Exploring Vetrinary Financial Aid Fund

[Guest sanshelb]

Our group has been exploring setting up a separate fund within our financial structure that would allow for donations from people to be deposited and then used to offset veterinary bills for existing adopters

who need a little extra help. We have seen an increase in requests for help and also an increase in return dogs strictly due to the financial reasons. We realize there would be lots of leg work to set up and maintain but I was wondering if any other groups out there have something like this in place and how it

was working out. We have not been able to help out in the past because we couldn't use funds for individual adopters when our website states the fund is to be used for vet care for new dogs.

 

We were mainly interested in whether people would actually make donations to the fund if they know it

is helping dogs already adopted as opposed to fresh off the track and how stringent the guidelines

need to be (i.e., paying the money directly to the vet not the adopter, money in vs. money out, hassles

with rejected applications).

 

Any insight would be welcome.

 

Thanks

 

Laurie

[Burpdog]

I think people will donate. Is your group a 501c3?

[Guest crazy4greys]

Are you talking about when you adopt out special needs dogs that require continued care and you group would like to help pay part of that care?

 

I believe if you are a 501c3, you can not give the money directly to the adopter, you would have to pay the vet and then keep records of the visit and payment.

 

We have a Yogi Medical Fund, that is for greys that come from the track, or returned that need special medical care. If we needed to help a grey who was special needs and we wanted to help out the new adopter, I am sure the money would come from the Yogi Medical Fund.

 

I hope that explanation helped.

[Guest sanshelb]

Thanks for the replies ladies. We already have a fund for special needs hounds right off the track so this new fund would be specifically for previous adopters whose dogs need medical care which might present a financial hardship for them. The most recent example would be a great adopter who had his dog for 5 years and suddenly found himself out of work due to the progression of his MS. His dog was in desperate need of a dental and being the selfless owner, he pondered returning the dog to our group because he couldn't afford to have the dental done. He was heartbroken but wanted to do what was best for his dog. We were able to intervene and made arrangements with his vet to co-sign for the costs should he not be able to keep up with the monthly payments. We have had an increasing number of adopters reach out to ask for help within the last year and we don't want to spend money in the groups "general" fund to pay individual vet bills. Our hope is to establish a new fund where donations could be earmarked for these types of requests. We are still doing our research on how to manage this fund but are optimistic we can make it happen in the near future.

 

 

[LuvAPuppy]

I have a Bad story and I hate to share bad stories but I also believe in having all the information available...

My vet's office did something like this. they had a fund for mostly emergencies I think. the stipulation was your bill could be paid out of the fund but you had to pay it back so it was available to others in need. Like a loan so to speak. it was used up by three patients and nothing was ever repaid. they closed the fund and now everyone is on their own. what I don't know is if there were contracts signed so those that partook could be legally pursued or if it was just a good faith gesture on the part of the office (no good deed goes unpunished you know...). If you have a legal representative that can tell you if you can have papers drawn that essentially force repayment of emergency funds used, it might work very well for you. Incidentally we were discussing it in the treatment room when the vet walked in to see my Great Dane. She had an ear infection with psudomonas bacteria. we had already spent over $600 in treatment and slides and cultures and different drops and pills. We were chatting about how awful it would be if you didn't have the means and had to have your pet euthanized because of something like a "simple" ear infection. Dr happened to walk in to the middle of the conversation and told us they had tried the fund but had to stop it because of such disappointing people.

[Guest KelseysLackey]

This is a good idea, and I wish you and your group lots of luck in implementing it.

 

If you decide to structure it as a revolving loan type fund, either in whole or in part, make sure to get some legal advice on how to set it up so that you have some reasonable degree of collecting repayments. I doubt it will be easy, but should be somewhat doable.

[Guest lizmego]

I understand the intent of your idea, but my concern would be if your group is a registered 501c3 that you may be placing that status in jeopardy since you are wanting to assist those retired racers that are already adopted. Check with the mission statement that your group had to supply when you applied for your 501c3 and I think that you'll find that your mission statement probably says something to the effect "to place retired racers into loving homes" or something like that. So to help those retirees already in homes would be against that mission. I think it would be best to establish an entirely separate 501c3 organization for your idea of assisting already adopted retired greyhounds. It may seem like a huge pain to do this, but if the IRS ever does find out that you're abusing your 501c3 status (and they would think that, even though you have the best of intentions), it can be revoked and then where would your group be?

 

Good luck!