Pet Relocation

My heroines! Mandy and Maegan were champs at getting our beloved 12 y.o. yellow Labrador «Motu» relocated to Singapore from Long Beach, CA. We needed to do all the things that are difficult for pet travel:
* Travel with an older pet
* Travel to a warm location
* Travel in summer
* Travel with a dog not in the plane cabin
* Travel a looooong way with a plane change
If you talk to anyone in the states they’ll tell you to get a note from your doctor that your dog is a «therapy dog» so it can travel in the cabin. This doesn’t work if a) you’re not willing to lie and sign a document that you’re mentally unstable 2) your airline doesn’t allow a large dog in the cabin for an 18 hour flight. So don’t listen to the gossip in the U. S – call Pet Relocation.
While researching the process of relocating our dog to Singapore – strict import standards that require either 10 or 30 days quarantine from dogs arriving from the U.S. (except Hawaii which requires no quarantine) – I was nervous about the process. Would my dog be stuck on the tarmac in 90 degree heat with no water in her cage? Would she be in quarantine 10 days or 30? Would she have enough room in her kennel?
As soon as I began talking to Maegan I immediately felt better. She told me the best airlines to use to ensure Motu’s safety and well-​being, the best size kennel for our dog, and she gave me specific time periods to accomplish each task within the relocation process to ensure that Motu was in quarantine for only 10 days – not 30!
Meagan and Mandy were professional, super responsive when I had questions, and they provided clear documentation and directions to me, Motu’s veterinarians, and each of the agencies (USDA and the Singapore equivalent AVA). There were a couple of times that I ran into paperwork questions locally and PetRelo was always available providing answers so we could address the problem immediately.
Motu is home with us in Singapore and she settled in very quickly! We’re so happy to have her with us and ever so grateful to Mandy, Maegan, and the Pet Relocation team!

We moved from the Bay Area in California to Washington DC. PetRelocation knew which airlines should be used and which should be avoided. They booked a flight for our dog, recommended a travel kennel, and told us what needed to be done when. It was a pretty seamless process. I would recommend them.

Right now I am in the middle of a pet relocation to the Netherlands. I feel that I haven’t really been given the correct information in a timely manner. Right now I’m considering other pet relocation companies. I contacted them in April and just now getting the responses that I need. For $ 3500 I really expected more in terms of information as to how to prepare my dog for the travel centers shots and other requirements. My vet in Arkansas has been much more helpful than these guys. the people that work there are clueless and have no sense of urgency.

I feel for the people who have to deal with Pet Relocation. As for me I am on the other end. I had to work with them so a client of ours could move their animals. One person that works there in particular was a nightmare. I understand there are timelines and these people need to get their info but if the lab doesn’t have the info to give and they know if would take 4 weeks to get back important info, don’t call us 2 weeks later DEMANDING reports and telling us «This needs to be your MAIN PRIORTY!» And then going as far as saying you work for our clinic and posing as a technician so you can get results. I believe that is against the law! I am just glad the lady at the lab noticed some REDFLAGS about this woman! I hope we NEVER have to deal with this lady again.

I have nothing but praise for PetRelocation. We recently relocated from San Diego to Seattle with my husband’s company coordinating the move. This was the first time we’d used a pet service and I’ll be honest that I thought it was ridiculous. However, our coordinator, Penney, was FANTASTIC as was the pet receiver on this end (Cheryl?).
The most important thing about PetRelocation is that they are not stingy with information. Throughout the process, they contacted us to let us know what was expected and what was happening. We received photos of our pet after pick up (our pet was boarded and the service retrieved her and put her on the plane). Cheryl contacted me twice on the day of pick up, to let me know her expected timeline and then once my pet was securely in her possession.
There is a decent amount of overhead to using a PetRelocation service (health certificate, new crate, vaccinations, etc), so carrying your pet on the plane is ideal. However, if you’re moving, wielding ridiculous bags, finding a new home, etc… this is the way to go.

What to do when you’ve got 2 cats, and are moving from Los Angeles to Kuala Lumpur? You call the experts.
Pet Relocation has been an absolute boon — when I knew a move was possible I began making enquiries with various companies. Pet Relocation stayed in touch until I was ready to make the decision.
I opted to have them supply the travel crates and bedding which was a true time saver for me. I set the crates up in the house once they arrived about a month prior to the travel date so the cats could get used to them.
Pet Relocation supplied information specific to my trip from LA to KL that I provided to my vet. My vet was impressed with the ease of the documentation. (They’ve worked on other relocations to Korea, Europe — and folks who didn’t use a service often had conflicting paperwork supplied from the embassies web sites — Pet Relocation gave us clear, concise easy to follow directions.) Additionally on the last day, Pet Relocation caught a mistake in the paperwork prior to my leaving the vets office that we got corrected then and there.
Once the kids were on their way I received regular email updates from my coordinator (Mandy), and she also assured me that she had her cell phone by her bed *just in case* any after hours calls came through.
Mandy also provided photographs of the quarantine facility in Kuala Lumpur and informed me of a possible flea problem at the facility that had just been reported to them.
It’s not easy moving your pets (my family moved our dog and cat from New Zealand to the US in the 1990’s) — having a company that cares and knows what it is doing is a wonderful thing.
Can’t wait to greet my cats in their new city, country and home!

Unilocal won’t let me link to my expanded rundown of this company on my blog in my previous review, so here it is in under 5000 words as required:
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At our last vet visit in Boston, the vet took it upon herself to call the USDA and check some facts for me. Turns out, there were some things to be concerned about. At that point, the cats were scheduled to fly out of JFK in two weeks. However, as I had never received a response as to exactly when Joey needed to have his rabies shot following his microchipping, it was too late. The only response I’d gotten from our agent was «anytime is good.» No, no it’s not. Not when it’s required that he have it done at least 21 days before entering Sweden.
Next up was the disaster of getting the cats from Boston to New York. Originally, it’d been implied that they’d be boarded for a couple days before flying out near JFK airport. So, in the days leading up to when my friend was to drive them to New York, I contacted the agent a few times in an attempt to get the address of where she was supposed to bring them. I believe I sent two or three emails over the course of the week, the last two being each of the two days before the drop off was to happen, still having no information at all. Sometime around 2:00am the night before, my friend got an email from the agent with the information, finally. And something that shouldn’t have surprised us at all was that the drop-​off location was no where near NYC. This was somewhat nicer for the cats, as it was a shorter drive for them, but my friend had originally been considering staying at a friend’s in NYC, which was no longer reasonable.
Upon arriving, my friend was quickly informed that the carriers they were in – the expensive ones I’d bought at the direction of the company and sent back photos to them for verification as asked and confirmed as good — were the wrong size. Of course. So, they were switched to new crates and, in one of the very rare emails received from our agent, we were told that we’d be contacted by billing regarding payment for the new carriers soon. (I didn’t even reply to this one, as I had nothing nice to say and there was no way we were paying to fix their mistake. We were contacted again about a month after they arrived about this, but told that they’d do us a favor and let it slide, ha.)
The next contact we had was photos of the cats at JFK in their carriers, about to board the plane. They were alive — that was good to see at least. The contact following that was one of the best so far: the Swedish customs forms. Our agent had done us a favor and filled out the form for me – all I had to do was sign! Nice. I quickly inserted my electronic signature into the PDF and then read it over quickly before sending it back. The errors were no less than amazing. Every single thing on the form, perhaps besides my name and the cat’s arrival date, was incorrect. Wrong phone number, wrong visa information for us, wrong arrival date for us, and my personal favorite — a fabricated Personnummer for me! (For those not familiar, a Swedish Personnummer is their equivalent to the USA’s Social Security Number, each person’s being their birthdate + four numbers, YYMMDD-​XXXX.) I had skipped over it at first not recognizing it, but then when realizing what it was, couldn’t help but laugh at the new low reached. My actual Personnummer begins 890 311. Their version? 19 890 411. That’s right, couldn’t even get the month correct.
That day, I also found the contact information for the Swedish agent on this end that would take them through customs and drive them to our apartment. I knew she likely had no correct information from the American company and wanted to reach out to her to make sure she at least had my phone number — she didn’t, of course. They’d given her the wrong one.
That night, we received their flight tracking info — one of the rare emails actually containing information from the company. We tracked them and the next afternoon, I awaited their arrival. Around 2:00pm, I finally got the call that they were here… apparently after the local agent had been calling the wrong number, which was given to her by our American agent. Of course.
Neither seemed more traumatized than I’d expect. However, Luna was a mess. It seemed that sometime between Lee Anne dropping them off and their arrival here, she’d been given a bath (probably after peeing on herself in a carrier). However, she was completely full of soap. Not wanting to traumatize her more, I carefully tried to wash as much of the soap out as I could in the bathroom. But, I really couldn’t get it all without pinning her down in a way I didn’t feel she deserved at this point, so I gave up.
Ultimately, the move of the cats was 10x worse than the hell we were expecting anyhow, mostly due to a massive lack of communication and the scary appearance of having not even a care in the world as to what was going on, other than when dragging the payment out of us.

I did not think I would ever need the services of a pet relocator… it sounds a bit ridiculous, even. But what do you know, getting 4 cats from Austin to Los Angeles is a lot harder than it sounds! Rather than traumatizing everyone by spending 3 – 4 days in a car with 2 humans and four cats, rather than trying to drag unwilling cats through airport security and taking 2 different round trips because most airlines only allow a maximum of 2 animals in-​cabin per flight, rather than trying to convince family members to help us take cats through airport security, we called Pet Relocation.
I was very satisfied with their service. We got updates from the staff at every step of the way. When we realized we would need to get crates, and they happened to have some already, they sold them to us at cost and made our life a lot easier. They told us exactly what we might need to get from the vet, what we would need to bring for the cats, etc.
When the day came, our cats were picked up from our house in Austin. They were taken to the airport and Pet Relocation dealt with the check-​in and getting them organized on the plane. Our ‘concierge,’ Christina, sent us flight status updates to notify us when the planes had departed and landed, and we also got calls to tell us that they had changed the pads in the crate and given the cats more water. I also spoke with the woman who would be picking our cats up in LA and delivering them to our house.
All our cats arrived safely in the time frame that Pet Relocation originally specified. I hope I never have to move a bunch of pets across the country, but if I do, I would not hesitate to pay for this service again. It’s worth the expense.

did a terrific job moving our two cats from Austin to Portland, OR!
Both kitties arrived safe and sound. Neither one appreared the least bit traumatized by the journey. We were extremely satisified with their customer service and their prices were quite reasonable for a complete door-​to-​door transportation package. They handled all the paperwork, too. We could not have had a better experience… and we could not be more satisfied. Highly recommended!