Are our cats coming with us to post? Beats me. We're hoping they will, but the timing for their paperwork is pretty atrocious. Our vet said he can't certify animals to go overseas any earlier than 10 calendar days prior to departure. Then you have to bring, mail, or fedex the paperwork to the regional USDA vet (Richmond for us), and have them give, mail or fedex it back to you. The Government of India, on the other hand, requires the paperwork be submitted 5 business days before arrival. Here's where things get really sticky. India is, for all intents and purposes, one business day ahead of us and it takes 24 hours for us to travel to India. Also if we don't have the paperwork from the Government of India in hand, Lufthansa won't let us board our flight from Frankfurt to Chennai. So if we do the math... 10 calendar days before the 26th is the Monday the 16th... overnight to Richmond and the USDA vet signs off on the 17th. Fedex back to us on the 18th (after our scanner was packed and taken) arriving around 8pm. We scanned the documents in and sent them to post on the morning of Thursday the 19th... after Chennai's business hours. They receive them on Friday the 20th... Now if all goes well, the paperwork should be completed before our arrival 5 business days later, right? Great... except we have to have the paper in our hand when our flight leaves 4 business days later...
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| The culprits. |
So once again, here's hoping our cats can come with us. Not looking forward to the prospect of shipping them separately (especially after paying the extra $750 to take Lufthansa instead of British Airways, so we'd be able to bring them with us).
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