You’d think that the person who returns your missing cat to you should be welcomed with open arms and proclaimed an honorary friend. However, that’s not always the case with lost pets. You see, there are some people out there who make promises they don’t plan to keep, just to get what they want.

One family promised a hefty sum of $500 reward money to whoever found their lost cat. When a person showed up on their doorstep with the pet cat in tow, the family was overjoyed. For about a minute. That’s when they realized that the Good Samaritan actually wanted the reward money and wasn’t just searcing for the hiding cat out of the kindness of his heart.

The man who found the family pet was so distraught by the experience that he turned to the ‘Am I the Assh*le’ community on Reddit to hear their verdict on what he should have done.

A man found a lost cat and decided to bring it back to its owners

Image credits: Alan Stanton (not the actual photo)

Image credits: Steve Baker (not the actual photo)

When he asked for the offered reward, he was met with an unexpected reaction

Image credits: kcmocats

Reddit user Kcmocats’ post on the AITA subreddit got over 15.7k upvotes. The redditor himself got 3 Silver Awards and was officially branded as ‘not the assh*le.’

The vast majority of community members thought that Kcmocats was in the right after reading his story. According to them, asking for the reward money was the right thing to do because the family promised it for returning their lost cat. After all, why make promises that you hope you won’t have to keep? And why would you get mad at someone for asking you to keep the promises that you made?

So then, should you or should you not offer a reward if you ever lose your pet? Unfortunately, the answer isn’t as clear-cut as you’d like.

According to Pet FBI, there’s a long-standing debate about whether or not owners should offer a reward to the people who find their lost pets. Pet FBI states that in the “vast majority of the successful reunions” that they document, a reward wasn’t involved. But it can help speed things along.

Sometimes, a reward can incentivize people to be on the lookout for lost pets. However, it’s not a good idea to state the exact amount of money you’re willing to give out. Some people feed and house lost pets before returning them to their owners. So it’s a good idea to at least reimburse their expenses.

On the other hand, offering rewards does have its downsides. For instance, some believe that it encourages pet-napping (i.e. kidnapping pets for profit).

Keep in mind that if somebody found your pet but refuses to let you have it unless you pay them money, that’s called extortion and you should phone 911 (or whatever the extension number for the police is where you are).

Have you ever found and returned a lost pet, dear Pandas? Perhaps someone returned your own pet to you? Let us know what happened and if you took/offered a reward in the comments below.

Most people thought that the cat-finder was in the right

But some people thought that the man was wrong to demand the reward money

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