For many people, a pet becomes a member of the family. They develop their own personality, establish their own role within the family dynamic, and are often a source of comfort and joy.
So when a person’s pet passes, it can feel truly devastating.
One woman’s grief turned into disbelief when she learned what happened to her dog’s remains, and it could all be unfortunately chalked up to human error.
What Happened To The Ashes?
In a viral video, dog mom Pey (@pey.k), who seems to have only started publicly posting on TikTok to share her story, played back the shocking phone call she got from the vet about her dog Deja’s remains. Her video has more than 3.3 million views.
“When you pay to get your dog cremated and you wonder why it’s taking so long, and this is the phone call you get from the vet,” she writes in the text overlay.
In the video, she shows a screen recording of the call she got from the vet with the accompanying audio.
The vet sounds incredibly sorry, apologetic, and defeated. He starts by saying he needs to review the circumstances of her pet’s cremation with her.
“I am so sorry,” he begins.
He confirms that Pey paid for a private cremation for Deja. But there was an unfortunate mistake.
A Grave Mistake
“The team accidentally clicked the wrong button. And that was a private group cremation,” he explains. “So Deja’s remains are in a memorial garden.”
In this situation, there’s really no way to separate Deja from the other pets, even if they’d made the mistake before the scattering of the ashes.
The vet assures Pey that he’ll refund her the entire cremation charge of $295.
“No remains charged, you know, even not a charge for the group cremation, which wouldn’t have been what you had wished,” he says.
He shares contact information for the memorial garden, noting that some people like to visit for closure.
The mistake means Pey will never be able to bring Deja home. Instead of having her dog’s individual ashes in an urn, Deja’s remains are somewhere in a communal memorial garden, mixed with countless other pets.
In a comment reply to a viewer, Pey expressed her devastation.
“I don’t want anything else to happen. I wanted to be able to bring my baby home,” she wrote. “I’m not blaming them, but I am terribly upset over the whole situation. To know she could be here with me if they just clicked the right button hurts me to think about.”
What Options Are There For Pet Cremation?
There are typically three types of pet cremation offered, Pet Passages noted:
- Communal cremation is when several pets are placed in the crematory together with no partitions separating them. All the ashes are together. So owners don’t receive any remains back. The ashes are often scattered outside.
- Semi-private cremation uses stainless steel partitions to keep each pet’s ashes separate while multiple animals are cremated together. The ashes are then returned to each owner.
- Private cremation is a pet is placed in the crematory alone and cremated individually. The ashes are returned to the owner.
Private cremation typically costs $150-$300 or more. Communal cremation runs $50-$150 for smaller pets, Everis noted.
Commenters React
In the comments section, viewers had empathy with the worker who had to break the news.
“He doesn’t sound unprofessional to me he sounds deeply sorry and disappointed with his staff that this happened. I am so sorry,” a top comment read.
“This voicemail was actually so sweet and you can tell that he feels absolutely shattered for you,” a person said.
“Deja is just living her best life with all of her new friends,” another wrote.
“Honestly, it’s a horrible mistake, but they SO easily could’ve just lied. good on the business owner for not doing what most would’ve done. accountability is a rare commodity,” a commenter added.
BroBible reached out to Pey for comment via TikTok direct message and comment. We also reached out to the pet aftercare company the man names in his voicemail.