Short term Schooling livery - how much contact would you expect?

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sjdress

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Horse has been sent off to schooling livery for 2 weeks only whilst I am moving house. Been away for a week and I have been sent one video of her being ridden but not much else, hardly any updates of what she been doing etc. however it’s only been a week so perhaps I am expecting too much, just finding it difficult to give over full control to someone! I’ve asked what’s she’s been doing with her and if I can pop over , but she skirts around the question and bit and just says she’s doing great. Do I just wait until I pick her up next week or keep pushing for more updates?
Do I just say I’m coming to see her and just turn up, or is that a bit much for only one week away?!
 
Having had experience of just how little many pros do with their schooling liveries 🙄 (20 mins a day if you’re lucky, rest of the time stuck in a stable) I’d defo go and check on her.

Only problem is, if pro takes offence and says come and collect your horse right now, can you do that?
 
You need to feel you can just turn up but don’t expect to see any action if you’ve not arranged previously. I think people forget how much time it takes to video / text etc when there are a number of horses to do and the phone is forever ringing. A week isn’t very long but you should feel confident that your horse is being worked every day even if it’s only for 30 mins.
 
I'd rather the rider I was paying to focus on riding the horse than making videos and sending me lengthy updates, but once a week phone call or visit would be what I would expect
 
Over the years I have used a few, and most of them are very bad at giving any feed back. The only one that tried was actually a dealing yard that was obviously set up for customer service.
If you are not going to be a long term client I suppose they think, why bother.
 
Go and check her now today.i sent mine away to a trusted place and turned up unannounced one day to find they'd twitched and clipped him and hogged him I specifically said he was afraid of clippers. His top lip was cut and bleeding. I removed horse immediately and insisted that I got my money back. They reimbursed me. I was livid.
 
I got texts pictures and videos most days and she let me know when he was having a day off he was only there 2 weeks and he came back a much better horse to ride, she did such a lovely job with him well money spent and I was really happy.

I would have expected a bit more than 1 video tbh in a week.

I went over twice when Louis was away and I got on him once after she had ridden and she gave me a bit of a lesson fir about 15 minutes.
 
In my experience you don’t get that much. Possibly a brief text a couple of times a week and maybe a longer message/call once a week if lucky. I’ve had to rein in my slightly suspicious control-freak nature - I’d generally want to watch them work every couple of weeks or so, that generally tells you what you need to know in terms of improvement.

If you think of it from the riders perspective it will take some time to really assess the horse and maybe pick things apart. I do think some clients expect miracles in quite short timeframes. But equally even good pros can fall short on customer management/comms (and of course there are others that are charlatans).
 
Mine went away for 6 weeks last year and we didn’t get stacks of updates, which I found quite difficult but I knew I was welcome to swing by any time and so I did call up a couple of times.
They were a busy yard with quite a few horses in for breaking/schooling and the owners also have a young family, so I can understand why they weren’t tying up time in sending messages out. Also, it was a total signal black spot 🤣
 
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