April 08th, 2022

​What you are paying for when you hire a Certified, Vetted and accredited Trainer and or Behaviourist

Lots of people think that dog training and behaviourist services are highly priced, which is fair enough. If you don't know enough about the industry of course you think it's over priced.

Many people think it's cuddling dogs or puppies most days.

This is so far from the truth lol. If you have read the about me section pinned to the top of this page you will know I am a part of many accredited memberships and have many qualifications.

As financially accessible the organisations make these memberships and courses they of course have to consider their time, the committees time, the secretary's time, the services that they offer us such as CPD and the entire vetting process annually.

For studies we have to consider the time of the individual or organisation and what they have had to use to access the materials for the course.

We also don't get paid for many of our hours. We don't get paid to study, many jobs pay for training days, we have venue costs, travel costs, wear and tear on the vehicle, costs for perishable items, we don't get paid for travel time, we don't get paid for behavioural notes.

Virtually, we don't get paid for electric, Internet and our time on building courses, making demonstration videos, follow up emails and behaviour notes.

We also don't get paid for liaising with other professionals, we also don't get paid for answering messages and or admin.

Many of us have to state on our contactable details that we aren't available 24/7 and we also need time and space as anyone else working as an employee but for us this isn't to watch TV, go out or chill, this is when we cram in admin and studying.

People get annoyed at us for not answering messages immediately or in unreasonable hours.

For many people in work when they leave the building that's it, there is no further contact or worry until the next shift.

We also don't get paid for annual leave, time off sick compassionate leave etc.

The amazing colleagues that I know who are jot independently wealthy or financially sound from a spouse, are not rich and barely scratch the surface with covering their costs and meeting their bills because they do it for the Dogs and the love of helping people with their dogs.

So when someone says that Dog Training or Behaviourists are expensive, ask them about that individuals credentials, the alphabet soup after their name and their CV because there is a reason the cost is what it is and however expensive someone thinks it is, the cost will only be touching the surface of the actual cost.

Image description: Storyboard layout with one big rectangle, two small squares underneath and a large rectangle at the bottom.
The top image is of a two tone blue sky, with trees and hedges in the background, there is a 7 door kennel, with different shades of grey roof, wooden panels on the left hand side, with stacks of dog food. The kennels have silver mesh doors, a pink mop bucket in front of the third kennel door and a wooden map handle. There is a man crouched tying a yellow toxic waste bag and a poop scoop shovel to his right. There is a woman with short blonde hair to the left bottom of the rectangle walking a Wolfdog on a pink truelove harness and a long black lead.
First left square has an outline of a human cross legged, with two tone pink short messy hair tucked behind her ears, wearing a mint green hoody, rolled at the elbows, blue jeans, black socks with green top toes. She is sat on a red/pink bean bag reading a book. The carpet is a beige brown, she also has a desk behind her with a glimpse of the back of an orange computer chair. The desk is brown and you can just see the right hand side of a computer monitor, there is a red and pink lava lamp on the right of the table. There are 3 shelves above the desk, the two in symmetry hold books and the top shelf holds three green succulent plants. One in a white planter one in a pink planter and one in a dark red planter.
In the right hand square is a computer monitor with the Geek Week Presenters screen, a pink post it note on the top right of the monitor and a white mug with a purple paw on the mug. On the left hand side of the brown desk top. The wall behind is magnolia.
In the bottom rectangle is a cream background with the text in the right hand middle of the screen with Black text with white stroke which reads "It takes a Village to holistically support a dog"
To the left is a woman with dark blonde hair, in a pastel red blouse, with grey trousers and her arms folded, with a fluffy white, brown and caramel Jack Russell sat in front of her.

Under her on the bottom left of the corner is a woman with purple hair two tone, in a purple hoodie, blue jeans, black trainers, sat in a Wheelchair holding a Clicker with a black and white Collie sat next to her panting.

Second to the left is a woman with grey hair in pigtails, her hair is grey and blueish, she is wearing a black full body wetsuit with dark blue patches. She has a golden retriever sat in front of her. The Golden Retriever is an orange and gold colour and is very fluffy and is panting.

Second to the right is a man with blonde hair with a lab coat over a pastel green shirt and blue trousers with white shoes. With a Wolfdog panting sat in front of him. He is brown, dark grey and cream.

In the right corner is a man sitting with a Wolfdog. He has black hair with green highlights, he is wearing an orange t-shirt with black baggy trousers and high top trainers that are white and grey with green laces. He is stroking a Wolfdog sat next to him. The Wolfdog is in a sit pretty pose, with tongue hanging out, brown in colour with a white chest and a black dipped tail and darker brown on the face.
A smart phone in the top right hand corner with 3 notification bars, to the left is a behavioural history form document. In the top middle is the computer monitor again but this time with the apps screen which contains Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc.

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