Lay My Hat

amandajane wrote:Is it not the case that you can't refuse a person with an assistance dog as it would be discrimination? So, as owners we can never guarantee to have a completely dog free environment.

That's it in a nutshell. Gone are the days when we could guarantee a pet free property due to this, even if you don't accept dogs under other circumstances.

My husband is allergic to dogs- he has asthma and we can often tell if we are in a house where a dog has recently been as, if there are hairs, particularly short ones, he gets wheezy. Our friends, however, have a cavapoo (as their daughter is also allergic to dogs) and he has absolutely no problems with it- he can stroke it, have it sitting on his knee and everything and this is because it doesn't shed.In his case the dander isn't the problem it's the hair.

Well, I think very few people kennel a dog because a property owner forbids it - there are plenty of dog-friendly options! I doubt it happens often. But, as always, food for thought in a discussion with different viewpoints

I notice that some sites allow you to filter by "No pets allowed"

EG
http://www.sykescottages.co.uk/no-pets- ... tages.html

The text that goes with that reads:

"There can be a number of reasons why you're looking for a 'no pets' holiday cottage. Perhaps you're allergic to cats and dogs and suffer terribly when you come into any kind of contact with them. If you stay in a cottage that normally accepts pets, no matter how thoroughly we clean the property in between stays, there would always be the chance of a stray pet hair. That's why it's much better to book one of our 'no pets' holiday cottages instead. "

Now with nearly 4000 cottages in this search, I personally don't believe that not one has ever had a pet in it, e.g. owner's pet, friends or relatives pet, guide dogs etc.

So even though your own holiday home text may not specify anything about pets, but you just don't normally accept them, Sykes is saying that your place is suitable for allergy sufferers. To me (not to everyone!) this is a very different proposition and certainly I feel it's misleading to allergy sufferers (though if it's that bad, you would think people would double-check)

I do already have allergy information on my own site, but I will clarify the information in the response email to include a note about allergens and a link to the page on the site.

As always interesting to hear different opinions

We don't allow pets in our cottage - but we do not advertise it as "allergy friendly" either because we are aware that no matter how careful you are, there is still a risk of cross contamination with pet hairs if those doing the cleaning (us, in our case ) have a pet.