13 May 2016
From the 6th April 2016 it will be made compulsory that all dogs must be microchipped and registered to an approved database throughout the UK.
If a dog is not microchipped by the 6th April its owner will be given a 21 day notice period in which they must do so. If they fail to microchip their dog in this time they will face a £500 fine. The same applies if the owners contact details are not kept up-to-date on the microchip database, again they will be given a 21 day notice and fined if not corrected.
There is no age exemption when microchipping a dog, unless the dog is deemed medically unfit by a veterinarian. A microchip must be administered and registered before a dog reaches the age of 8 weeks old, and it is advised that breeders wait until 6 weeks of age to microchip – giving a 2 week window to do so.
As puppies are recommended to stay with their mum until 8-12 weeks of age, this makes it the breeders responsibility to microchip their litters. As a new dog owner when picking up a puppy, you should be given (or request) your puppies microchip paperwork and any other details from the breeder. You are then given 21 days to change the registered keeper’s details over to yours, which comes at a small fee. While the breeder will probably tell you how to do this, the paperwork for the microchip that you receive with the puppy will tell you how to change the details held on the database.
Alternatively if you decide to adopt or rescue a dog, you similarly have 21 days to microchip and/or change the details.
