Excitement turned to despair when a Cape Cod woman realized she was the victim of a puppy scam.
The little dog she bought never showed up and the website she purchased it from disappeared.
Truro residents Barbara Wohlgemuth and Carrie Stapleton bought a dog bed, collar and toys in preparation for the new Maltese puppy they purchased from what they thought was an online breeder in June.
“He sent, you know, four or five pictures and a very short video of Cabo, and I fell in love,” Wohlgemuth said.
Before you bring a dog home from the shelter, celebrity animal trainer and Link My Pet ambassador Brandon McMillan says all new pet-parents need to think about how to set their new dog up for success. “If you don’t train your dog, that’s like not sending your little kid to kindergarten. Once your dog learns their ABCs and 123s just like a human, that’s where your basic control and manners come in.”
They paid $700 for the dog and another $150 to have it shipped from North Carolina. But before the dog arrived, the shipping company demanded another $900 be sent via a peer-to-peer mobile payment app for a new crate and insurance.
“They said, ‘well, we can’t send the dog unless you send us this money,’ so that’s what we did,” Wohlgemuth said.
And it didn’t end there.
“Then they wrote and said, ‘we had to give him shots, vaccinations, and plus we have to get a permit, get him into Massachusetts. And that’s going to be…
