Someone mentioned at the beginning of the thread and quoted the ADA but I think it needs to be clarified a bit further.
A dog is legally considered a service dog if it provides any form of medical assistance to the owner. These services can be, but are not limited to, guide-dogs, hearing dogs, dogs that provide assistance to a disabled individual (ie. picking things up, carrying items), dogs that detect oncoming seizures or low blood sugar or provide any degree of emotional support. Service dogs do not need to be formally certified and businesses cannot deny access to any individual with a service dog. Businesses can ask what services the dog provides but the handler is legally not required to disclose the nature of their medical conditions. There really isnt an "audit" perse, of this process but if an individual is caught lying than they can be prosecuted for fraud by the ADA.
A therapy dog is a totally different. A therapy dog is required to be certified through a formal organization for insurance purposes (the industry standard is $1m in insurance). For some organizations the test is as simple as the CGC with medical equipment, other organizations have much more rigorous testing. A therapy dog usually falls into 2 different categories: emotional therapy and physical therapy. The emotional therapy is intended for other individuals such as patients in hospitals or children in special-needs programs. Physical therapy is an additional tier of certification where the dog is actually used in the physical therapy plan for certain individuals who have had loss of mobility from strokes/MS/or accidents. Therapy dogs are not considered service dogs and the certifying organization usually has a clause in their contract that any handler is caught posing their dog as as a service dog that their certification can be revoked.
Wheewh that was a novel! Hope this clears things up!
