My Mastercard Priceless Moment
Posted on | September 25, 2009 | 7 Comments |
Since last Thursday we’ve been on a UK move paperwork kick. The latest thing we had to do was figure out the cost of our dogs’ transport. We have a Lhasa and a terrier mix (size of a collie). In order to take our dogs to the UK without going through the quarantine process we have to follow UK’s Pet Travel Scheme (PETS) rules and regulations.
July:
Chip (another)+Vaccine(and another)+Rabies test: $200/ea
NOTE: The dogs have chips and vaccines but they had to get another chip because it needed to be the Euro type. Also, for them to go through the PETS program, you have to follow each step according to the PETS order and within their timeline.
Just yesterday from Continental Air:
Flying the Lhasa from Kansas City to London Heathrow: $667
Flying the terrier mix/Shady Girl: $887
Care in their Houston doggy facility: $100
To claim your animals in London, the first animal: $530
The second animal: $16.23
Keep in mind this is for M-F 9a.m.-5p.m. any other hours/weekends are more, weekends a lot more.
Total: $2,196.23 (this is JUST an estimate, you don’t pay until you get to the counter)
Oh, don’t forget the kennels (series 300 and 400 for ours.. Max could have fit in a 200 but I couldn’t find one), the dogs need to be able to stand up comfortably and turn around. Don’t use their regular small sleep kennel: $120
Watching my Lhasa tip-toe in front of a sleeping (but peaking) Shady and then dashing away with Shady chasing him and unconditional love: Priceless. Imagine Jerry tip-toeing pass Tom and Tom’s not asleep.
So that’s that. After calling all four airlines, Continental seems to be the best with British Air being the most expensive ($800 just for the Lhasa from JFK). Virgin (their dogs’ air fare was $1175, $11.75/kilo basically, from JFK) and Delta’s a toss-up but Continental won us because of the doggy facility in Houston and the whole process seems the least stressful for me (Delta didn’t seem very single adult friendly with $1860 air fare from KC) since I’ll be hauling carry-ons and two kids. Where’s the husband? It might be different by the time comes but right now we’re looking at him going there first and we’ll follow in a month or two. I’m use to traveling alone overseas but with two kids and two dogs, hmmmm…. it’ll be to blog for probably ha ha…
Just a little bit of info since it was hard for me to find the cost of flying a dog to the UK when I was Googling. I just wanted to get an idea on how must it would cost to transport our dogs without having to call the airlines.
UPDATE: We’re all in the UK.
They passed their rabies tests, we waited 6-mo and in March I went back to the vet’s office to get their travel certificate filled out ($75/ea… I think my vet was trying to take advantage of the situation… really, $75 to fill out paperwork? Oh, this was on top of the vet visit cost) so that I could send it to the USDA office to get signed and stamped ($25/ea for me). Do this a few weeks before the travel date if you’re doing it via the regular mail system. If your USDA office is in town you just go there and they’ll do it right away. I got mine back in a few days via priority mail.
Here’s another critical part. The last piece is the heartworm and tick medication. This HAS to be administered 48-24 hours BEFORE the dogs are checked-in. So if you have a Monday flight keep this timeline in mind since a lot of vet offices are closed on Sundays or only open for half a day. The meds has to be administered withing that window, 49 hrs or 23 hrs will not do! If you have a Monday 8 a.m. flight and check-in is at 6 a.m. then you need to have the tick and heartworm administered sometimes between 6 a.m. Saturday and 6 a.m. Sunday. My vet opens from 9 a.m. to 12 a.m. on Saturday so I had to book this way in advance to make sure I have an appointment for the dogs that day. This is serious I guess. I watched the counter guy calculate the time when ours was administered. He said the UK folks are really strict.
What was the total? The dogs cost a bit over $2700. Continental forgot to tell me how much it’d cost some company to walk the dogs through custom and take care of them until the husband gets there. Now, I’m not sure if this is a must if you fly with them but since our dogs were flying solo I had to pay about $500 or something for that service. Also Shady’s weight was a bit off, etc. etc. So $2700 and change. Still: OUCH!! Also, the price they give you on the phone is a quote. This way if you’re charge a bit more at the counter on the actual flight date you won’t pass out. It was 6:30 a.m. with two kids and two dogs after driving 3hrs to Omaha, NE the day before and I just wasn’t ready for $2700. Last but not least, don’t forget to get your pets a cup for food and another one for water. Get them nice blue training pee-pee pads to put in the crate. You can use towels but they’re heavy and it might just jack up the price to $3000. After the dogs got weighted I taped their leash and food on to their crate. Don’t want to add $50 for that weight either.
Despite the cost (thank goodness for tax returns – makes the cost less painful) Continental and that company at the airport did a great job. Our dogs were happy when hubby got them. They acted like they were just at a regular kennel. So I am assuming the Houston stop was nice and the little pampering at the airport before hubby got there was satisfactory.
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Hey there….just wanted to make a quick comment about your dogs..we moved to Italy 10 years ago with the army. I am sure things are a little different now, but we flew the dogs as cargo to my husband who had been there for 5 months before we flew there. It was cheaper and that way he knew his way around already and could go get them and deal with all the paperwork without crany wife and kids and then when we got there we didn't have to worry about it all at one time. On the way back they travled with us and we had to push them on a cart through customs and letme tell youthat was not fun…if cargo is still an option I would definitely recommend that….Good luck with the move, can't wait to hear all about it! Deidre
Add a CommentThanks for the info and yup, they're going cargo. The airlines seems to want it that way nowadays it seems… unless it's domestic or itty bitty ones :)
Add a CommentWow, that is a freakin' lot of money!! My sympathies… Our dog came from Spain but he was "imported" by the Animal Welfare Organization we got him from, so we didn't have to pay those fees. I guess travelling by plane is not much fun for the doggies, so give them a little hug from me :)
Add a CommentThat's a lot of $$$ signs! I hope the military will help you guys out somehow!
Add a Commentawww…. the things we do for our four legged loves.
Add a CommentI feel for you, we moved to Hawaii last year and they also have strict guidelines to follow. It was more stressful moving the pets than ourselves! lol. I hope all goes well with your move! It sounds like you're on top of it all so I'm sure it will go fine!! (We also flew Continental for the pets, they did a great job).
Add a CommentIt’s expensive! But pets are also part of our family…you can’t leave a family member behind right. But I’m sure it worth every dollar :)
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