Reactive dog advice

[u/Cool_Ad_1196]

Hi all! I am newer to the boarding dog community and while I have my own dog, I will take on watching a couple for some extra money from time to time. With this small experience I have learned it may likely not be for me, and that is ok!
I however would love advice on how to go about the conversation of letting this owner know that their dogs reactivity does need to be addressed. This dog is reactive to any and all dogs on walks and will aggressively bark incessantly. In the times I have watched him, he is only provided a small thin collar and nothing else. I have personally gifted a smaller martingale collar that I no longer used because I was not comfortable with theirs provided. They accepted but I’m unsure you they it. This is an Italian greyhound mix that is probably 20lbs for reference.
There seems to be no training other than the owners avoiding other dogs on their walks, which in the city were in is nearly impossible and honestly quite stressful to deal with daily. I’ve already decided I will no longer be watching the dog as now after a couple close call incidents have happened, it is beyond something i feel comfortable handling. Especially along with my dog that is not reactive.

How would you broach the conversation? Would you at all?

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[u/missmoooon12]

Hey there, I'm a professional pet sitter/dog walker too!

My boss has a strict rule that sitters aren't supposed to bring up training unless the client specifically asks us about it. Clients can easily get offended and you can lose them that way. Besides there's no guarantee that a client will follow through with training if you tell them to do it, or they may hire someone who's unqualified and makes things worse.

If something pops up during our visits/walks we just "observe and report". If it's truly a safety issue that they aren't willing to address or make accommodations it's totally fine to fire the client. We rarely get super dangerous cases because of our thorough on-boarding process.

We also have a policy that dogs must be walked on harnesses so that we don't have to worry about slip ups on flat collars.

[u/Cool_Ad_1196 → u/missmoooon12]

Thank you! This is super helpful. I did originally try to nicely suggest a harness as that’s what I use for my own dog, which they declined because of his history being rescued. I honestly then should have declined looking back. Lesson learned for sure. I’ll likely end up not working with them after this last board.