Up to date help needed on pet passports please

[neil beard]

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Can anyone help please - we are completely lost!!

we live in UK but wanted to take out dog to Holland to see our daughter. we got our health certificates and had a good trip. While we were there we had our worming treatment and bought an EU pet passport, but it has been rejected by Eurotunnel

They say "the date of the microchip reading must be before the date of the rabies jab". This is impossible, because the rabies jab is needed 21 days BEFORE you travel to EU, and the chip is only read in EU when they issue the passport, by definition AFTER.

I believe Eurotunnel are mis-quoting the UK Government rules, which say the chip must be INSTALLED before the date of the inoculation (not READ). It strikes me everybody who goes from UK and buys an EU passport while overseas must have the same problem??? has anyone else got any advice please?

 

[JudyN]

@JoanneF , can you help?

 

[JoanneF]

Yes. As a disclaimer, I am neither a lawyer or a vet but I am an experienced traveller and this is my understanding of the situation. This is how it works.

I don't have my pet passport with me right now but from memory, the chip date is the date it was ”read or inserted”. And if the vet in the Netherlands entered the date read (as he will have done, as he didn't put in the chip himself) you are correct, it is going to be after the rabies shot your dog had to have to leave the UK.

However, the Tunnel staff are correct too - legally the recorded chip date must be before or on the same day as the rabies shot.

If you haven't already done so, you can travel back using the Animal Health Certificate that you used to exit the UK.

The way round this, is before your dog's current rabies vaccine expires, get a booster IN THE EU and recorded BY AN EU VET in your pet passport. The vaccination booster date will obviously then be later than the chip date. NEVER let a UK vet make any entries in the passport though, as that will invalidate it.

You would have to go out on another Animal Health Certificate. If you want to say roughly where you live or which crossing you use, I can probably suggest lower cost providers that you can contact.

There's no harm in having the rabies booster done early. It's a dead vaccine so won't do any harm. In fact, when vets used to do them the dog needed a blood test about three weeks after to make sure they had the right level of antibodies, and if they didn't, they got a second vaccine within that month. That's how safe it is.

If there's anything specific you need to know, please shout out.

 

[neil beard]

Yes. As a disclaimer, I am neither a lawyer or a vet but I am an experienced traveller and this is my understanding of the situation. This is how it works.

I don't have my pet passport with me right now but from memory, the chip date is the date it was ”read or inserted”. And if the vet in the Netherlands entered the date read (as he will have done, as he didn't put in the chip himself) you are correct, it is going to be after the rabies shot your dog had to have to leave the UK.

However, they are correct too - legally the recorded chip date must be before or on the same day as the rabies shot.

If you haven't already done so, you can travel back using the Animal Health Certificate that you used to exit the UK.

The way round this, is before your dog's current rabies vaccine expires, get a booster IN THE EU and recorded BY AN EU VET in your pet passport. The vaccination booster date will obviously then be later than the chip date. NEVER let a UK vet make any entries in the passport though, as that will invalidate it.

You would have to go out on another Animal Health Certificate. If you want to say roughly where you live or which crossing you use, I can probably suggest lower cost providers that you can contact.

There's no harm in having the rabies booster done early. It's a dead vaccine so won't do any harm. In fact, when vets used to do them the dog needed a blood test about three weeks after to make sure they had the right level of antibodies, and if they didn't, they got a second vaccine within that month. That's how safe it is.

If there's anything specific you need to know, please shout out.

Hello , and thank you so much for your reply. That explains everything. We showed the vet in Holland the original chipping document, so I guess in retrospect we could have asked her to enter the date "installed" as opposed to "read"? anyway, we are where we are...In terms of your kind offer to suggest a vet for our second health certificate, we like in Maidenhead (Berkshire) but we are very often in the Folkestone area too, so could see anyone there who you recommend. Thanks again

 

[JoanneF]

we could have asked her to enter the date "installed" as opposed to "read"

Possibly but most vets seem to use the date of reading, for some reason. My guess is that it's because they haven't installed it themselves.

Abbeywell vets in Folkestone do a very good price on the Animal Health Certificate, currently £99. I don't think you will get much better than that. But you do have to do a little bit of work yourself. You complete all the details online, they contact your vet for confirmation of the rabies vaccine, and you go and pick up the certificate from them before you travel.

Abbeywell Vets Folkestone - Local Vets, Happy Pets Abbeywell Vets Folkestone - Local vets, happy pets

 

[neil beard]

That's great, I'll get in touch with them. Thanks again