I am currently sitting a dog which which doesn’t have an ID tag on her collar, and she’s not the first.
Please can owners ensure there is an ID tag on their dog’s collar because if there isn’t and the dog gets lost, or even just out in public without one, you can be fined up to £5000!
The Control of Dogs Order 1992 states that all dogs in England, Scotland and Wales must wear an ID tag in public places with the pet owner’s name & address including postcode. A good idea to add a phone number too but that’s optional.
It might also be a good idea to do the same for cats, although not law.
When I started sitting, I bought an engraved tag that says: Call sitter if found.
It has my contact info on it. So I will be called ASAP, where the dog is, not hosts who are traveling/out of the time zone, maybe sporadically reachable or unreachable.
It cost less than 10 bucks and I clip it on their collar when I get there and remove when I leave. (I use a checklist when I leave, so I don’t forget things.)
On our own dog, we have an engraved tag, plus a tag with a QR code, which anyone who scans can find a bunch of info, including his vaccination info for rabies, his allergies, etc.
He’s also chipped and we have him scanned periodically when he goes to the vet, because chips can fail or migrate sometimes.
I understand the law as you’ve explained it, and if it were the law I would follow it.
However, I would not and don’t put my full address on my dog’s ID tag. I put her name, our phone number, indicate she’s microchipped (which leads to our address and full contact information) and her county license number (which would also lead to our contact information). Most people who find a lost dog would either call the number or bring the dog to a shelter or vet to scan for a chip. No need to include a full address, which can be seen by people in public even if your dog is with you and not lost.
Edited to add: my dog is a therapy dog and visits hospitals and other public events. I have a separate collar and tag with just her name for those outings, as we are advised to do. Some patients have actually called/texted or in one case, shown up at a teams house, after pulling information from a dog tag. We are also advised to have a separate social media account for the dog, as some patients will ask to connect with us and having a dog account protects our privacy.
Anyone finding the dog would have to take it to a vet to find out who the owner is. When the dog has an id tag on, which is the law in the UK, a person coming across the dog can call the owner.
Is there a law in the US that states a dog has to have a tag with the owner’s name and address on too? We have discussed the idea here on the forum of a sitter using a tag with their number on but in the UK that would have to be in addition to the owner’s info.
Don’t know, because such laws would be local to the county or city level, of which there are tens of thousands of jurisdictions nationwide. The U.S. would never have such laws at a federal level.
So far, I’ve lived in a bunch of cities/counties/states in the U.S. and haven’t been subject to an address-on-tags requirement.
Personally, we put our phone numbers on our dog’s tag. And it says he’s chipped, so any vet or shelter that scanned him would see our address then.
In some U.S. jurisdictions, you’re required to register your dog and in some to buy a rabies tag, to verify vaccination. That’s because it’s seen as a public health measure, in case someone is bitten and they can’t get hold of the owner to verify vaccination.
As a public matter, it’s not that important to the government whether you get your dog returned if lost in the U.S. That’s seen as an individual responsibility.
BTW, microchip readers are available for sale generally. In the U.S. at least, you can buy one without being any kind of vet or pet professional. Like some folks who do rescue work as a hobby own them.
In my area, for instance, sometimes someone will find a stray or lost pet and message on social media, and someone will offer to scan the pet for them, saving them a trip to a vet.
It makes much more sense to me to just put the owner’s phone number on the tag, but apparently that’s optional. However, who’s going to check whether tags have an address on anyway? There’s no one out fining owners who don’t pick up their dog’s poo…
It is great when a pet is chipped, but much easier to trace the owner with a name tag. I have a cheap scanner (under US $20) and I have reunited multiple pets with it. However, it takes a few steps. This is how it works in the US:
Somebody contacts me or posts on social media, that they found a lost pet.
I meet the finder and scan the pet for a chip.
If there is a chip, I look up the chip company online (there are multiple chip companies in the US).
I call the chip company and tell them that somebody found that pet.
Chip company can tell me whether or not the chip is registered to an owner. If the chip is not registered, there’s nothing we can do.
If the chip is registered, the chip company contacts the owner and asks them to contact the finder about the pet. The chip company will not give me the owner’s information directly because I am not a rescue or vet office.
As you can see, it’s an awful lot faster if the pet has a name tag. I’ve also heard that the cheap scanners can’t read every type of chip, depending on the radio frequency used.
Interestingly, I saw a news story last time I was in the UK where people were being massively fined just for walking their dog without carrying poo bags on them…whether or not the dog did an actual poo during the walk & the owner failed to pick it up. Apparently the walkers had to present a bag if asked; if they couldn’t show one, they were cited.
Somehow, it reminded me of the comedienne (can’t recall her name atm) who did a bit where she impersonated “national treasure” Dame Judi Dench, getting fined over tossing her poo bags up into a tree when no one was looking…
(Edited to add: oooo, just remembered it was Tracey Ullman. Brilliant woman.)
Beyond privacy reasons, Americans tend to move more frequently than people in other countries, so having your address on a pet’s tag might be more of an inconvenience than say using your cell phone number, which is portable.
In my county, a dog is required to wear a tag with its license number, which also indicates the pet has had their required rabies license. Other than that, no legal requirement to wear a tag with owner contact information.
I think @Maggie8K has the simplest solution really, a sitter tag engraved with sitter contact details. I’m thinking I would need a hand written old fashioned key tag as our phone number often changes depending on where we are (local Sim). Now I’ve given myself a good idea and must add those to my shopping list .
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