FAQs

We are a UK registered charity (#1161695). In order to keep our overheads to a minimum and invest more of our funding into our projects, our team work remotely and meet in London for regular team catch ups.

Whilst we’re based in the UK, our work reaches across the world. We collaborate with a number of international shelters, and have initiated global projects all over the world. You can find out more about our global project work here.

We’re always grateful for any voluntary support our community can offer: from hosting fundraisers; helping out at our events; accompanying a dog on its journey home as a flight buddy; or even fostering one of our rescue dogs. There are so many ways you can show your support for Wild at Heart Foundation and, by extension, rescue dogs all around the world.

Click to find out more about our volunteer opportunities, and register your interest. You can also sign up to our Volunteer Newsletter to be kept up to date with all our latest opportunities.

Please note, as we don’t have a UK shelter or rehoming centre, we’re rarely able to offer volunteers the opportunity to work directly with the dogs. Sign up to the newsletter to receive updates about any overseas shelter volunteer opportunities.

Setting up a regular gift to Wild at Heart Foundation is one of the most meaningful ways you can help; your ongoing support helps us fund vital costs, including food, supplies and vet care for our partner projects, urgent care, and treatment costs for dogs who require major surgery or veterinary attention before they’re able to be adopted.

Set up a monthly donation

If you’d rather make a one-off donation, you can do so on our donation page.

Of course! We’re grateful to receive donations in whatever form best suits you:

Cheque

Please make cheques payable to ‘Wild at Heart Foundation’, and send to:
Wild at Heart Foundation, Units 3 & 4 Linford Business Estate, Linford Street, London, SW8 4AB, United Kingdom

Cash

If you’d like to donate cash (for example, if you’ve raised funds through a fundraiser, event, or raffle), we recommend that you bank the cash into your personal account and then make a donation via our website. This allows us, where eligible, to claim GiftAid on your donation which means we can claim an extra 25p for every £1 donated!

However, if you’d prefer to pay by direct transfer, our details are below. Make sure to drop us an email to let us know you’ve deposited the funds so we can thank you!

Alternatively, if you’re London-based, you can drop cash donations off to any Nikki Tibbles Wild at Heart store where it will be passed to the Foundation.

Bank Transfer

Our sort code is: 40-52-40
Our account number is: 0002 6608

Facebook

We are a Facebook & Instagram verified charity, which enables you to set up a fundraiser directly from your Facebook page. Click here for instructions – you’ll simply need to search and select ‘Wild at Heart Foundation’ when choosing your charity.

Donation Providers

You can also donate via JustGiving, Virgin Money Giving, and PayPal Giving Fund.

Thank you so much for your generous support!

We understand that circumstances can change, if you would like to cancel your regular donation, please contact your bank to ask them to cancel the direct debit. Thank you for your support.

There are many wonderful charities in the UK and worldwide promoting similar causes to those promoted by Wild at Heart Foundation; we have always championed collaboration where appropriate, and support all those organisations that share our values. However, in the interest of total clarity, we must specify that we are an independent charity, and are not associated with Underdog International or any of its employees.

We are incredibly proud of what Wild at Heart Foundation have achieved over the years. We are powered by a truly committed and hard-working team, and we know that incredible things lie ahead. It’s thanks to our supporters that we have rehomed and sterilised tens of thousands of dogs, and educated tens of thousands of children. We have implemented truly life-changing projects around the world, with many more on the horizon; we can’t wait to share our achievements with you as we grow.

Thank you for considering adopting a rescue dog from overseas! If you want to know more about the steps involved, our adoption process overview is the best place to begin. Once you’ve had a good read, you can browse our gallery of dogs currently looking for a home and fill in an adoption form to get the ball rolling.

You’ll also find more information on adopting a dog during Covid-19, over on our blog.

Please note: Our adoption fees are currently under review.

Due to the global pandemic and various changes brought about by Brexit, travel routes are becoming more complicated and – in some situations – more expensive. Please see below for our current adoption fee structure.

The adoption fee varies depending on which country your dog comes from. We have a transparent pricing structure which is dependent on the costs of travel involved in your dog’s rehoming journey:

• Bulgaria – £595
• Greece – £795
• Lesvos – £850
• Romania – £495
• Spain – £795
• UK – £295 – Dogs currently in a UK home are shown with their country of origin set to “UK”. Please read their bio for more information on where they’ve come from originally, what their current adoption fee will be and why they’re now available for adoption.

Further afield – POA
We facilitate adoptions from all over the world, including Puerto Rico, Lebanon, India, South Korea and China. As the transport, customs and registration process for these countries is based on a number of different varying factors, we charge our ‘further afield’ adoption fees on a case-by-case basis. Due to the more complex nature of these journeys, fees can exceed £1000.

We do not charge anything for the dog itself; the adoption fee covers the cost of finding them their new home and supporting the partner shelter providing them care until they’re able to travel. This includes the cost of food, vaccinations, micro-chipping and any further veterinary treatment needed. It also covers the cost of onward transportation, and all necessary admin required to prepare them for travel.

We rely on the generosity of our community to help keep our adoption efforts running, and to ensure that we can continue to rescue and care for those dogs who are not yet lucky enough to have found their forever home. You’ll have the option to add a donation to your final balance when you pay your adoption fee, and we’re so grateful for whatever you’re able to spare.

Many adopters also choose to set up a regular monthly gift, which provides invaluable support and allows us to care for hundreds more dogs who are still waiting to find their forever home.

Your dog will be fully vaccinated (included rabies and standard annual vaccines), microchipped, defleaed and dewormed before they travel.

Where applicable they will also be blood tested against common diseases and given parasite preventative treatments.

All your dog’s vaccinations and treatments will be detailed in their pet passport or vaccination record card which travels with them. You can speak to a member of our adoption team for more information at any point during the adoption process.

Your dog will be neutered or spayed if they are over the shelter’s standard age of sterilisation (usually around 9 months+ or, in the case of female dogs, once they’ve had their first season)

Most young puppies will not be neutered or spayed, but we insist this is something you do when they are of the appropriate age and in good health. We recommend you speak to your vet about this when your dog arrives.

The timings for adoptions vary depending on the age of your dog, their country of origin, transportation options, your availability and, more recently, the global pandemic.

With Covid-19 and Brexit complicating travel routes, and our team seeing a surge in the number of adoption enquiries we’re receiving, this process is taking a little longer than usual.

Please read our adoption process overview for more information, including how we’ve adapted the process in light of the global pandemic. Our blog also provides some insight into adopting a dog under Covid-19 restrictions.

As always, we thank you for bearing with us during these exceptional circumstances.

Please note the age brackets we sort our dogs into below. More detailed information about each dog’s age and character can be found in their individual profile.

• Puppy = up to 1 year
• Adolescent = 1-2 years
• Adult = 5-9 years
• Senior = 9+ years

We understand that there are certain lifestyle factors you may need to consider before adopting a dog. The most common of these we need to take into account are:

• living with children
• living with cats, or other small pets
• living with other dogs
• living in an urban environment

We try our best to provide accurate information about whether our dogs may be suitable for adopters that need to consider these traits, and make the decision to place any of our dogs within these environments very carefully. This is to ensure the best interest of both our dogs, and our prospective adopters, and to minimise the risk of needing to onward rehome dogs that may later prove unsuited to your home.

We always err on the side of caution when considering these traits, so please bear with us if it takes a little longer to find the right dog for you and your lifestyle.

You can browse dogs that may be suitable for you by using the ‘Key traits’ filter on our adoption page. Please note, we will only mark a dog as fit for mixing with children, cats or other dogs when this trait has been tested.

Whilst we can provide no guarantee that any dog will fit into a certain environment without any issues, we take this responsibility very seriously. We pride ourselves on both our rigorous adoption process, and our aftercare check-in service, both of which are in place to help your new dog settle in as smoothly as possible.

When browsing our adoption page, you’ll notice that some dogs are marked with a blue ‘Reserved’ tag. Please note, a dog will only be marked as such once we’ve matched them with and spoken to their prospective adopter, and taken a security deposit.

Occasionally, a reserved dog may become available for adoption again if the adopter’s circumstances change, at which point we’ll contact those who were originally on that dog’s shortlist.

More about the reservation process

To give you a better insight into the matchmaking process, it takes us a little time to assess all applications for any particular dogs’ most suitable home, and sometimes that means that a dog who may have been advertised as ‘available’ on our website, already has a number of interested parties and the adoption might be close to being finalised “behind the scenes”.

The reason we don’t mark them as ‘reserved’ as soon as interest is shown, is that we can’t be sure we’ve made a match until we’ve gone through each application in detail and spoken to our initial batch of prospective adopters. We group enquiries for each dog into batches – it’s important to note we don’t reserve dogs on a first come first served basis, but rather work through all enquiries until we find the right home for the dog.

It’s only once we’ve had a chance to chat further with the prospective adopter and confirm suitability that the adoption deposit is paid and the dog gets marked as ‘reserved’ on our website.

With hundreds of adoption forms coming our way each month, this may mean that we’ve already created a batch of prospective adopters for the dog you’re interested in before your enquiry reaches our inbox and your first choice of dog may no longer be available, especially with more popular / mainstream choices (e.g. our young pups).

Whilst we understand this may be a little disappointing, rest assured that it’s nothing personal! We’re just trying to find the very best homes for the dogs in our care whilst juggling a lengthy waiting list, so please don’t lose hope!

With all this in mind, it’s worth noting that, sometimes, no one in our initial selection proves suitable. At this point, we move onto any other pending applications which came through at a later date to see if any newer enquiries might be the perfect fit. This is another reason why we don’t mark a dog as officially ‘reserved’ until everything is officially confirmed.

Please rest assured that we treat each application with the attention it deserves and will always be able to recommend alternative dogs (many of whom may not have been on the website when you first got in touch) who we’re sure you’ll find just as endearing. We pride ourselves on our commitment to both our dogs and our prospective adopters, and always take the time to match you with the perfect companion for your lifestyle.

Thank you so much for your patience!

When browsing our adoption page, you’ll notice that some dogs are marked with a red ‘Adopted’ tag. Dogs do not get marked as adopted until they’ve arrived in the UK and are settled into their new homes.

You’ll find more FAQs specific to adopting a dog during Covid-19 over on our blog.

For UK orders, we aim to have your order delivered within 3-7 working days; and we’ll always try to get your order sent as early as possible within this timeframe.

Please note, on rare occasions, our delivery processes can sometimes be interrupted and it may take us a little longer than usual to post your order: however, we will strive to let you know if this is the case.

All our shop orders are packed and shipped by members of our small team – thank you for your patience!

Yes! We can ship to most countries worldwide. International shipping costs are calculated based on the size of your order, and its final destination.

Delivery times vary depending on where in the world your order is being shipped to.

We offer refunds to all UK customers, for all non-sale items if logged within 14 days of receipt. As a small charity, we’re not able to offer free shipping for returns, so please ensure you check our size guides and your order summary carefully before placing an order.

If you’d like to return an item, please email us on [email protected] (or reply to your order confirmation email) and provide details of what you’re returning, and whether you’d like us to exchange for another size, or refund you.

Next, please post in appropriate packaging to:

Wild at Heart Foundation, Unit 3 Linford Business Estate, Linford Street, London, SW8 4AB, United Kingdom

For exchanges, we’ll send your new item in our next delivery batch. For refunds, we’ll process your payment within 7 working days of receipt of your item.

Please note, we cannot offer international refunds / exchanges

As a rule, we’re unable to guarantee delivery for a set date. However, if you have an urgent delivery date that you’d like us to bear in mind, please drop us an email before ordering, and we’ll try our best to honour this.

Sometimes, this may require a small additional payment to secure recorded delivery, but we’ll always explain your options before we proceed with shipment.