The current Mission in Progress at Your Pet Space is improving communication company wide. To that end, we trust this post will help clarify some recent misunderstandings among our clients.

The below reminder information was sent out as recently as Sept 26th of this year:

We are proud to offer longer hours than any other facility in town! However, should you request drop off or pickup even further outside of our normal hours, we can do this for a $10 fee, with prior notice. (This applies to early/late daycare as well as boarding). We do not allow extended check in/out earlier than 6am or later than 8pm on any day, for the comfort of our boarding guests. At our discretion, we may allow an exception to the after hours checkin/out policy. Also, for the comfort of our daytime guests, please remember that we are closed daily for Doggy Naptime from 12 to 3pm.

We sincerely apologize that we have not done enough to inform clients of this policy. In future, every client that has a pet in boarding will be provided with this in writing upon checking their dog in, to avoid anyone missing the information. In addition, we apologize that we have not done enough to explain why this policy is so important.

Firstly, we are always ALL about the dogs. Your dogs. Other clients’ dogs. The safety and health of the dogs comes first–not only with Dave and I, but our staff as well.

When the dogs in our care (an average of 20-40 at a time) are awakened while sleeping in the middle of Naptime or later than 8pm or gotten excited during feeding earlier than 6am, their routine is shattered. This leads to additional stress which, if done repeatedly, can lower their immune systems, leading to illness. In addition, when we are closed, our staff on site are performing deep cleaning procedures when the dogs are awake–which directly effect their health on a day to day basis.

In regards to safety of our guests, we are fortunate in our new building to have a private lot with gated entrances, and have recently implemented a new safety protocol where we secure the gates as soon as the last client has checked out. They are routinely opened again between 630-645am each day. Also, to ensure the safety of our after hours staff, we have provided a RING doorbell at the entrance to assist clients that have informed us in advance they will be checking out late. Our staff is instructed NEVER to open our doors unless they know a client is coming and properly identifies themselves. All doors to the facility are secured at night, and the yards padlocked as well.

We love our clients and their pets dearly. And we have also boarded our dogs from time to time before we owned Your Pet Space. We understand you want to check your dog out as soon as you can upon returning–they’re your family! As mentioned above, most other facilities have very strict guidelines on checkin and out times–but we have always keep these as relaxed as possible. As much as we understand how you feel, we need to emphasize that we are Staffed 24 Hours, not open 24/7. We will always consider each after hours request on a case by case basis, however we base all of our policy decisions on what is best for the pets.

This year, we implemented a liability form for other caregivers, so that our clients who choose to hire someone other than our professionally certified staff for home care can keep us properly informed if we are accepting their pets out of another’s care. We are seeing situations though where our staff is being directly contacted after hours when already at a job, to help when the other caregivers don’t show or cannot be reached.

Please be aware that even though we have provided our clients with the personal contact info of some staff members who perform services such as transport and home care, none of our employees is permitted to schedule their own services–clients MUST call our office to schedule them. For best security, if you ever receive a message from one of our staff asking you to schedule a service, please call us to make certain they are still employed by us! We have a very low turnover, but we do part ways with staff from time to time. In addition, we will always try to help our clients, even at the last minute and even if someone else has let you down…but our clients that are already scheduled must come first and be our top priority…and it may simply not be possible.

We are very excited that our grooming and transport services are popular and scheduling is filling up. This does mean, though, that if your pet was not scheduled for a groom or a ride home and you have a last minute request, we may not be able to accommodate. So we do suggest you schedule recurring grooming appointments and let us know as soon as you can about transport. We always do our best to help, and you are welcome to pick up your pet if we cannot provide transport at the last minute. (Please note hours we are always closed, as above.)

Luckily, we have many ways clients can communicate with us:

If you are computer savvy, and you want to schedule with at least 24 hour notice, our Pet Reserve online scheduling service is available even when we are closed! You can simply go to the main page of this website and scroll down to Make A Reservation…or follow this link. Every client that has previously scheduled with us already has an account. If you have never used your password, just select “forgot password” and it will be emailed to you.

Alternatively, our office number is 575-652-4404. Or you can email us at frontdesk@yourpetspace.com.

For those of you that have mine or Dave’s cell #’s or emails, those are fine, for now, as well. Be aware that it may take us awhile to respond, since we’re usually with your dogs, so the other methods may provide a faster response.

Again, we so appreciate all of our clients and how much they have helped us grow over the last 4 plus years–we will continue to explore new and better ways of communicating with you. Stay tuned! The best is yet to be!