had for 5 months died. My three year old daughter was devastated as you can imagine. So we had a little funeral for her and we went to petco to purchase another fish. My daughter picked out a betta crowntail male. She was so excited about the red and blue colors on the tale. Anyway, they next morning I noticed that the fish had died sometime during the night. I did not want my daughter to know that it had died so I quickly put it in a zip lock bag and drove over to petco. I was told I needed to talk to the manager in the fish department "shaun". I explained to him what happened and showed him my receipt. He took one look at it and said that the girl the day before had rung me up wrong. She under charged me. She only charged me $3.99 and it should have been rung up at $6.99. He said since that happened he would not be able to replace it with a crowntail fish. He said he would replace it with a cheaper fish but not a crowntail fish. I explained to him I needed the exact same kind and color so my daughter would not notice. He was very rude to me and not sympathetic to my daughters feelings. He said I could pay the difference for a crowntail fish. It was a $3 dollar difference. After several minuts of begging him to replace my fish he just walked away from me. I told me I would not be shopping here anymore and his response was "that's fine!" he did not care about my business or my daughters feelings. It's a big deal to a 3 year old losing a pet. I was so upset. I have never had such bad customer service in my life. I had to hurry and get home so I had to pay the $3 difference so I could have the same fish. I was not happy. My mom, also shops at petco and she said she will be taking her business elsewhere. She couldn't believe a petco employee acted that way. So petco lost our business over $3. Not good business.

I went in on Friday, July 23, 2010 and purchased a baby bearded dragon, which I named Zeus, for just over $60. I also bought additional pet supplies such as food (meal-worms), a special kind of sand filled which has vitamins mixed in so that if they eat some by accident it is actually good for them, a heat light, as well as temperature and humidity gauges. Every thing I bought was approved by the guy who was helping me and telling me the supplies I needed.

Four days and three hours later, Zeus died. I had no idea what happened since I kept his cage conditions to what I was told in terms of temperature andhumidity . I kept putting fresh worms in his cage and had a water bowl in addition to spraying the rocks lightly to simulate dew, which is how desert lizards drink in nature.

I went into the store roughly an hour and a half ago after talking to the manager on the phone unsure of whether or not they would give me a refund so I could get a new bearded dragon. They had me bring in the Zeus's body and after checking him over the manager said Zeus most likely died by ingesting a large grain of sand, the same sand which was recommended to me by an employee.Still, they offered to give me store credit, which I accepted, and despite having lost a pet, I was hopeful that my new one would would be with me for a long time.

This is where my shopping experience at Petco went from indifferent to down right pissed off. I was willing to get over the fact that an employee had recommended sand as bedding even though what he didn't know was that the sand was meant for slightly older bearded dragons and could be harmful or deadly to babies, which it was for Zeus.

I decided to buy an additional light and replace the sand with a mat which would run me about $50, but I was fine to pay for it. I was presented with a gift card by the manager after he "made a call to someone, " and when I informed him I wanted another bearded dragon with this gift card, he informed me that I needed to buy a new terrarium so that he would be more comfortable.

I was keeping Zeus in a 5 gallon, plenty big for his size, and the display they kept 4-5 baby bearded dragons in could not have been bigger than 6 or 7 gallons. When I said maybe I would buy another a different lizard, the manager insisted I would still need to buy at least a 10 gallon tank ($44 + tax) so they would be sure he would be in a safe and loving environment, using this clearly rehearsed speech to hide behind while simultaneously trying to hit me up for more cash. In addition to the new light and mat, my total for the visit was now well over $100.

When it had become clear that in order to spend this $40 gift card I would have to spend over $100 of my own money in addition to all the stuff I had bought before, and considering the whole reason my buddy Zeus died is due to terrible and down right wrong advice from one of their own employees, I just simply walked out. It made me furious that after Petco essentially killed my pet, they refused to replace him without me spending a lot of money.

I am not saying all Petco stores are like this, but the one located at 1929 Old Gallows Road Vienna, VA, 22182 (Tyson's Corner) is certainly like this, since that is where all this happened. This could be even worse if you get a pet from them for your kid, they get attached to it, and it dies, especially if it is out of your control.

Warning! Warning! Warning! Do not take your pets to petco in harker heights for grooming services. I took my great pyreness mix there to get groomed. Those of you who are familiar with the breed, know they have very long (6-8 inch) curly hair. He used to love to be brushed, but after this encounter with the head groomer if you approach him with a brush or even brush your own hair in his presence, he tries to bite. Not a simple nip, to draw blood. While on a visit to petco after the incident with the groomer, to buy other products there, the head groomer walked toward him and he tried to bite her, and he doesn't bite, he likes everyone.

Now in order to have him groomed for about $70.00 is is costing me $176.00 because he has to be sedated. There lies another problem, because he could die from sedation. During the short time he is sedated he has to be shaved, because it is nearly impossible to try to brush him out in a short hour. The loss of hair on his body aslo requires us to put sunblock on him and not let him out during the day cause he could go blind.

Of course he no longer goes to petco and it would be wise for others not to use them either, god only knows what type of abuse your animals are going through. We believe she hit him with the brush. Three of my friends who have used petco have had similar experiences with their animals and no longer use petco. The manager said he refuses to fire her because he has got no other complaints.

So, I went into the grooming salon to drop my puppy off (petco in phillipsburg NJ) and there was this girl Heather H who was grooming my puppy, she told me it would be 2-3 hours so after 2 1/2 hours i went back to the store, figured i'd shop around for a while, I saw this groomer (heather) sitting in a maroon truck shooting a needle into her fingertips, i went into the salon, demanded my dog NOW, lets top it off, my little girl had all of her nails QUICKED, this girl obviously was too high to realize how far to cut her nails told the manager what i saw, and did they care? NO. they made me pay my $22 and i left, i will never go back there unless that girl is gone. they did tell me to go to the vet and it would be on them. so thats the only good thing that happened!

Once again: petco = cruelty to animals (Proven in court)! So if being charged, convicted of and fined $900, 000 for extreme cruelty to animals in 2005 in california wasn't enough to teach the badly trained and unprofessional employees and truly sociopathic, greedy executives at petco in san diego, california wasn't enough, they've again been charged with more cruelty to animals and again swindling customers in june, 2010. Only this time, petco settled for 1.75 million dollars (Read: pled no contest = guilty), instead of having their company's sorry history of freezing, starving, stomping and burning defenseless animals to death through the california courts once again. So what's it going to take before people realize what an utterly evil, pathetically greedy and truly mentally unbalanced bunch of animal torturers the slime who run and work at petco really are? If you care about animals, please send this post to any pet owners or animal lovers you know. Remember: you may just save the life of an innocent animal by keeping him or her out of the clutches at a local petco deathhouse!

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!