Terms of service

By using dogserv.com, in English or Spanish, including its guides, tools, directory, newsletter and forms (together, the "site"), you agree to these terms and to our privacy policy, cookie policy and affiliate disclosure, which are part of these terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the site.

If you use the site for a business, you agree to these terms for that business and confirm you have authority to do so.

The site is run by DogServ, founded by Cal Hewitt and operated with Web Leveling, and based in the Houston area of Texas. "DogServ", "we", "us" and "our" mean the operator of the site. "You" means anyone who uses it.

You may use the site if you are at least 18 years old, or if you are younger and have a parent or guardian's permission and they agree to these terms for you. The site is not directed to children under 13, and children under 13 should not send us any information.

You may not use the site if the law where you are forbids it.

DogServ publishes general information about dog care, food safety, health, behavior and training. It is not veterinary advice, and it is not a diagnosis, a treatment plan or a substitute for an examination by a licensed veterinarian. We are not veterinarians, and nothing on the site creates a veterinarian and client relationship or any professional relationship. Every dog is different, and a dog's age, size, breed, health and medicines all change what is safe.

Always ask your veterinarian before you change your dog's diet, give any medicine or supplement, or start a training or exercise plan, and whenever your dog seems unwell.

If your dog may have eaten something toxic, or you think it is an emergency, do not wait for information on this site. Call your veterinarian or the nearest emergency veterinary clinic right away, or an animal poison control center:

• ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center: (888) 426-4435
• Pet Poison Helpline: (855) 764-7661

Both lines answer 24 hours a day and may charge a consultation fee. We are not connected to either service.

Training and behavior content is general guidance. For aggression, biting or any behavior that could hurt a person or an animal, work with a qualified professional in person.

We base health and food safety answers on published sources, such as the ASPCA, the Pet Poison Helpline, the Merck Veterinary Manual and the American Kennel Club, and we show those sources and a last reviewed date on the page. We work to keep information accurate and current, but sources can disagree, research changes, and we can make mistakes. We do not promise that any content is complete, accurate or up to date for your dog.

If you think something on the site is wrong, please tell us through the contact form. We read every report and correct errors we confirm.

Can My Dog Eat gives a general verdict on whether a food or item is safe, calls for caution or is toxic, with the reasons and sources. The Dog Toxin Dose Checker compares an estimated amount eaten with toxicity thresholds published in veterinary sources and shows an estimated risk level.

These tools have real limits, and by using them you accept that:

• they give estimates from published general thresholds, not a finding about your dog, and a dog can become seriously ill below a published threshold;
• the result depends on what you enter, such as your dog's weight and the amount and type of product eaten, and those details are often uncertain;
• products vary in strength and ingredients (for example, cocoa content in chocolate or xylitol in gum), and a label or our data may not match what your dog ate;
• a "low" result does not mean your dog is safe, and it is never a reason to delay calling a veterinarian or poison control; and
• the tools are not for people, other animals, medicine dosing or treatment.

The directory is not open yet. When it opens, these rules apply to it.

Where listings come from. We build listings from information businesses have already made public, mainly their public business listings on Google Maps and their own websites. A listing shows facts such as the business name, categories, address or service area, phone number, website, hours and links to the business's own social profiles. It may also show an image taken from the business's own website, until the business sends us one of its choice.

Facts, not ratings. Listings do not include ratings, reviews or review counts, and we do not rank businesses by quality. Being listed is not an endorsement, recommendation, certification or guarantee by DogServ. We do not check licenses, insurance, credentials, safety or the quality of any business's work unless a listing says a detail was verified and when. Before you hire any business, check it yourself. Any agreement you make with a listed business is between you and that business, and DogServ is not responsible for its services, prices or conduct.

Sponsored placements. Any listing or placement a business pays for will be labeled Sponsored.

Corrections and removal. If you own or manage a listed business, you can ask us through the contact form to correct a listing, hide a street address or remove the listing. We will act on a verified request within a reasonable time. We may keep a record of the request so the listing is not added again by mistake.

Claiming a listing. A business can claim its listing through the contact form to add a photo, a description in its own words and the services it offers. We may ask for reasonable proof that you speak for the business. We may edit what you send for length, accuracy, style and these terms, and we may decline anything we think is inaccurate, misleading or unsuitable.

Photos and descriptions you send us. When you send a photo, logo, description or other material for a listing, you confirm that you own it or have permission to let us use it, and that anyone identifiable in a photo has agreed to its use. You keep ownership. You give DogServ a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license to host, copy, resize, crop, format, translate into Spanish or English and display that material on the site, including in the listing, on directory pages and in search results on the site, and in the newsletter or on our social media pages when we feature your listing. You can ask us to stop using it at any time, and we will remove it from the site within a reasonable time; copies already sent in a newsletter or posted to social media may remain there.

Using directory information. You may use the directory to find and contact businesses for your own needs. You may not copy, scrape or harvest directory information in bulk, or use it to send spam or unsolicited marketing.

When you send us a message, a request to be featured in the newsletter, a correction or any other material (a "submission"), you confirm that it is accurate, that it is yours to send, and that it does not break any law or anyone else's rights.

You keep ownership of your submissions. If a submission is meant for publication, such as a newsletter feature or listing details, you give us the license described in "Photos and descriptions you send us". If you send us ideas or suggestions about the site, we may use them without any obligation to you.

We do not publish reader comments or reviews on the site.

When you use the site, you agree not to:

• break any law, or help anyone else break one;
• send false or misleading information, or pretend to be someone else, including falsely claiming a directory listing;
• send spam, malware or anything harmful through our forms;
• copy, scrape, crawl or harvest the site or its data in bulk by automated means, except for search engines indexing public pages under our robots.txt file;
• use the site's content to train or build artificial intelligence models or datasets without our written permission;
• try to get around security features, disrupt the site, or overload it; or
• harass, threaten or defame anyone, including businesses in the directory.

We may block access, remove material or refuse service to anyone who breaks these rules.

The site's text, tools, data compilations, design, graphics, photos and code belong to DogServ or to those who licensed them to us, and are protected by copyright and other laws. You may read, print and share single pages for your own personal, non-commercial use, as long as you keep our name and any copyright notice. You may link to any public page. For any other use, such as republishing an article or embedding a tool, ask us first through the contact form.

DogServ and the DogServ logo are our trademarks. You may not use them in a way that suggests we endorse you or your product. Other names and logos on the site belong to their owners.

Copyright complaints. If you believe material on the site infringes your copyright, send us a notice through the contact form that identifies the work, the page where the material appears, your contact details, a statement that you believe in good faith the use is not authorized, a statement under penalty of perjury that your notice is accurate and that you are the owner or authorized to act for the owner, and your physical or electronic signature. We will review it and remove material that infringes.

Some links on the site go to stores, such as Amazon, through a dogserv.com address that starts with /go/. If you buy through one of these links, DogServ may earn a commission, and your price is the same. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Articles with affiliate links say so near the top. Our affiliate disclosure explains how we are paid.

Purchases you make at a store are between you and that store, under its terms, prices, shipping and return policies. We do not sell, ship or guarantee products sold by other stores, and product details and prices can change after we write about them.

The site links to other websites, such as the sources we cite, stores, businesses in the directory and our social media pages. We do not control those websites and are not responsible for their content, products, privacy practices or availability. A link is not an endorsement unless we say otherwise.

The site describes web design, SEO, review management and video marketing services for dog businesses. These services are provided by Web Leveling. The service pages describe the services and show starting prices. Prices shown are "starting at" prices, and the final scope and price depend on what your business needs.

Sending a service inquiry does not create a contract. Any work is governed by a separate written agreement or proposal between your business and Web Leveling, which sets out the scope, price, payment terms, ownership of work and cancellation. If that agreement conflicts with these terms, the agreement controls for those services.

Services are marketing services. Nobody can guarantee search rankings, a number of reviews, calls or sales, and we do not.

The DogServ store and digital products are not available yet. When they are, purchases will also be governed by our refund and returns policy, shipping policy and digital license and usage rights, which will be shown before you pay.

We provide the site and everything on it "as is" and "as available". To the fullest extent the law allows, DogServ disclaims all warranties, express or implied, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, title, non-infringement, accuracy and completeness, and any warranty that the site will be uninterrupted, secure or free of errors or harmful components.

Some places do not allow certain warranties to be excluded, so some of these exclusions may not apply to you.

To the fullest extent the law allows, DogServ, Web Leveling and their owners, employees, contractors and agents will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary or punitive damages, or for lost profits, revenue, data or goodwill, arising from or related to the site, even if we were told they were possible.

This includes, to the fullest extent the law allows, any harm to you, your dog or your property from relying on information or tool results on the site instead of a veterinarian's advice, and any loss related to a business listed in the directory or a product bought through a link.

To the fullest extent the law allows, our total liability for all claims related to the site is limited to the amount you paid DogServ in the 12 months before the claim arose.

Some places do not allow these limits, so some of them may not apply to you. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot be limited by law, such as liability for fraud or, where the law provides, for gross negligence or willful misconduct.

To the extent the law allows, you agree to defend, indemnify and hold harmless DogServ, Web Leveling and their owners, employees, contractors and agents from any claims, losses, damages and costs, including reasonable attorneys' fees, arising from your breach of these terms, your submissions, or your misuse of the site or of directory information.

These terms and any dispute about the site are governed by the laws of the State of Texas and applicable US federal law, without regard to conflict of law rules. The Federal Arbitration Act governs the agreement to arbitrate below.

For any dispute that is not arbitrated, including a small claims case or a case after an opt out or a court ruling that arbitration does not apply, you and DogServ agree to the exclusive jurisdiction and venue of the state and federal courts located in Harris County, Texas.

If you live in the European Union or the UK, you also keep any protection that the mandatory laws of your country give you, and you may bring a claim in your local courts where those laws allow it.

Talk to us first. Before starting any claim, you agree to send us a written description of the dispute and what you want through the contact form, and we agree to try to resolve it with you in good faith for 60 days. We will do the same before bringing a claim against you.

Binding arbitration. If we cannot resolve the dispute informally, you and DogServ agree that any dispute, claim or controversy arising from or relating to these terms or the site will be resolved by final and binding individual arbitration, not in court. The arbitration will be administered by the American Arbitration Association (AAA) under its Consumer Arbitration Rules, or its Commercial Arbitration Rules if you use the site for a business, in force when the arbitration starts. The arbitration will take place in Harris County, Houston, Texas, unless you and we agree otherwise; if the claim is for 10,000 US dollars or less, you may choose to have it decided on written submissions or by video or phone hearing. Payment of AAA fees follows the AAA's rules. The arbitrator may award the same individual relief a court could, and the award may be entered in any court with jurisdiction.

Exceptions. Either of us may bring an individual claim in small claims court in Harris County, Texas, if it qualifies. Either of us may ask a court to stop the infringement or misuse of intellectual property.

Class action waiver. To the fullest extent the law allows, you and DogServ agree that disputes will be resolved only on an individual basis, and not as a plaintiff or class member in any class, collective, consolidated or representative action or arbitration. The arbitrator may not combine more than one person's claims. If this waiver is found unenforceable for a claim, that claim must be decided in court, not in arbitration.

By agreeing to arbitrate, you and DogServ each give up the right to go to court and have a judge or jury decide the dispute, except as stated in this section.

Time limit. To the extent the law allows, any claim must be started within one year after it arises, or it is permanently barred.

We may change these terms as the site changes or the law changes. We will post the new version here and change the date at the top. If a change is significant, we will also put a notice on the site. Changes apply from the date posted and do not apply to a dispute we already knew about before the change. If you keep using the site after a change, you accept the new terms. If you do not agree, please stop using the site.

You may stop using the site at any time, and you can unsubscribe from the newsletter with one click. We may suspend or end anyone's access to all or part of the site, or change or stop any part of it, at any time, including if we believe someone has broken these terms. The sections that by their nature should continue, such as ownership, disclaimers, limits of liability, indemnity and dispute resolution, continue after access ends.

If a court or arbitrator finds any part of these terms unenforceable, that part will be enforced to the extent possible or limited as needed, and the rest of the terms stay in effect. If we do not enforce a term right away, we have not given up our right to enforce it later. You may not transfer your rights under these terms without our consent; we may transfer ours as part of a sale or reorganization of the business. These terms, with the policies they include, are the whole agreement between you and DogServ about the site, and they replace any earlier terms for the site. Headings are for convenience only.

These terms are also available in Spanish. If the two versions differ, the English version controls.

Questions about these terms can go through the contact form. You can also write to us at DogServ, 11807 Westheimer Road, Suite 550, PMB 835, Houston, TX 77077, United States.