An Adelaide family was stunned when a shocking vet clinic bungle led to them receiving the wrong cat’s ashes.
To Katelyn Tanner-Smith and her family, their little cat Spy was more than just a pet.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Adelaide family ‘baffled’ when given the wrong cat’s ashes.
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“He was just a loving cat, loved everyone, very friendly,” she told 7NEWS.com.au.
For the family of three from Sturt in the city’s south, his death a few weeks ago was particularly tough.
“Emotionally … it hit us a bit,” Tanner-Smith said.
To honour their pet the family paid to have him cremated.
They received a black cat-shaped urn with a plaque adorning the words “my true little Spy”.
It sat proudly in their home until they got a call they never could have imagined receiving.
“(The vet) told me that the ashes they had in the urn weren’t my cat,” Tanner-Smith said.
Instead the ashes belonged to a deceased stray cat who had been cremated by mistake.
“My cat had actually been left in the freezer,” Tanner-Smith said.
“It broke me, like he was our family.”
The urn was eventually returned and replaced however Tanner-Smith said she still doesn’t have the closure she paid for.
“I don’t even know if it’s my cat really, they stuffed the ashes up once … it just baffles me,” Tanner-Smith said.
The southern suburbs vet clinic has apologised for the mix-up and in a statement told 7NEWS: “We are only human. We owned up to our mistake and did everything to rectify the situation as quickly as possible.”