Metro Vancouver woman claims dog trainer went on "racist tangents" and owes her money (VIDEO)

A Metro Vancouver woman is warning others about the unregulated pet services industry after a trainer cut ties and refused to refund her hundreds of dollars — all because she brought her dog to Pride while it was hot.

After sifting through review after review to find an adequate dog trainer for her eight-month-old pitbull, Akash Gill decided to hire a trainer from In Training K9 Services.

She says she initially paid for an $80 in-person assessment so a trainer could assess her dog’s behaviour and customize the program.

Thinking this would be the right fit, Gill e-transferred $750 for six sessions. However, she tells Daily Hive, “Now, in hindsight, it seems so glaringly obvious, like why didn’t they have anything in writing?”

After the assessment and payment, Gill says she would communicate with him through text.

“Typically, if you’re going to hand over an exorbitant amount of money … you would expect at least some sort of results or open lines of communication with somebody for that amount. But … there was no set training schedule, there was no regulations, there were no guidelines, there were no policies in place.”

@nashandkash who NOT to hire 🙃 #dogtraining #trainyourdog #dogtrainingfail #badtrainer #puppytraining #storytime #langley #cloverdalebc #fyp ♬ original sound – Kash&Nash

During the first four 45-minute sessions, Gill says the trainer did a decent job. After that, however, she claims “he went on weird racist tangents.”

Gill says she felt some comments about the British colonization of India were made because she is South Asian.

The dog owner claims other sexist, homophobic and transphobic comments were made during these sessions.

“I have a buzzed head. I am tattooed from head to toe. I don’t dress very feminine, so I’m not sure these particular comments were aimed at me or just in general, but … the one comment that really stood out — that he said more than once was — ‘I remember when men were men and women were women. And you could actually tell the difference,'” she says.

Gill says she felt she had gotten some value from the first few sessions for her dog, but she also had few options considering she had already paid the trainer in full.

Credit lost because dog, owner spent time “in the sun” at Pride

Heading to her second-to-last session, Gill’s dog started to feel sick. Considering the fifth session overlapped with last month’s heat wave, she texted the trainer to reschedule the appointment, and he agreed.

The day Gill was meant to attend the session, she instead took her dog to Vancouver’s English Bay for a swim and then visited the Vancouver Pride Parade. She posted a video to her Instagram page of her dog Nash at the event. 

“We just had a more relaxed day rather than jumping hurdles in a non-air-conditioned facility with no way to cool off,” she explained, adding her dog wore a cooling vest and cooling shoes.

“I fully admit I am a crazy dog lady. I have a backpack full of every supply you could basically think of, including frozen water bottles, water treat food, a cup for water — all of the above to make sure he is well taken care of in that environment. And made sure we stayed in the shade without being in the sun.”

 

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A post shared by Nachattar aka Nash (@nashandkash)

The following week, Gill texted the trainer to confirm a time and location for their rescheduled appointment. But he said she would need to pay an extra fee.

“Sorry to say but your last credit was lost due to a decision that you decided to go to parade downtown in the sun and saying … Nash was not well because of heat and u are wanting keep him safe. [T]he training centre [was] covered and no sun at all it would have been better and safer to come to training, if y[ou] are still [interested] in joining the group you are welcome, but there is a fee for the last two sessions which is $80,” the text from the trainer reads.

Gill tells Daily Hive that she found this unfair considering there were no boundaries, guidelines for a cancellation, or a rescheduling policy set from the start.

“You’ve agreed to now reschedule, the reason for which is not something that you get to decide if you’ve already been paid upfront for a service, if you haven’t set out any guidelines. That doesn’t make any sense,” she tells Daily Hive.

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Gill responded to the trainer, explaining how she cared for her dog while attending the parade and accused him of having an issue with the 2SLGBTQ+ community.

“Nash had diarrhea, so I didn’t want him running a course and pooping everywhere, instead we found a cool spot and hung out for the afternoon downtown and took every precaution for the heat and went swimming,” her text reads.

“Your homophobic comments throughout training have been problematic, but we didn’t say anything because you seemed to be a good trainer. It seems like you have more of a problem with the gay and trans community, and that’s where the issue is. You’ve made comments about what men and women should be and their gender roles and made sexist jokes about women throughout our training.”

Her text says that without a contract, she was not clear on the rescheduling policies in the first place.

“Seems like the issue is that we were at Pride. You were paid [$]750 for six training sessions and now you’re using your personal judgements as a reason to not fulfill that, there was no contract stating any of these conditions and you seeing our social media and judging how we spend our day is not appropriate for withholding training.”

The trainer responded simply saying he did not accept Gill’s response and texted her saying, “Since u are making personal statements, I think it is better for u to move on.”

Gill agreed and requested a refund for her last two training sessions. However, over two weeks later, she says she did not receive a response or her money.

Daily Hive reached out to the In Training K9 Services, but the trainer declined to comment. 

Dog trainer receiving negative reviews

Earlier this month, Gill posted a video about her experience with the dog trainer, and it has been viewed over 33,000 times as of Tuesday afternoon.

Since then, In Training K9 Services has received several one-star reviews from people the trainer claims not to know and have not sought his services before.

“I will not be using this business, and I hope you don’t either, after hearing about the biased and absolutely absurd behaviour happening here. You have no right to treat someone (especially a client) with disrespect and try to gouge them out of money based on your own personal beliefs. Get a life,” one person wrote.

Google Review screenshots

Others wrote they’ve heard about the trainer’s discriminatory views and concerning attitude, which is why they’ve written reviews to warn potential clients.

In response, the owner called the people posting the reviews “aliens” and said, “Nothing better to do on wonderful day, to spread lies about my business [than] people I have never trained.”

Dog owner looking at next steps

Gill is looking at her options to make a complaint, including contacting the small claims court. However, she says what makes it difficult is businesses like the trainers are not registered with the Better Business Bureau.

“It’s an unregulated industry. So it’s sort of hard to know where to go to make your complaints,” she tells Daily Hive.

Based on her experience, Gill says dog owners have to scroll through hundreds of results, “and you don’t necessarily know what to trust because there’s no accreditation that people have to do.”

“There’s no certain courses that people have to do. There’s no quality review for dog trainers; you’re basically going off of what other people’s experiences have been, and hoping that if somebody had a negative experience somewhere that they would have voiced it online,” she says.

In the future, she says she knows she won’t move forward without the right paperwork and is encouraging other dog owners to do the same.