Equimins vitamin e

TheSpottyCobby said:
Just come back to this thread and see people have had the exact same dismissive email response as me. Like everyone else, I’ve been under dosing my pony by half ? and wondering why he’s slowly got more tight behind! I swapped to the equimins over the summer as I was advised at the time it would work out more cost effective... easier to get him to eat it too. I’m hoping if I go straight to doubling the dose, he’ll be OK now until I get some natural from FP. Will be taking him straight off the advance complete too - I’ve just had to have him shod as his feet were so awful, I was wondering why they weren’t improving!
Safe to say I was fuming when I got this - clearly a cut and paste because I never even mentioned Cushings!
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What an unprofessional reply, TheSpottyCobby. The man is so uninformed about a product that he sells.

This is marketing suicide in action.

The vitamin E oil that they are listing now should be clearly labelled as ‘synthetic’, because it is. Simply omitting the word ‘natural’ is deliberately misleading.
 
Not just poor marketing, but mis-selling. Anyone who has bought this product can claim for a refund and compensation. I am no legal expert but it seems pretty clear from this:

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/regulation/misrepresentation-act-1967

I'd say 'we were told it was natural' is inadequate so even from the beginning this was (I would argue) negligent mis-selling:



A misrepresentation is a statement of fact (not opinion) which is made by a seller before a contract is made.

If you relied on that statement when deciding whether or not to go ahead with your purchase, and this then turns out to be wrong, you may be able to claim compensation.

There are three types of misrepresentation and your path to redress will depend upon whether the false statement was made fraudulently, negligently, or innocently.

Negligent misrepresentation
There is a negligent misrepresentation under the Misrepresentation Act 1967 where a statement is made carelessly or without reasonable grounds for believing its truth.
When a claim for negligent misrepresentation under the Act is based on negligence, the law states that the person who made the misrepresentation has to disprove the negligence.
In other words, they must prove that they had reasonable grounds to believe the statement, and that they believed the facts represented were true.

I'm not sure 'I was told' is reasonable grounds if all the documention from the suppliers stated synthetic.

From the day they realised the oil was synthetic to the day they changed their website, this strikes me as fraudulent mis-selling.

Fraudulent misrepresentation
A fraudulent misrepresentation occurs when someone makes a statement that -
  • they know is untrue, or,
  • they make without believing it is true, or,
  • they make recklessly (i.e. that person does not care about whether the statement is true or not).

I think they could be in trouble if anyone decides to pursue action against them.
 
TheSpottyCobby said:
Just come back to this thread and see people have had the exact same dismissive email response as me. Like everyone else, I’ve been under dosing my pony by half ? and wondering why he’s slowly got more tight behind! I swapped to the equimins over the summer as I was advised at the time it would work out more cost effective... easier to get him to eat it too. I’m hoping if I go straight to doubling the dose, he’ll be OK now until I get some natural from FP. Will be taking him straight off the advance complete too - I’ve just had to have him shod as his feet were so awful, I was wondering why they weren’t improving!
Safe to say I was fuming when I got this - clearly a cut and paste because I never even mentioned Cushings!
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They sold it for 4 years before they got any documents? ???

This is like watching a marketing slow motion car crash. Ratner, anybody?
 
I've given out his contact details a lot of times over the last few days so I expect a lot of people have had that email, or a very similar version of it. He has agreed to refund at least two other people that I know of. He seems to think this is a generous and kind offer rather than something everyone is legally and morally entitled to.
 
Just to expand a little on "are they allowed to do this", the answer is a clear "no".

The Consumer Rights act 2015 contains the following requirement:
  • As described The goods supplied must match any description given to you, or any models or samples shown to you at the time of purchase.
So, irrespective of any argument around "it works for me/it didn't work for me/I'm ok with it/I'm not ok with it" - it's illegal for Equimins to sell something that is "not as described"

From the screenshots earlier, in 2015 the descriptive line stated: "This natural oil is an excellent way to provide vitamin E in its most natural form"
Subsequently, this changed to "This oil is an excellent way to provide vitamin E in ts most natural form"

You could argue that removing the first "natural" in there means they aren't describing it as 'natural' vitamin E, and hence they were no longer mis-selling. I have to spend tedious hours at work talking to lawyers about the interpretation of wording in contracts, and I know that if I suggested that to them they'd just laugh at me.

Anyways, I messaged via the website customer services form, so haven't had any response yet - but I'm waiting to see what, if anything, comes back. I'm sufficiently pissed off to spend the money on a couple of solicitors letters if I don't hear anything further :D

The legislation itself is here, if anyone wants to read it (like all legislation, it's a great cure for insomnia) https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2015/15/contents/enacted
Section 11 details the need for goods to be as described, then sections 19, 23 and 24 add up to 'you've got the right to ask for your money back'

I'm not really going all tack-room-lawyer here, I just looked it up because I was interested and it was something to read whilst I ate bacon sandwiches and waited for the weather to clear up before I go and muck-out :)
 
No dosing recommendation but IU as labelled is IU regardless of synthetic or natural. Bioavailable IU is not labelled. So regardless of what the horse can actually take into the blood stream it is not inaccurate to say the oil has 1000IU per gram (it's just that only 500IU will be absorbed if it it is synthetic). Except it's slightly weird to use grams for a liquid but I'm not sure if that is normal for oils.

The 98% vs 25% proof thing in his response to SpottyCobby is a complete red herring. We feed this stuff by IU, not weight or volume.
 
The Which article I cited also refers to the Act cited by MC - but said the earlier Act (Misrepresntation Act) gives you more 'remedies ' in terms of compensation. If I had spent thousands of ££££ over years I'd be mightily tempted to spend a bit more on an opinion from a solicitor. This kind of thing makes my blood boil! How can people be so careless and casual. And those responses are beyond inadequate. He is still parotting the 'well it's more or less the same stuff anyway' line. So let's add incompetent, arrogant and unconcerned about knowing anything about his own products to the list of reasons to avoid this company.
 
I have never fed the vitamin E but must say that I wasn't impressed with the advance concentrate in pellets form. I bought a large tube and started feeding it, my mare then abscessed within a week or 2. I kept the tube and started again a few months later, she abscessed again. This was a few years back, I threw the rest of the tube away because the coincidence was strange, (now I think it could be explained by high iron levels in this supplement but that info wasn't available at the time). They are a bit cheaper than high end supplements and I think the quality is not as good.
 
PapaverFollis said:
No dosing recommendation but IU as labelled is IU regardless of synthetic or natural. Bioavailable IU is not labelled. So regardless of what the horse can actually take into the blood stream it is not inaccurate to say the oil has 1000IU per gram (it's just that only 500IU will be absorbed if it it is synthetic). Except it's slightly weird to use grams for a liquid but I'm not sure if that is normal for oils.

The 98% vs 25% proof thing in his response to SpottyCobby is a complete red herring. We feed this stuff by IU, not weight or volume.
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Thanks. Wasn't sure what it said on the label. Some products have a recommendation e.g 1 x 5 mg scoop will provide x of product, 1 scoop recommended for maintenance etc

This discussion is between people who have more than average knowledge and horses with particular needs but the average person will feed the number of scoops on the label and if that depends on exactly what is in the bottle.
 
I think the thing is that the only suppliers of natural vitamin E are the specialists. All the mainstream products are synthetic general purpose ones where people will just feed the recommended scoops on the label.

People deliberately sourcing natural vitamin E will feed by the 1000iu that is bioavailable.

The two powders I know of contain different amounts of buffer, so the number of grams is different. To feed it and to compare costs you have to do it by iu.

.
 
Which is why it's useful that companies lime forageplus and progressive earth tell you how many grams in a scoop and how much active ingredient it contains.

I trust that information and while i may feed different rates according to my forage, i use that information to work out how many scoops it equates to
 
I can’t actually believe what I’ve been reading. Not knowing what ingredients are in their product is inexcusable and the responses when people have questioned it makes the situation even worse. As if it’s not bad enough that people have been over-paying for a synthetic product that was sold to them as natural, it’s truly appalling that many horses have been under-dosed and nobody would suspect this could be the cause of a health issue.

Are the ingredients accurate on the other products they sell? Who knows? This will be very damaging for the company because trust has been broken and they have not done a good job of managing this.
 
SatansLittleHelper said:
Maybe all of this would be of interest to Dr David Marlin, he regularly "outs" companies on their false advertising/statements and backs it up with scientific evidence ?
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Hes a friend of mine, he has all the info and evidence. His opinion of them was pretty low to start with, and it was something said in one of his posts that actually triggered all of this.

ester said:
fwiw it's easy to report things to advertising standards, not done it for a while.
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Very easy. I reported Astrids Oil amongst others for misselling products or making misleading claims. Not sure if the ASA would be interested in anything now its retrospective but might be worth a call to them tomorrow to get their take on it actually.
 
TheSpottyCobby said:
Like everyone else, I’ve been under dosing my pony by half ? and wondering why he’s slowly got more tight behind! I swapped to the equimins over the summer as I was advised at the time it would work out more cost effective... easier to get him to eat it too. I’m hoping if I go straight to doubling the dose, he’ll be OK now until I get some natural from FP. Will be taking him straight off the advance complete too - I’ve just had to have him shod as his feet were so awful, I was wondering why they weren’t improving!
!
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y I was surprised to read your comments as they just didn't tie in with what I had previously read. Looking back at your foot situation and AC you told us on 30/4 he was working 6 days a week and on 13/5 that AC had completely transformed his barefoot. By 14/5 he was barefoot and rock crunching like never before and AC was definitely worth it.

By 2/6 afer 6 months of AC the difference in his feet is amazing. I was one who recommended AC so I do note with interest updates.

Then by 14/12 he was struggling with the wet and footy on a hack. You also told us in your post of that date that he you had been able to exercise him (in the past) 6 days a week and not a symptomatic tie up since (the original was in Dec 2019) His feet had been so much better on his new diet and exercise plan.

By 1/1/21 he was foot sore and on 11/1 he was shod and you said his feet were not great in the winter.

By17/1 he was like a different animal and you said "he must have been so uncomfortable"

Now I agree that equimins have been careless, it may have disadvantaged some. I have no connection with equimins other than buying AC and oil. It is up to them to defend themselves. It makes not the slightest difference to me if people buy their products or not. If they want to change as a matter of principle it is up to them and I really don't care.

However I do believe in being fair.
You fed AC and within 6 months had rock crunching barefeet like never before and AC was definitely worth it. .

By December he was struggling with the wet. That is called winter. Many barefoot horses struggle in winter, many go on to have soft soles, many cannot cope and have to be shod. That is nothing to do with AC and everything to do with the wet winters and owners who cannot control the environment sufficiently for that particular horse to remain working rock crunchingly barefoot. So, like you, they have to shoe.
You had to shoe a horse that had spent the first 6 months becoming rock crunching on AC and had to be shod because of the wet. I would suggest the reason why his feet were not improving had little to do with AC and a whole lot to do with the wet conditions you, like many other barefoot horse owners, could not control.

You said after he was shod and was like a different animal he must have been so uncomfortable. I am sure he was.
There is one downside to horses who are being worked when they are foot sore. That is the problem continues through their backs, joints and in fact all over their body. They become tight and their body is very sore and uncomfortable. That is due to being ridden when they are foot sore. Not due to PSSM.
I would expect a footsore horse to be getting tighter and tighter behind over quite a while as he struggles in his movement to compensate for the pain in his feet.

You are right to be outraged over buying a product that didn't turn out to be what you thought you had purchased however I think to blame AC for your foot problems and lower levels of vit e for a horse you describe as not being symptomatic since his original tie up is, obviously only IMHO, slightly unfair.

If people want to blame equimins for their failures no problem. They made a mistake no one doubts that. However I think blaming AC for your foot problems and a knock on effect to a stiff horse when 6 months earlier you were commenting on your success and that it was definitely worth it is a little unfair.

You will disagree, people will now post pages of unpleasant comments about the above but so be it. I have seen your situation happen so many times over very many years with barefoot horses that I just think it is wrong to blame AC for something that is not the fault of the product.
 
paddy555 said:
y I was surprised to read your comments as they just didn't tie in with what I had previously read. Looking back at your foot situation and AC you told us on 30/4 he was working 6 days a week and on 13/5 that AC had completely transformed his barefoot. By 14/5 he was barefoot and rock crunching like never before and AC was definitely worth it.

By 2/6 afer 6 months of AC the difference in his feet is amazing. I was one who recommended AC so I do note with interest updates.

Then by 14/12 he was struggling with the wet and footy on a hack. You also told us in your post of that date that he you had been able to exercise him (in the past) 6 days a week and not a symptomatic tie up since (the original was in Dec 2019) His feet had been so much better on his new diet and exercise plan.

By 1/1/21 he was foot sore and on 11/1 he was shod and you said his feet were not great in the winter.

By17/1 he was like a different animal and you said "he must have been so uncomfortable"

Now I agree that equimins have been careless, it may have disadvantaged some. I have no connection with equimins other than buying AC and oil. It is up to them to defend themselves. It makes not the slightest difference to me if people buy their products or not. If they want to change as a matter of principle it is up to them and I really don't care.

However I do believe in being fair.
You fed AC and within 6 months had rock crunching barefeet like never before and AC was definitely worth it. .

By December he was struggling with the wet. That is called winter. Many barefoot horses struggle in winter, many go on to have soft soles, many cannot cope and have to be shod. That is nothing to do with AC and everything to do with the wet winters and owners who cannot control the environment sufficiently for that particular horse to remain working rock crunchingly barefoot. So, like you, they have to shoe.
You had to shoe a horse that had spent the first 6 months becoming rock crunching on AC and had to be shod because of the wet. I would suggest the reason why his feet were not improving had little to do with AC and a whole lot to do with the wet conditions you, like many other barefoot horse owners, could not control.

You said after he was shod and was like a different animal he must have been so uncomfortable. I am sure he was.
There is one downside to horses who are being worked when they are foot sore. That is the problem continues through their backs, joints and in fact all over their body. They become tight and their body is very sore and uncomfortable. That is due to being ridden when they are foot sore. Not due to PSSM.
I would expect a footsore horse to be getting tighter and tighter behind over quite a while as he struggles in his movement to compensate for the pain in his feet.

You are right to be outraged over buying a product that didn't turn out to be what you thought you had purchased however I think to blame AC for your foot problems and lower levels of vit e for a horse you describe as not being symptomatic since his original tie up is, obviously only IMHO, slightly unfair.

If people want to blame equimins for their failures no problem. They made a mistake no one doubts that. However I think blaming AC for your foot problems and a knock on effect to a stiff horse when 6 months earlier you were commenting on your success and that it was definitely worth it is a little unfair.

You will disagree, people will now post pages of unpleasant comments about the above but so be it. I have seen your situation happen so many times over very many years with barefoot horses that I just think it is wrong to blame AC for something that is not the fault of the product.
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what's AC?
 
After just two days with double the dosage I've already seen a big difference! She's much softer in her eye and I can just about lift her tail without her hind end spasming. She's still sore in her hamstrings which is normally her worst area but they don't feel as rock hard as they were. Thankyou so much to the person posting this!! I feel awful I didn't connect the dots myself and blamed it all on hormones but with the amount of vit e I was feeding I thought her pssm was under control. She has had good days in the last few months hence my thinking too. Will be interesting hacking out with others this week as her aggression to others has been getting worse resulting in her kicking out, even when riding out with her field companion who she does like.
I want to write an angry letter to Equimins but can't see it going anywhere tbh
 
That’s the problem with supplements in general . Company’s make cheap as possible so they get more profits . I always look at the ingredients and research before I buy a supplement . That’s just me though I always want to make sure a product works before I spend my money on it.
 
I am shocked by this, I won't be using Equimins any more, back to progressive earth and forage plus. Less convenient and more expensive but it is vital that supplement companies are honest about the content of their products and this raises so many red flags.

I don't buy their Vitamin E but anyone who does should report this to trading standards.
 
Wow. I don't feed their vit E but did feed their advance complete and will now not do so. Unbelievable- especially the price increase even when they found out it was an inferior product.

They deserve to go out of business, frankly.

Any suggestions for a good pelleted balancer my nags don't eat the powdered FP one or the pelleted version :D
 
Michen said:
Wow. I don't feed their vit E but did feed their advance complete and will now not do so. Unbelievable- especially the price increase even when they found out it was an inferior product.

They deserve to go out of business, frankly.

Any suggestions for a good pelleted balancer my nags don't eat the powdered FP one or the pelleted version :D
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Thanks Michen.
I started a thread asking for help choosing a balancer for my fat Connie. I was dithering between Forage Plus and a couple of others. Perhaps will discount FP now as my pony, in spite of being a fattie, is a bit of a fussy eater.
 
Meredith said:
Thanks Michen.
I started a thread asking for help choosing a balancer for my fat Connie. I was dithering between Forage Plus and a couple of others. Perhaps will discount FP now as my pony, in spite of being a fattie, is a bit of a fussy eater.
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Yep so is my fat one and my super model one. Really annoying, tbh I’ll probably go back to one of the bog standard ones as they actually eat it.
 
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