If your animal dies
Answers
A difficult question asked at a difficult time, with a straightforward answer.
The accommodation attached to that animal
The test was whether that animal alleviated a symptom or effect of your disability. So an accommodation does not automatically transfer to a new animal, and a provider is entitled to be asked again rather than to discover a different dog in the flat.
Requesting for a new animal
- It is a fresh request, and usually a straightforward one where the disability is unchanged and the provider knows you.
- The documentation should name the new animal. A letter naming an animal that has died is not documentation for the one that replaced it.
- In the five relationship-rule states the requirement runs to the new documentation, though if you are still with the same clinician the relationship already exists.
Telling the provider
Worth doing, briefly and in writing, before a new animal arrives. It keeps the file straight and avoids the situation where a manager notices a different animal and treats it as an unapproved pet.
Grief following the loss of an animal is not itself a basis for documentation. Where it has precipitated something that meets the standard, that is a different assessment, and it is one a clinician should make rather than a form.
Common questions
- Do I have to tell my landlord?
- Nothing compels it, and doing so keeps the accommodation record accurate and avoids an avoidable argument later.