British Airways Pet Policy from Canada: No Cabin Pets, and What That Takes

British Airways flies from Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver to Heathrow, and it is the airline Canadians ask about most for a move to the UK. It also has the shortest answer to the first question anyone asks. BA does not carry pets in the cabin. Not on the transatlantic routes, not on any route, and not for a small cat in a soft bag. The airline’s own wording is “we don’t carry pets in the cabin on any route.”

From Canada that one sentence sets the shape of the whole move. The pet travels as manifest cargo, booked through an agent rather than added to your own reservation, and two separate governments have work to do before it flies: the CFIA on the way out and the UK’s pet travel rules on the way in. This guide covers how that works and in what order. Everything here is from British Airways, IAG Cargo, the CFIA and GOV.UK, checked on 8 September 2026.

Air Canada carries small pets in the cabin on its international flights, so Canadians arrive at British Airways expecting the same choice at a different price. It is not there. No size, no weight and no fare class changes it.

Understand what that swaps before you price anything. Travelling in the cabin, the whole trip is a fee and a soft bag under the seat in front of you. Going as cargo, it becomes a specification-compliant container, an agent, a CFIA-endorsed certificate, an import entry and a facility at the far end that has its own opening hours. Two different jobs, two different budgets. If your animal would fit a cabin booking, our guide to the Air Canada pet policy sets out that route on the same city pairs.

One category is treated differently. Recognised assistance dogs travel in the BA cabin at no charge on the majority of its flights, under a separate process with its own paperwork and its own notice period.

An emotional support dog does not qualify. BA’s position is that it is a pet, which means everything described below applies to it.

Pets travel in the temperature-controlled hold, handled by IAG Cargo, the cargo arm of British Airways, Iberia, Aer Lingus, Vueling and LEVEL. IAG Cargo works through pet travel agents rather than taking bookings from owners directly, and its own guidance is to contact one.

Canadians will recognise the pattern from the other side of the market. Air Canada requires a registered IPATA, IATA or ATA agent for international pet cargo out of Canada, which is set out in our Air Canada guide. The reason is the same in both cases: manifest cargo needs an export entry, an import entry and a physical tender at a cargo facility, and none of those happen at a passenger check-in desk.

IAG Cargo also states that some dangerous dog breeds and some snub-nosed breeds of cats and dogs may not be accepted, and that the agent will advise on a specific animal. Breed clearance is therefore a question to settle before a date is fixed, not after.

IAG Cargo works to the IATA Live Animals Regulations, and it publishes one requirement that names Canada directly. Series 100 kennels are acceptable for most countries. For departures from Canada and the USA, a Series 200 kennel is required.

The distinction matters because Series 100 is what a Canadian pet shop sells you by default. Series 200 is the next specification up, built heavier, and the larger sizes are frequently a special order rather than something on a shelf in Mississauga or Laval. Order it against the route, allow for the lead time, and do not assume a container that satisfied a domestic WestJet booking will satisfy this one.

Everything else follows the IATA Live Animals Regulations, which we set out in full in our guide to airline crate requirements in Canada, including two conditions that Air Canada’s and WestJet’s own summaries leave out. Measuring the animal is a separate job with its own formula, covered in the crate size guide.

Where IAG Cargo does accept a snub-nosed dog or cat, its stated minimum is a container 10 percent larger than the normal minimum for that animal.

Ten percent sounds like a rounding allowance and behaves like a size change. It pushes a borderline animal into the next kennel up, and freight out of Canada is priced on the container’s dimensional weight rather than on the animal, so the quote moves with it. For a flat-faced breed the container has to be settled before any number is worth discussing.

This is the half of the move that has no equivalent for an American owner, and it is the half that decides your earliest travel date.

A pet leaving Canada for the UK needs an export certificate completed by your own veterinarian and then endorsed by an official CFIA veterinarian. The endorsement is an appointment, not a formality you attach to the file afterwards, and the CFIA is explicit that endorsement cannot be done once the animal has left Canada. There is no way to correct a certificate from Heathrow.

That single rule makes the endorsement appointment a scheduling dependency rather than a last step. Book it before the flight, not around it. Our guide to the CFIA health certificate covers the two-step process and what the appointment involves. The CFIA does not publish a fee for it; the amount is calculated for you by the officer at the appointment.

The entry rules belong to the UK government and apply whichever airline carries the animal. For a dog, cat or ferret travelling from Canada into Great Britain:

The line worth reading twice is the last one. GOV.UK lists Canada in its table of listed countries, and it applies the rabies antibody blood test only to pets travelling from countries that are not listed. So a Canadian pet going directly to Great Britain does not need a titre.

That is worth months. Where a titre is required, the sequence involves a blood draw at an approved laboratory and a waiting period measured in months rather than days, and a booster given one day late restarts it. Canada’s listed status removes that from the critical path entirely. Our rabies titre guide covers where it does still apply, because plenty of other destinations require one.

Extra rules apply if you are moving more than five pets and are not attending or training for a competition, show or sporting event. Above that number the movement stops being treated as non-commercial, which changes both the paperwork and who inspects it on arrival.

Nothing arrives at a baggage carousel. The City of London runs a dedicated animal facility at Heathrow, and every pet flown in as cargo is taken there from the aircraft in a climate-controlled vehicle. Its staff check the Pet Travel Scheme paperwork on a non-commercial movement, APHA checks a commercial one, and customs clearance only follows once that has passed. On average the animal is ready to collect within 2 to 4 hours of landing.

The centre charges for this, separately from anything the airline or the agent charges, and the amounts sit on our Canada to United Kingdom cost page alongside the rest of the route’s line items. The one thing to know before you read them: there are two boarding rates, and the cheaper one applies when the paperwork has been pre-checked. Ask your agent about the pre-check by name rather than assuming it is included.

The United Kingdom prohibits several types of dog outright, and the test is what the dog looks like rather than what its papers call it. That is unusual, and it means a Canadian dog with clean registration can still be refused on appearance.

Check this before crate sizing, before the endorsement appointment and before any date is fixed, because it is the one input that cannot be worked around. The prohibited types are listed on our Canada to United Kingdom page, and our guide to banned dog breeds by country explains how a lookalike test differs from an import ban and from a keeping condition.

Breed first, because it can end the plan. Then the rabies sequence, because the microchip has to precede the vaccination and the 21 days run from there. Then the container, to the Series 200 specification, with 10 percent added if the animal is snub-nosed. Then the CFIA endorsement appointment, which cannot be repaired from the other end. The flight is booked around those, not before them.

Done in that order a Canada to UK move is one of the more predictable international routes there is, because Canada’s listed status keeps the long waiting period out of it. Done in the wrong order, it is the one where people discover at the endorsement appointment that something upstream is wrong.

No, and there is no exception at any size. Cats leaving Toronto on BA travel as cargo in the hold, arranged by an agent. Air Canada is the cabin option on that routing.

No. IAG Cargo handles the animal on a separate air waybill, arranged by an agent. It can be on the same aircraft as you and it is still not part of your booking, which also means the two are not rebooked together if something changes.

No. Canada sits on GOV.UK’s listed countries table, and the blood test applies only to countries that are not on it. What Canada needs instead is a Great Britain pet health certificate.

Series 200. IAG Cargo names Canada and the USA specifically as the departures where Series 100 is not enough. Snub-nosed animals need a further 10 percent on top of the minimum.

Yes. The export certificate and its CFIA endorsement are Canada’s requirements for an animal leaving the country, and they apply regardless of which airline carries it. The endorsement cannot be done after the animal has left Canada.

Two to four hours from landing on average, according to the facility itself. The delay is the paperwork check, which has to clear before customs release, and that is exactly what the pre-check option is for.

Air Canada flies the same routes and does carry pets in the cabin, within its own limits, and its cargo product carries larger animals through a registered agent. Our Air Canada guide and our list of international pet cargo airlines cover the rest.

Checked on 8 September 2026.

Most of the work on a Canada to UK move is sequencing: getting the endorsement appointment, the container order and the tapeworm window into an order that holds. That is the part we handle, out of Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, on British Airways and on the carriers beside it. Send us the animal and the timing and we will map the route back from the arrival date.