Traveling with pets

From Trans World Express

General Information

airline requirements

Airlines have different requirements for traveling with pets. You must follow the rules of the airline that is operating your flight. Avoid flights combining different airlines for different legs of the journey. The specific rules will be listed on the airline website and you may want to choose your airline based on these rules (weight and size restrictions for pets, allowed pet containers, additional cost, deadlines for registering your pet's travel etc.). If in doubt, it can be a good idea to call the airline or use their chat supports to sort out any unclear bits.

Possible modes of travel include:

  • Traveling with a small pet (usually only cats or dogs) as additional carry-on baggage in the cabin. Typical weight restriction: 8kg including transport box.
    • This can depend on the destination country, e.g. the UK only allows pets in the hold unless it's a service dog or a private charter flight.
  • Traveling with your pet as checked luggage (crate) in the cargo hold.
  • For some airlines: transport as air freight with cargo plane.

Example airline information website: Lufthansa https://www.lufthansa.com/us/en/travelling-with-animals, Air France https://wwws.airfrance.fr/en/information/passagers/voyager-avec-son-animal-chien-chat

flight route

Try to book a direct flight from the US to your country of destination. Some countries (e.g. Iceland) have very strict quarantine rules that make stopovers with pets impractical or impossible. If your pet is traveling in the cargo hold, avoiding layovers reduces stress for your pet and decreases chances that anything can go wrong.

A potential exception to this can be if the entry-modalities of the target country differ between air and land. E.g. entry with a pet to the UK is significantly easier via ferry/car shuttle train than via air.

Country-specific information: US to EU

import requirements for cats, dogs, ferrets (EU)

You can travel with your cats, dogs, or ferrets (up to five at a time) if you take the following steps:

  • Your pet must be equipped with an ISO-compliant microchip. If your pet is not chipped yet, do this first.
  • Your pet must be vaccinated against rabies *after* it has been microchipped. The primary rabies vaccination (if vaccinated for the first time or if previous vaccination is more than a year old), must be completed 21 days before traveling to the EU and the microchip number must be recorded on the vaccination certificate.
  • An Accredited Veterinarian must issue you an EU animal health certificate. It is only valid for 30 days after the veterinarian has issued it. This is done in the US before your travel.
  • You must fill in the declaration that is part of the EU animal health certificate and take it with you when you travel.
  • The USDA must endorse your EU animal health certificate within 10 days of your pet's arrival. This can be done electronically by your US-based Accredited Veterinarian through the Veterinary Export Health Certification System (VEHCS) or you can do it by mailing the certificate to the USDA and having it returned.
  • When traveling to Finland, Ireland, Malta, Norway or Northern Ireland: Your pet must have been treated against the tapeworm Echinococcus multilocularis within 5 days of arrival.

Further information

flight route

You must enter the EU with your pet through a designated travellers' point of entry. These include international airports like Berlin, Frankfurt, Munich, Amsterdam etc., as well as many smaller ones.

Country-specific information: US to UK

import requirements for cats, dogs, ferrets (UK)

The UK.gov website provides a lot of information about bringing pets.

On a high level the requirements are:

  • Traveling by approved route (see below)
  • The pet needs to be microchipped
  • The pet needs to be vaccinated against rabies. The primary vaccination needs to be at least 21 days old at time of arrival.
  • You have a valid pet travel document. Coming from the US, you will need a Great Britain Pet Health Certificate . This certificate must be signed, stamped and dated by an official veterinarian (OV) who has authority from their government to issue it. In practice this can mean that your vet might need to contact the OV to certify the document.
  • If you have a dog: Dogs need to have a tapeworm-done at least 24 hours but no more than 5 days before arrival in the UK, this likely also needs to be marked in the Great Britain Health Certificate.

Extra rules can apply if your pet arrives >5 days before/after you - or if you bring 5+ pets with you.

flight route

The UK government maintains lists of approved air, sea & rail carriers for bringing pets. For air travel, this means you will have to use an approved combination of airport and airline. Furthermore, many airlines that service the UK for pet travel will require the use of a third-party company to handle the pet transport. In practice, this means you might be asked to drop the pet a few days before your own travel date with this company, and then pick the animal up at a later point on the UK-side. The required use of such third-party companies also means that you will have to pay them for their services in addition to the flight itself.

Given this, some people opt to instead fly to an EU country like France first, and then travel onwards from there to the UK with their pets. The UK.gov pages also list approved ferry services, as well as the approved LeShuttle car-shuttle train service. The LeShuttle service requires driving a car on the car-shuttle-train to cross from Calais, France to Folkstone, UK. There are companies that are specialised in offering pet taxi services for this part of the journey (in 2022, a one-way pet-taxi from Paris to London was ~$1,000). Be aware that doing it through an EU country also means having to take into account the EU regulations outlined above.

Country-specific information: US to Canada

You can bring cats and dogs into Canada. If you have other pets, check Canada's documentation on traveling with pets. For dogs and cats, make sure you bring their medical records and in particular anything about their rabies and other vaccinations to show they're up to date.

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