Adopting from Cats Protection
Are you Ready to Offer a Furrever home to a Cat or Kitten?
One of our main objectives is to find good homes for cats and kittens in need and we want to make sure they are right one for you, your family and your circumstances.
Our homing process, including the checks we carry out, is as follows:
Step 1 is a Home Visit – no need to get the vacuum cleaner out, bake a cake, or plump up the cushions! This is not an ‘inspection’ but a simply an informal visit to get to know you, your family, and your circumstances, e.g., whether there are other pets or small children for example which might mean that a shy or nervous cat may not be the best fit. We’ll also ask whether you plan to allow your new friend outside, whether you’re at home or at work most of the day, or perhaps live near a main road.
The visit will be arranged to suit you as soon as you’ve decided you want to go ahead and adopt. We can answer any questions you may have or offer advice on how to introduce your new friend, where to place litter trays, food bowls, vaccinations and health care etc if needed. We make a promise to anyone having to hand over a cat to us that we’ll personally visit the new owner before the adoption procedure is completed to find their beloved pet the very best home we can – the home visit helps us meet that promise.
A note on
Rented accommodation. If you live in rented accommodation, we will need to see your landlord’s written permission for you to have a cat.
Step 2 - Meet & Greet Your New Cat. This is the exciting bit where you will get to meet the cat or kitten you’ve expressed an interest in. We don’t have a shelter or adoption centre in our branch; all of our cats and kittens are looked after by individual fosterers, in their own homes. We’ll give you details of which fosterer is looking after the cat so that you can make arrangements to go and meet him or her. If you don’t have a specific cat already in mind, we give you the contact details of one or more fosterers so you can discuss which one might be best for you. Since COVID sadly, we try to keep visits to a minimum, for the safety of our volunteers, our cats, and yourselves. If it’s not possible to visit before adopting, we can send you lots of photos and videos to help you make your choice.
Step 3 – it’s decision time! If you decide you would like to adopt, arrangements will be made with the fosterer for you to collect your new member of the family at time that suits you. If transport is an issue, we can arrange for the cat to be delivered to your home by one of our team; although this could take a little longer depending on driver availability.
How Much is the Adoption Fee?
We have a few forms to complete during the process to officially hand the cat over to you and we have an adoption fee that needs to be paid before this process can be finalised. Our adoption fees are £95 for kittens up to 6 months of age, and £75 for older cats – this fee covers the cost of the Cat Care package that your cat was given when they arrived with us, and includes the cat being fully examined by a veterinary surgeon, vaccinated against flu and enteritis, treatment for fleas, tapeworm and roundworm, microchipping and neutering (if your kitten is too young to be neutered at the time of adoption, this will be done afterwards). The adoption fee also entitles you to 4 weeks free pet insurance with Petplan which we will organise for you upon adoption.
We spend somewhere in the region of £150 on each cat in our care; plus, the cost of day-to-day expenses such as food and litter. This gives you the reassurance of knowing that your pet is in the best possible condition to start its new life with all these important costs already covered. Obviously, if you’d like to make a larger donation to support our work, we’d be delighted.
What if I Change my Mind?
We really hope you and your new cat will live happily ever after, but we do appreciate that things can sometimes happen which may be beyond your control. With this in mind, we offer a guarantee that we will take the cat back into our care during the first 6 months post adoption, as soon as a fosterer is available. This guarantee does not apply to Direct Home cats.
Aftercare
Hopefully your new cat will have its paws under the table in no time, but you’re always welcome to contact us with any questions or for advice. We’re happy to help and we love to know how our cats are getting on so do send us some photos when you get chance. Seeing them go off to a fresh start in a loving, new home is the most satisfying feeling in the world. It’s what we’re here for and it makes the hard work worthwhile – aww !
But Wait… There’s More ? What could be better than giving a loving home to a cat? The only thing we can think would be to give a home to two cats! A lot of cats in need of a new home are bonded as lifelong friends that would be happier staying together. When that is the case, it will be highlighted in their profiles. A pair of cats is perfect for people at work most of the day as they can keep each other company, and for younger pairs they keep each other entertained whilst you are busy. With two cats you get twice the personality and double the fun!
Would You Prefer a Senior Kittizen? Our kittens are always riotously popular but if that all sounds a bit too much, we have many a gentle and loving older cat just looking for a second chance for a happy home. These cats are usually very loving as they are used to living in a home environment and receiving lots of love and attention from a previous owner. Cats regularly live into their twenties so, while a cat of 10 years or over may only be halfway through its life, these Golden Oldies still have lots to offer a new owner and are usually really grateful to have found a loving home.
Direct Homing - not all the cats available for adoption are in our direct care. Please click here to read more about our Direct Homing scheme. One benefit of a directly homed cat is that our usual adoption fees do not apply. However, should you change your mind after adopting a Direct Home cat, we will be unable to being the cat into our care; we would only be able to offer you the same home-to-home service, but can help advertise the cat for you on our website and social media pages. Any new prospective owner would then contact you directly to make arrangements.
