A case of mistaken identity left me fuming

This brought back very unpleasant memories for me! I live alone in a large flat. My former neighbours opposite to me were a family with two young boys. I didn’t really know them that well, but could hear the mother shouting at them rather a lot which didn’t really bother me as it was distant and quite muted. It bothered the husband in the family above though-I had met him and he was rather ‘highly strung’, shall I say! He often complained to her (and me!) about the noise. One day I had a knock on the door from Social Services who stated that there had been a complaint about me shouting at children! I pointed out that I am a grandmother, who occasionally has grandchildren to stay and certainly DO NOT shout at them! I also pointed out the circumstances above and told her it was a case of mistaken identity. She was a rather unpleasant older woman, very patronising and just would not believe me. I have worked in ‘official’ positions all my working life and found her confrontational and rather silly, a no no with your customers. I told her to contact my daughter to verify she is happy with my treatment of her children (She later did; my daughter was furious and told her where to go, I think!). I also told her to contact the original complainant (I thought at the time it was probably the man upstairs and told her so although she wouldn’t confirm my accuser). To her great irritation I ended up being very dismissive of her and refusing to take her seriously- not as scared as she would like, I suppose. Inwardly I was absolutely fuming and well as upset as I am a gentle and (too) indulgent Nana and am known as such! The noisy family eventually moved out to a house with a garden where I suppose life would be less fraught. I actually felt sorry for her as she and her husband both worked full time and were constantly back and to with childcare etc. I later confronted the man upstairs and, yes, he had given Social Services the wrong flat number. I certainly gave him a piece of my mind as complaints like this can be upsetting not to say, serious and the least complainants should do is to get their facts right! IMHO the family needed help, not censure and this silly man could have done harm to me if my DD did not trust me completely with her children. I believe his wife asked him to leave about a year later as he was too volatile in his behaviour.

I had the same problem with a male neighbour who would come over to complain that , if he stood at the back of his garage , beyond his car port and opened the window at the side , he could hear my Dad’s dog barking. Simple answer … Don’t stand there ! Another neighbour pointed out that he might be ‘ in his cups’ when complaining because he kept his home brewed wine at the back of the garage. Might it be that your obstreperous neighbour takes one too many occasionally ?

We once had neighbours who said that our children 8,6 were out at night vandalising phone boxes (a good few years ago😂) in fact our little girls were tucked up in bed and were never allowed to roam unsupervised anyway! It turned out to be teenagers! The neighbours hated us as they had wanted to buy our house for their married daughter but we pipped them at the post and this was vicious revenge!

Absolutely no chance of the RSPCA being interested in any dog barking malarkey.

I'm not really sure what they actually do tbh.

you did well Lizbeth.... some years back now, husband and I went to church in the am. and left our two dogs outside in the garden.. we had a visit from the RSPCA,,,, having been reported by someone about our barking dog(s)

would have been more neighbourly imo for neighbour to contact us..

another "event" we had a cat with a wonky tail, so we took her to the vet to see what was going on, recently aquired wonkiness.

vet said tail broken, come next week and we will remove it..

obviously very upset for cat, ,, but within a few days, tail was o.k. so we didn`t bother to make appt with vet,, actually we were a bit upset that vet didn`t seem to know what was what..

we again!!! had a visit from RSPCA! saying someone,, ?? had reported our cruelty to cat..

as the RSPCA person sat in our living room, and we explained, and cat was there for inspectin,, our other cat sauntered down the stairs, as they do, asking what all the fuss was about..

huh! again, we suspected it was the vet`s assistance who had reported us, and again, we wondered why the vet hadn`t contacted us... meanwhile our relatives wanted to report the vet for .... incompetence... ?? whatever.. but we declined. use another vet now.. but it does make one wonder.

why can we communicate with one another?

Thank you Oreo

A man that lives in the road behind us, came and started shouting at 5ft me about my 'nasty little sh*t of a dog'.
Big problem for him was our last dog died 3 years ago.
Did he apologise did he heck.
Also did he go and complain to the very large over 6ft man whose dog was the one barking. No to that as well.

Theexwife

I can see both sides of this, if he thought a dog was being ill-treated then good on him for going to someone’s house and saying he was going to report them, I wish more neighbours would report ill-treatment of animals.

That’s outrageous!
Apart from wasting the RSPCA’s time, which costs money, this neighbour had no reason to think the puppy was neglected, and dogs bark for loads of reasons.My neighbour three doors down had a well looked after dog that barks at passing cats/ people/ delivery men/ trucks and vans.
The neighbour had nothing to report, he hadn’t even seen the puppy, what a jerk to carry on and rant at the OP.

Some people an be down right spineless I wonder if he would have spoken to your husband the same way. Give him a wide berth in future I would.

Some people can be downright spineless give him a wide berth I would.

I once had a note put through my door - about my dog barking all night. She doesn't, she sleeps soundly in my bed, so I presume they'd picked the wrong house. I couldn't put them straight as it was anonymous.

Guarantee the RSPCA will do nothing they havent the staff to respond to tittle tattle. In cases of barking it is the local authority dog warden/animal welfare officer who would more likely be involved. Nothing can/will be done unless dog is barking all day every day and even then it is a “chat”. Like you i would be absolutely furious with the neighbour concerned - my next door neighbour did the very same thing and my dogs are not permitted to bark nor are they left alone. I myself spoke to Animal Welfare at the County Council who said nothing would happen. (Animal welfare then asked me if i would foster a needy dog for them).

I do agree that IF we had a dog that barked a lot or IF we were mistreating it, then he would have been justified in sorting the issue out. But to knock on someone's door at 8.00am and to launch into totally unfounded accusations is just not acceptable. There are ways and means of doing things and better times of day. This man has known us for over 30 years. To open the door to such an thing was distressing to say the least.
I do wonder if he has been round to see the owners of the real barking dog. I doubt it, because those owners don't have the best reputation themselves.
We do wonder if he may be "losing it" a bit. He is older than us. We have never had any issues with him at all.

Now you know you have a neighbour who is a potential snitch.

I have found that some men find it impossible to apologise, especially when they have been corrected by a woman.

Its a sign of weakness.

Many years ago my boss made a snitty and tasteless remark on hearing that my grandmother had died. I walked out of the office and slammed the door so hard that the glass in it rattled. I left him a note saying how angry and upset I was, All the next day (while at another location) I waited for him to phone and apologise but he didnt. The day of the funeral he was equally snitty so I called "his" boss and raised a grievance. Despite getting a thorough telling off from the big boss for his unprofessional behaviour he never apologised or referred to the incident. I never spoke to him again except on strictly professional matters. Any attempt at social chat and I walked off.

DD1 had a bag of cat cr*p left in her doorstep with quite an offensive note.
She doesn’t even have a cat!

Dog owners have no idea how irritating dog barking is; it may have been mistaken identity, but your daughter handled the situation far better. and more politely, than you.

I opened my front door two days ago to see a puppy weeing on my lawn; he was on a leash and his owner was standing there happily allowing him to do it. The girlfriend said, 'well, he is a young puppy and he doesn't understand boundaries yet;' no apology, they walked away when he had finished and moved onto another lawn four houses away.
What is particularly annoying is that literally two minutes away is a large dog walking area at the bottom of the football field, created specially because the footballers were fed up with having dog mess all over their field, and their clothes and boots, when playing.

I had a similar thing, with neighbour. He was in our garden chatting and said ‘your dog doesn’t bark so much now does she’. Our pooch rarely barks and I certainly wouldnt leave her barking in the garden.
I explained that it was another neighbours dogs and they moved away. I was upset that he’d thought it was our little pooch all that time.

We've been accused of breaking a neighbour's greenhouse windows with a golf ball - no one here plays golf in the garden. He then accused our children - none of them were here. He later found out it was our neighbours' children - but no apology to us. Another neighbour came and ranted about our bonfire - which was not in our garden. No apology there either. Our previous next door neighbour accused us of moving her bin so it didn't get emptied - she screamed at me on the door step till she was red in the face, young daughter in tow then found out it was the road cleaner.

Everyone comes out now with all guns blazing before checking what is happening and then get embarrassed. I

I can see both sides of this, if he thought a dog was being ill-treated then good on him for going to someone’s house and saying he was going to report them, I wish more neighbours would report ill-treatment of animals.

Like all puppies yours does bark but is not the one barking all day and annoying your neighbour opposite, who should apologise to you and go round to the neighbours who do have the all day barker and talk to them.

Having said that there are means of training your puppy to stop barking or not to bark for long as he gets older. I am trying this on my lab at the moment. I don’t want to stop her barking when someone comes but I don’t want her barking for 10 minutes afterwards.

Well, the problem has been sorted, but he could have come over and apologised to you.