Banfield Pet Hospital
Regular clients praise the vets and techs as genuinely compassionate and thorough, especially Dr. Barnhart, and note flexible scheduling for urgent needs. Groomer Taryn earns particular praise for her gentle handling. Yet the business suffers from a reputation for long waits, frequent appointment delays, and staff turnover that leaves people seeing a different vet each visit. Several reviewers report costly misdiagnoses, including one case where Banfield missed masses on X-rays that led to a dog's death a week later. Wellness plans attract customers with low introductory costs but critics say they obscure full-price charges and fund unnecessary upsells; one person was offered only an 80-dollar refund after a $300 fee, contingent on signing away her right to leave a review. The core tension is stark: skilled individual clinicians clash with a corporate structure that reviewers see as profit-driven, opaque about plan terms, and dismissive of complaints. A 3.8-star rating from 458 reviews masks a 56/23 five-to-one-star split, suggesting Banfield creates intensely loyal and intensely burned customers.
