Going Overseas: What to Do With Your Pets

The order people actually do this in is trip first, animals second. By the time most Australians start thinking seriously about the pets, the flights are booked and the dates are fixed. That is workable for three of the four options below. It is a real problem for the fourth, which runs on deadlines measured in months.

The four options

• Take them with you.
• Board them at a kennel, cattery or pet hotel.
• Ask family or friends to take them, or to come and go.
• Have someone stay in your home while you are away.

Each of these is the right answer for somebody. The useful question is not which is best in general, but which is best for a trip of your length, with your animals, from your house.

Taking them with you: start now, not later

This is the only option with hard external deadlines, and it is the one people underestimate. Depending on where you are going, the process can involve microchipping in a particular sequence, vaccinations with waiting periods attached, blood tests sent to approved laboratories, parasite treatments inside specific windows, an import permit issued by the destination country, and export documentation from the Australian side. Some destinations require a sequence that takes six months or more from start to finish.

The return leg catches more people out than the outbound one. Bringing an animal into Australia has its own import conditions and a period in the government quarantine facility, and those requirements are reviewed and changed periodically.

Beyond the paperwork there is the animal. Air travel in cargo is stressful for most pets, some airlines restrict or refuse snub-nosed breeds, and older animals or those with heart or respiratory conditions carry more risk. A good number of people who begin this process conclude that the trip is not worth it for the animal and choose one of the other three options. That is a legitimate outcome, not a failure.

Boarding: predictable, and the animal leaves home

Boarding is the option with the fewest unknowns. You pay a nightly rate, the facility is set up for the job, and someone is responsible in a formal sense. The trade is that the animal is somewhere unfamiliar for the whole trip, which matters more for some species and temperaments than others.

It also scales badly with time and number of animals. A nightly rate that looks reasonable for four nights looks different across three weeks with two dogs. Our comparisons of in-home sitting against kennels and of catteries against house sitters for cats go through when each is genuinely the better choice.

Family and friends: cheap until it is not

This is the default for short trips and it often works. It gets harder as the trip gets longer, because you are asking someone to absorb weeks of daily obligation as a favour, which is a different thing from asking for a weekend. The awkwardness usually arrives partway through rather than at the start. Our guide on asking family or friends covers how to make the ask fairly and when not to.

Someone stays in your home

For a longer overseas trip this is often the option that fits best, because the length works in its favour rather than against it. The animals stay in their own house with their own routine, and the house is occupied rather than visibly empty for three weeks. For sitters, a longer sit is more attractive than a short one, so availability tends to be better for exactly the trips where boarding is most expensive.

What it does not solve is the need to choose a person well. Nothing about the arrangement removes that work, and it should be done properly before you leave the country.

What changes when you are on the other side of the world

Most of the practical differences between a domestic trip and an overseas one are about reach and timing rather than the animals themselves.

• Time zones. A question at 6pm your time may arrive at 3am theirs, or the reverse. Agree what counts as urgent enough to wake you.
• You cannot come back quickly. On a domestic trip, driving home in a day is a real fallback. On an overseas one it is not.
• Your phone. International roaming, a local SIM or messaging over wifi only are all different levels of reachable. Say which one you will be.
• Veterinary authority. Someone needs to be able to approve treatment and pay for it while you are asleep or on a plane.
• Keys and access. Who else has a key, and does the sitter know who they are and what they look like.
• Mail and deliveries. Three weeks of unattended mail is both a nuisance and a signal to anyone watching the house.

The veterinary point is the one worth doing properly rather than informally. Our guide to emergency vet consent sets out what to write down and what to tell the clinic, and mail and deliveries covers the rest.

The information pack

Whichever option you choose, someone will need to know things that live only in your head. Write them down before you are tired and packing.

• Feeding: what, how much, when, and what they are not allowed.
• Medication: name, dose, timing, and what happens if a dose is missed.
• The vet's name, address, phone number and after-hours arrangement.
• Your microchip numbers and registration details.
• What normal looks like for each animal, so a change is noticeable.
• Where the animal hides, so nobody concludes it has escaped on day one.
• Bin nights, alarm codes, the water shut-off, and who to call about the house.
• Two contacts in Australia who can act if you cannot be reached.

A realistic timeline

1. Six months out, if there is any chance you will take the animals with you, start on the requirements. If you rule it out, you have lost nothing.
2. Three months out, decide between boarding, family and a sitter, and start looking. Good sitters and good facilities are both booked early for school holidays and Christmas.
3. Six weeks out, confirm the arrangement and meet the person or visit the facility.
4. Two weeks out, write the information pack, sort veterinary consent and tell your vet clinic who is authorised.
5. The week before, do a handover in person if you can, and confirm keys, access and contact arrangements.

Where Sitterly fits, and where it does not

Sitterly covers the fourth option only. It is a non-monetary exchange: a sitter stays in your home and cares for your pets and house, and gets accommodation instead of a fee. No money changes hands for the sit and we take no commission on it. We do not do dog walking, drop-in visits, daycare or boarding.

We should also be clear about what we do not do. Sitterly does not vet or approve every user, does not guarantee a booking or an outcome, does not provide insurance, and does not supervise sits or find you a replacement if a sitter withdraws. Verification is optional and user-initiated, and homeowners can filter for it. Choosing the person is your decision and it stays yours.

If that is the option you want, you can read how it works, browse sitters by city, or look at current listings to see what other homeowners are asking for.