Hi,
I booked our flight with Canadian Affair for our move to Victoria next January.
We are flying to Vancouver with Air transat, we have a cat coming with us. I phoned Air transat in the UK who told me that i could not take my cat as excess luggage and that i needed to phone the cargo office in Gatwick instead.
I phoned the cargo office who told me that Air transat do fly pet as excess luggage and that is cheaper than doing it with them but that i needed to phone the Montreal office as the London office do not know what they are talking about(that was his words to me)
I phoned Air transat in Montreal and booked my cat on our flight .
It is 250 canadian dollars regardless of the size of the animal and 30 dollars when we get her back in Vancouver. We just have to check her in at the same time as us. We could have do it with the cargo office in Gatwick but that would have cost us about £200 for a small cat and an other 150 dollars in Vancouver to get her back plus we would have had to drop her off 3 hours before our flight and wait 3 hours in Vancouver to get her back.

Phone number for Air Transat in Montreal from the UK is 00 800 283 87673
Canadian Affair is offering 10 % off when using " discover canada" as a promotional code.

Loetitia

I might be missing something here, but one cannot give cats away in Canada. There are no end of free ones to be had, all colours, shapes and sizes.

Why pay so much to bring a cat?

I'm sure the same is true of women, but my husband is still taking me!

Thanks for the info, Loetitia.
Did you get all the vet paperwork done yourself?
Any vaccinations?
I have several cats to take, so any advice much appreciated.

Hi Helcat12,
We are not going until January but we will be doing the paperwork ourselves.You can phone the Animal , health and veterinary agency (AHVLA) ON 01228403600 they will send you an email explaining everything . When you are ready to go they will send an export health certificate to your vet .You will also need a fit to fly certificate before you go.
www.inspection.gc.ca or www.defra.gov.uk are important to look at but all the information can be a little confusing.
Hope that help.
Loetitia

I don't think they allow live animals to fly (as excess luggage) in the cargo bays during winter.. you may want to double check.

just in the process of trying to sort this from Glasgow. have had a nightmare with airtransat (actually canadian affair) staff. different answers every time I phone. Have had various questions, so have talked to reservation staff and the cargo handlers in Manchester (they deal with Glasgow).

Eventually, after getting nowhere I called the London cargo guys to ask advice and they mentioned the above also. Have just booked our flights today, and will be calling the Montreal office to have a chat about the cat since its obviously worked for you! The Canadian site does say they can be excess baggage, but the UK site doesn't mention it.

Hi Siouxie,
I booked our cat for a flight on the 19 th january.I saw on the website they flight pet again from the 6th of january.

I meant to say I had asked if they had restrictions over the winter and they told me no - but after the amount of different answers I've had in the last week who knows. I've flown my cats before though, in both directions and never had a problem with different seasons.

I've had all sorts of responses as well.
Some have said that they will only fly animals to certain airports in certain seasons due to both heat and cold for the health and safety of the animals, which I can understand.
Others have said there is no problem but maybe that is because Vancouver, where I am flying to has no extreme temperatures to speak of.
Various pet transport agents have told me different things -
I can send all my cats together
I can't send all my cats together. They have to go in two batches.
They do need to have rabies vaccinations.
They don't need to have rabies vaccinations....... It goes on and on!
As for the prices for transit, they vary wildly.
I am just taking the advice of the nice people at Glasgow defra and I am not sure yet what I am doing about the actual transit method. It isn't time for us yet, but when it is I hope it will be sorted out somehow!

Bit of a mare isn't it!

They defintely don't need rabies. I got mine the rabies shot, mainly cause it seemed the easier option than trying to get the government letter saying it was a rabies free country. I was just being lazy

The prices are mental. I've done this before, but not since Air Canada stopped flying from Glasgow. It was so easy when they did - just booked directly, paid the price and took the cat up to the airport.

Its frustrating when you know the person on the other end of the phone employed by the airline knows less than you. I called Air Transat the other day after having had various conversations about shipping the cat with their cargo agents. The girl told me they don't take cats. I said, they do.. she says.... do they? FFS!!?? I told her I'd call back later

How much later - when they eventually employ someone who knows what they are doing?
Yes, it is true they do not need to be vaccinated against rabies, but it isn't stopping several animal shipping companies telling me that they do.
As you say, it is a 'mare, but we will overcome!
There's always this to make you feel better when you get there http://vancouver.en.craigslist.ca/rd...528167137.html
Don't all rush at once!!!!!!!

I'm shipping two dogs on Thursday with ANA Aviation. The lady there is Lin and has been so so helpful so far.
Obviously being dogs it's costing more, one of them being a golden retriever, but the principles are the same in terms of paperwork.

You either have to vaccinate the pet for rabies (or against maybe) and have a fit to fly certificate issued by the vet within 96 hours of the flight

OR you get a certificate from defra confirming the UK is rabies free and the fit to fly certificate.

Simples!