My daughter and dog visit me regularly from Uk. Since Brexit this has become more complicated and expensive. This time one of the staff at Dover suggested they get an EU pet passport using my address here. Has anyone done this and what are pros and cons. I will be going to our local vet on Tues to enquire about it but would like to know what I am talking about. Thanks for any advice
Meggie
Pet passports are an oddity. I have two sets of U.K. based friends who visit their holiday homes here several times every year with their dogs. One couple have two dogs with EU passports, they are rescue dogs from Romania the others have to pay their U.K. vets for the paperwork every visit. The local vets have told the second pair that they can issue an EU passport for their dog but only once it has been in France for three months. Them being U.K. based is not a problem. On the other hand I have watched more than one YouTube motor caravan channel where they have got their dog an EU passport from ‘well known’ vets who don’t insist on the three months rule.
Is there any way the dog could have an extended holiday with you?
Exactly what our french vet said, so if we are coming for 3months it would mean registration on day 1 and we might make it to day 90 but only just so it will wait.
Some UK vets are extortionate for a piece of paper £300 recently charged by nieces vet in Salisbury.
On the other hand we use a vet for the cert who is just opposite the tunnel in Ashford, £99 for the 1st pet and £25 for the 2nd. Returning customers pay £69 for the first pet.
Very happy to recommend them.
You might want to look at this thread…
That was my understanding too.
Lots of sensible advice in this thread about the time for icad reg and having an address. We have been through the process a couple of times. One thing to remember is that, once registered and passported in France, the dog will be required to have it’s regular rabies & top up vaccinations also in france. Your daughter might need to commit to timing visits that fit the schedule, and never let a UK vet write in the passport as it invalidates it.
If the rabbies shots were done in the UK the french vet will want/need to re shot them? Thats what I was told, true or not?
Yes to both quotes.
Visited our vet last week with our new little chap Barney to get his microchip, passport, booster and rabies.
We have taken out pet insurance but his tattoo is only valid in France and insurance requires microchip. Also if he travels with us to UK the tattoo is not valid.
We were unable to get the microchip as the breeder had not yet registered Barney in our name.
Spoke with the breeder and they completed the transfer the next day with I-Cad and we received instant notification by email.
Returning to vets next month when Barney 3 months old to get everything done.
Our vet explained all the intricacies of the pet passport confirming the above quotes.
Pet insurance in France doesn’t seem to be as comprehensive as the UK but after studying what is available we have gone with Barkibu. As with all insurance there are various levels of cover.
Obtaining a European pet passport is simple and straightforward if you and you pet are EU residents.
If not then trying to navigate around the rules can backfire.
Trying to argue with border control is a pointless exercise
Just another Brexit benefit
Indeed it is, I remember the bad old days when a dog in France needed the rabies injection, after the chip, and then there was a wait of a month to make sure it had taken, then another 6 months before it could travel to UK.
Then the enlightened pet passport arrived and once rabies jabbed, each crossing only needed a worming pill. I use to get it done with mine en route in the first town with a vet.
Then Brexit.
Interestingly, our French vet had a different view. She volunteered that it was absurd to have to redo the UK rabies treatment, which was both in date and using the same vaccine as France, when we moved to France and obtained EU passports for our 3 dogs. She checked various vets databases, consulted the vets central advisory team and advised that we should simply take both the dogs UK passports (containing the rabies vaccinations) as well as the new EU passports whenever we crossed the channel. She also advised that the subsequent rabies boosters should clearly be recorded only in the EU passports when eventually due. This all seemed to work and was accepted at Eurotunnel etc.
For an EU pooch that’s exactly how it works, and a 5 day window to cross into UK. The beauty of being an EU resident.
…Or the really bad old days when there was a genuine 6 month quarantine when bringing your pet into the UK.
When talk to the vet just remember the french habit of saying what they think upi want to hear when they have no idea of the correct answer
Yes Jane. Know that one well!
Pleased a variation of the rules worked for you but I would feel much happier when all vaccinations eventually appear in the EU passport.
You never know if you are going to be faced with a jobs worth at the border.
It never ceases to amaze me how some folk don’t read the rules.when crossing to UK in January I saw a very irate couple with their dog being told that 24 hours had not elapsed since worming tablet administered, but he had the tablet yesterday was thier argument. Yesterday at 5pm and it is now 9am today, 14 hours and 1 day are not the same in this situation. The owners and pooch had to re-book a later crossing.
Sensible and has to be better than overdosing the poor pet.
Yep rules say 24 hours but why?
Worming treatments start working with a few hours.
Well I used to worm my dog in the morning at Chalus then overnight at the routier in Dieppe’s old docks before catching the early morning ferry to Newhaven. May have been before Brexit came into force though.
Unless there is a good reason, it just sounds like another rule dreamt up in a comittee room somewhere?