Thank you for your interest in rehoming a dog from the RSPCA Chesterfield Animal Centre.

We want as many people as possible to be able to rehome a dog from us – what’s important is matching you and your family with the right dog. Below you can find information about what steps to expect during our rehoming process along with lots of other useful information. We hope to see you soon!

Adopting a dog from the RSPCA Chesterfield Animal Centre

We do not offer general viewing around the kennels, instead we carry out meet and greet appointments to match you with your new best friend.

How the process works

1. View the available dogs on our website and read their profiles.

2. Complete the online dog application form for the animal you are interested in adopting.

3. If you meet the requirements of the dog and your application is selected, a member of the team will call you to discuss your application and the next stage of our rehoming process. Please note that we are only able to contact successful applicants to discuss the next stage of our rehoming process. If you are not contacted within 2 weeks from when you submit your application, unfortunately you may not have been successful on this occasion. We are unable to provide feedback on unsuccessful applications. We may receive multiple applications for a particular dog, for which we are very grateful. If we do have a number of applications to review, please rest assured that we will be in touch if your application is chosen.

4. If all goes well with this discussion, we’ll ask you to provide us with videos or photos of your home and garden and any existing animals you have. We’ll also need to see written permission from your landlord to keep a dog if you live in rented accommodation and the vaccination record for any dogs you already have. In some cases, we may come and visit you before or after the adoption as part of the rehoming process.

5. Once we’ve received all the information from you, we’ll arrange an appointment for you and any other members of your household to meet the dog at the animal centre and also carry out introductions with any existing dogs you have. Some dogs may need more than one meeting with you before they can go to their new home. 

6. If the introductions are successful, we will arrange an appointment for you to adopt your new family member from the animal centre. We’ll ask you to provide some form of ID (proof of name and address) prior to the adoption.

7. You will receive a follow up email or call from the animal centre after the adoption to find out how your new dog has settled in.

Adoption fees | Dogs over 6 months from £300 | Puppies under 6 months from £450 | Dogs over 8 years old from £250

If you would like to support our work, please visit our donation page. Thank you.

Why rehome from us?

Though there are many places you can find dogs or puppies for sale, we recommend giving a rescue dog or puppy the chance of the happy life they so deserve.

“We just wanted to say a big thank you to the RSPCA Chesterfield Animal Centre for being so helpful and making the process of adopting Scooby so smooth. It was lovely to have such an open and positive response to our application.”

– Kiren & Dominic | October 2021

Help and supporters for adopters

Introducing a new dog to your home will be exciting, rewarding and at times, challenging. It may take quite a while for your new rescue dog to settle into life with you, but don’t worry, if you do encounter some tricky bits, you’re not alone. Once you’ve adopted your new rescue dog, we’ve prepared lots of free online content for you about dog welfare and advice.

Remember, we’re still here for advice and support. Please get in touch with the animal centre and we’ll do our best to help with any questions you may have.

Important information

Please be aware that information relating to the temperament and behaviour of our dogs has been based on observations of them whilst in our care. Please note that there may be differences in behaviour observed in an animal centre environment compared to in a home environment. Any background information or history from before our dogs came into our care has been provided by third parties and will be shared by us in good faith. We cannot give any guarantee to the validity of the information provided or how one of our dogs may behave or react in a new home.

Veterinary responsibilities

Please be aware that after the adoption, you will become legally responsible for obtaining and funding all future veterinary treatment for your new rescue dog. This includes treatment for any pre-existing condition(s) and/or any conditions that your new rescue dog may have contracted at the animal centre and applies whether or not the symptoms were present or made known to you prior to adoption.

FAQs about dog rehoming

Yes, all of our dog rehoming is by appointment once you have been successfully matched. We do not offer general viewing around the kennels. Please visit the dogs on our website and complete an online dog application form if you are interested in adopting.

Adoption fees for dogs:

  • Dogs over 6 months from £300

  • Puppies under 6 months from £450

  • Dogs over 8 years old from £250

    These fees help us to cover the costs of caring for hundreds of dogs every year.

  • Every dog adopted is:

  • Neutered (or comes with a neutering voucher)

  • Microchipped

  • Vaccinated*

  • Vet checked

  • Treated for fleas and worms

  • You will also receive four weeks’ insurance with Petplan absolutely FREE. This is all included in the one-off adoption fee.

* This may be part or fully vaccinated depending on how long the dog has been in our care and its medical condition. Please note we can not complete any vaccination courses post adoption.

Owning a dog is a wonderful privilege, but with that comes financial and legal responsibilities. We are always very grateful for the offer of loving homes for our dogs, however your current financial situation could impact on your ability to adopt, or to adopt a particular dog considering its welfare needs.  

We have a duty to take reasonable steps to ensure that potential adopters have the ability to meet routine and emergency vet bills along with any other financial commitments that come with owning a dog. In some circumstances, such as people currently unemployed, on low income and/or low income benefits, we may need to ask for further information and/or evidence of your ability to fund veterinary costs so we can be sure that you are able to meet your responsibilities in relation to the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

We deal with each situation on a case by case basis but if after considering your individual circumstances and the information provided, we have any concerns about your ability to meet the costs of owning a dog, then unfortunately we would be unable to proceed with rehoming to you.

 Animal Welfare Act 2006

Section 9 of the Animal Welfare Act places a duty of care on people to ensure they take reasonable steps to meet the welfare needs of their animals to the extent required by good practice. In short this means positive steps must be taken to ensure owners care for their animals properly and in particular must provide for the five welfare needs, which includes the need to protect an animal from pain, suffering, injury and disease.

Further information about what this means in practice can be found in a specific Code of Practice produced by Defra (for England) and by the Welsh Government.

PDSA

We do not recommend relying on another charity to help finance your existing dog’s veterinary treatment and careful consideration should be given to this, as the charity’s service could be reduced or withdrawn at any stage or you could find that you become no longer eligible.

If you plan to use the PDSA to help finance your veterinary fees, we strongly advise that you contact them first or visit their website to check if you are eligible to qualify for PDSA veterinary services and live within a catchment area of a PDSA service. 

Please note that the PDSA has closed its Pet Practice scheme in the Chesterfield area to new registrations. 

In light of the above, we are unable to adopt to anyone who would be dependent on the PDSA or another charity as the principal source of funding for veterinary treatment and you would therefore need an alternative means of meeting these costs should you wish to rehome a dog from our animal centre.

Insurance

We would always recommend that pet owners consider taking out pet insurance. This will help you to cope financially with any unexpected bills. However, it is important to be aware that insurance will not cover preventative treatments such as vaccinations or flea and worm treatment and nor will it cover any pre-existing conditions that your dog has prior to the commencement of the insurance cover. You would therefore need to have sufficient funds to meet these costs and would also need to take account of the relevant excess (this is the amount of each claim the policyholder must pay) that applies to the insurance policy.

Yes. If you live in private rented accommodation then you will need to provide the animal centre with written permission from your landlord stating that dogs are allowed to live at the property.

We do not require written permission for council or housing association properties.

As long as you are permanently resident in the UK and you are able to visit the animal centre as many times as necessary to complete the rehoming process, you are welcome to rehome from our animal centre.

Please do not travel to our animal centre to visit our dogs without an appointment as we do not offer general viewing of the dogs. 

Every adoption is treated as an individual case, so while the process normally takes about a week, it can be shorter or longer depending on a number of factors, and this typical timeframe should not be taken as a guarantee.

 

Some dogs might need to get to know their new owners more gradually over several visits and others might be completing veterinary treatment before they can be adopted.

If you know there is a big event (moving house, going on holiday, a new baby) coming up soon, it’s best to start the process after everything has settled down, so that whenever you find your new dog, you’re ready for them.

We promote responsible pet ownership as part of our rehoming procedures. All our dogs are vaccinated against common diseases and where possible, neutered.

If you wish to adopt a dog from the animal centre, any existing dogs must be fully vaccinated unless a vet has advised otherwise. We also strongly recommend that any existing dogs are neutered and this is an essential requirement if the dog you are interested in adopting is of the opposite sex and cannot be neutered before adoption (or if in the case of a male dog not enough time has elapsed since castration for the dog to be guaranteed to be infertile).

Usually yes. We do not rule out homes without a secure garden or outdoor area, however this is likely to restrict the potential dogs suitable for you to adopt.

Our animal centre staff will always advise if a secure garden is needed for a particular dog or if any adjustments need to be made to your garden. 

We aim to publish new animals on our website at least weekly and update reserve information daily.

However, please be aware that our rehoming pages may not represent all the animals we have staying with us and during busy periods information may not be fully up-to-date.

Please feel free to contact the animal centre for the latest information.