"...combined experience of over 15 years in transport and handling of horses." If they have 4 drivers, as they say they do, then that's only 3.75 years per person. Furthermore, what if one has no transport experience or "real handling" experience.
If they're fully insured, their insurance should have covered the vet bill ...assuming it was an accident. We know it wasn't, so maybe that's why they didn't turn it in. Maybe they didn't want an investigation. Just my opinion.
"WE WILL NOT TRANSPORT ANIMALS WITHOUT THE PROPER HEALTH VERIFICATION." Hmmmmm. Based upon their statement, they were willing to transport mine. Even though I proved with documentation that I did, in fact, have "proper" health verification.
"We believe in quality care and service. We provide feed/water & proper rest as well as hostels..." They didn't provide us with quality care or service or feed or proper rest.
Only after this tragedy did they ever state one of their excuses for not showing up on time was the heat index. Here are two direct quotes from uship.com from 8/17/07:
"After
communicating directly, I am not comfortable with this Service
Provider. Horses were supposed to be picked up two days ago, no
communication, left several messages/emails. Finally got in touch
today, and they said they'd been having problems and couldn't come get
them for two more days. I'm going to find another shipper.
Response from Thumper34753:
I'm sorry that we were unable to transport for this customer on
schedual,but due to the excessive heat(heat indexes over 100) during
the day our drivers had to travel through the night and hostel the
horses through the day.Changing our schedual caused us to have delays
in pickups but our main concern was for our equine passengers."
Where was that kind of concern when my horses were entrusted to them? They didn't really address the complaint either. The complaintant said that S&E said "they were having problems and couldn't get them for two more days." If I was being a responsible hauler and truly boarding horses through the heat of the day, I would certainly want a prospective customer to know that. I would tell the customer that I was traveling at night to avoid the roads during the hottest part of the day rather than tell them I am having problems. S&E's reply simply doesn't make any sense at all here. Which again, leads me to believe (in my opinion) that they are making excuses. Maybe they couldn't waken Jim up again. They say they have four drivers, but the only one we hear about is Jim. Hmmmmmmm.