Some of you may have seen my posts re: the Siamese we purchased a month ago. I am having trouble with the breeder and wanted to get other breeders' opinions on it. I'll not post the name of the breeder, still giving her the benefit of the doubt. This is going to be very long, but I want to explain the situation fully. It's really bothering me and is a huge black cloud over this whole experience.
The story goes that we searched for two weeks to find a breeder who had what we wanted when, only the one we found is several states away so he had to be shipped. She didn't require any contract, and stated multiple times that all cats were registered which was specifically what we wanted. He's already neutered, so we knew there shouldn't be any problems.
She was very nice and accommodating at first. I even spent an hour chatting with her on the phone one night. She seemed very knowledgeable and trustworthy. However, when the cat arrived we were surprised that there was nothing in the envelope but the health certificate. I asked about the registration several times via email and she never responded to that question although she responded to others within the same emails. After 2 weeks I began to get suspicious and contacted the CFA with the name of the father cat she gave me, but they could find no record of him although they did have record of her female that I suspected was the mother, but no litters that would match our kitty. I wrote her and told her what the CFA said and asked that she rectify the situation. She responded with a very defensive, very nasty email in which she directly insulted me, told us that we would get the registration, and not to contact her again. I, of course, told her I certainly will be in contact until we have the registration in our hands. More than a week later after still not receiving it, I told her that I would give her 1 more week to get it to us or we'd be sending a complaint to the CFA. The deadline was yesterday... the mail has already come again today and it's not here.
After we threatened the complaint she said she put it in the mail Monday, but if so we should've had it by now. I wrote her last night to tell her that it wasn't here but I'd give it a few more days just in case since it wasn't sent in any fashion that could be tracked. I told her I wished we could put all this behind us so that she could feel comfortable checking in on him, and explained that surely she could see how we'd be suspicious by now. I also said that I had read up on the food she feeds (Science Diet) and they say it's not very good, so I let her know we had switched him to Wellness and wondered if she might consider that, too, since he's doing so well with it. Of course, I get another crass response full of little digs and once again insulting my choice to feed him a food that was referred to me by another breeder with sick cats (a breeder I was set to get our kitty thru but it fell through when her cats came down with a virus, so of course now it's the food's fault and once again she's insinuating that I'm a bad person for daring to feed it to him). She has also denied us her usual "lifetime guarantee" due to all of the "ugliness" that has transpired, seemingly insinuating that it has all been on my part.
I know that she is a CFA registered breeder, as I found a couple of old references to past show cats of hers at CFA but nothing on the father whom she says is nearing Grand Champion. She sent three emails following that last reply with photo attachments of other cats of hers to "prove" his registered status, and still acts completely defensive, offensive, and offended that I would even doubt her, but after over a month and still no straight answer? I have no choice especially after how unprofessionally she handled herself once I finally out right questioned her on it. Ours is beautiful and undoubtedly a purebred, but I'm wondering if anyone has any insight into what the #$!* this lady must be thinking, and what I should do next.
I will be printing up all email correspondence with her to accompany the letter to CFA. I just want to avoid sending it if I can.
The story goes that we searched for two weeks to find a breeder who had what we wanted when, only the one we found is several states away so he had to be shipped. She didn't require any contract, and stated multiple times that all cats were registered which was specifically what we wanted. He's already neutered, so we knew there shouldn't be any problems.
She was very nice and accommodating at first. I even spent an hour chatting with her on the phone one night. She seemed very knowledgeable and trustworthy. However, when the cat arrived we were surprised that there was nothing in the envelope but the health certificate. I asked about the registration several times via email and she never responded to that question although she responded to others within the same emails. After 2 weeks I began to get suspicious and contacted the CFA with the name of the father cat she gave me, but they could find no record of him although they did have record of her female that I suspected was the mother, but no litters that would match our kitty. I wrote her and told her what the CFA said and asked that she rectify the situation. She responded with a very defensive, very nasty email in which she directly insulted me, told us that we would get the registration, and not to contact her again. I, of course, told her I certainly will be in contact until we have the registration in our hands. More than a week later after still not receiving it, I told her that I would give her 1 more week to get it to us or we'd be sending a complaint to the CFA. The deadline was yesterday... the mail has already come again today and it's not here.
After we threatened the complaint she said she put it in the mail Monday, but if so we should've had it by now. I wrote her last night to tell her that it wasn't here but I'd give it a few more days just in case since it wasn't sent in any fashion that could be tracked. I told her I wished we could put all this behind us so that she could feel comfortable checking in on him, and explained that surely she could see how we'd be suspicious by now. I also said that I had read up on the food she feeds (Science Diet) and they say it's not very good, so I let her know we had switched him to Wellness and wondered if she might consider that, too, since he's doing so well with it. Of course, I get another crass response full of little digs and once again insulting my choice to feed him a food that was referred to me by another breeder with sick cats (a breeder I was set to get our kitty thru but it fell through when her cats came down with a virus, so of course now it's the food's fault and once again she's insinuating that I'm a bad person for daring to feed it to him). She has also denied us her usual "lifetime guarantee" due to all of the "ugliness" that has transpired, seemingly insinuating that it has all been on my part.
I know that she is a CFA registered breeder, as I found a couple of old references to past show cats of hers at CFA but nothing on the father whom she says is nearing Grand Champion. She sent three emails following that last reply with photo attachments of other cats of hers to "prove" his registered status, and still acts completely defensive, offensive, and offended that I would even doubt her, but after over a month and still no straight answer? I have no choice especially after how unprofessionally she handled herself once I finally out right questioned her on it. Ours is beautiful and undoubtedly a purebred, but I'm wondering if anyone has any insight into what the #$!* this lady must be thinking, and what I should do next.
I will be printing up all email correspondence with her to accompany the letter to CFA. I just want to avoid sending it if I can.
