Dog Registration

The dog registration fee supports:

• Fit-for-purpose vehicles - patrols and response, fuel, maintenance, branding and equipping to ensure officers can ensure public safety.
• Heavy duty, fit-for-purpose protective uniforms.
• Trained officers familiar with relevant legislation.
• Negotiation of voluntary handovers of dogs costs, but it's better than potential expensive court costs!
• Property visits for every complaint to educate, investigate and/or uplift.
• Dog poo bag dispenser and free bags around the district - including maintenance and filling.
• Education and support for people struggling to properly care for their dog.
• Door to door programme in August looking for known registered dogs that have not yet renewed their registration.
• Pound management - keeping it clean and hygienic, feeding, watering the dogs twice daily, seven days a week; rotating dogs in the exercise yards and walking the dogs.
• Public, and dog owner, safety - by getting roaming and aggressive dogs off the streets. $150! That's an expensive piece of plastic or is it
• Welfare - because the SPCA went into recession (now active again, which is great news), our staff field well over 100 calls a year from concerned residents about 'the dog next door'. These are investigated and education support provided. If the situation doesn't improve, the dog is uplifted and held either for seven days or longer depending on the dog's behaviour and temperament. The team put a huge amount of time and effort into animal welfare because animal cruelty is distressing for people.
• Adopt a dog programme - all dogs are desexed, microchipped and vet checked so that when the dog is adopted it is unable to have (potentially unwanted) puppies, is legally microchipped and healthy. Many dogs spend longer than seven days in the pound too. Our team put time and effort into assessing dogs for suitability for rehoming. Indeed other members of staff offer to walk the dogs during their lunch breaks too.

In addition:

• Officers are on call 24/7 to ensure public safety - largely around dog attacks, aggression and stock on roads.
• The service isn't just about dogs. The team enforce our Bees, Poultry and Animal Bylaw which covers a range of animals, mostly around stock on roads that need to be dealt to within an hour as a matter of serious public safety. And the team enforce various other bylaws like the Public Places bylaw, do parking infringements and deal with derelict vehicles. This is all covered in the cost of the service (rates component too).

But wait there's more

• Discounted Selected Owner Policy (or SOP) - apply between 1 March and 31 May. Officers will inspect your property, review your file to check history and a few other criteria. SOP is half of the standard fee. SOP is a privilege not a right.
• The proportion of dangerous or menacing dogs in our district in comparison to total dogs is high. Managing dangerous dogs is essential to public safety, the safety of other dogs and their owners.
• Automatic payment option - to spread payments throughout the year (means additional administrative costs).
• Credit in rates account - this can be transferred to your dog account.

So you see there's much much more to the Animal and Compliance Service than meets the eye.

More on these fees:

• Our Council has one of the highest dog registration fees in the country. We acknowledge that. There are several reasons for this and many are outlined above.
• In a nutshell, we deliver a higher level of service to our community than many other councils.
• Some councils for instance don't investigate door to door every complaint - they simply write letters or do nothing.
• Some councils don't put time and effort into rehoming suitable dogs that have been found or handed over and no owner has claimed them - they simply wait the seven days under the law and then euthanize the dog.
• Some councils don't split the service into 60% to users (ie, dog owners) and 40% on rates - they put more of the cost of the service on to rates, which means ratepayers who don't have dogs pay a larger proportion than what they do in our district.

All dogs must be registered as soon as your puppy turns 12 weeks or 3 months of age.

You have until the 31st of July to pay your dog registration. After this date you will incur a penalty rate for a late payment.

The registration of a dog in New Zealand is a process that must be completed annually by 31 July. Once your dog is registered in a district, you will receive a new registration reminder in June of every year.

We can arrange a payment plan that suits! Please call the Council Office or come in and ask to speak to a Customer Service representative or alternatively a Compliance Officer and they will take you through your options. We want to help make the dog registration cost easier for our community.

If you are a dog owner that has not paid your dog registration in full or has defaulted on your agreed weekly payments, you will receive an infringement for failing to register a dog. Please understand that if you remain non-compliant and your infringement has gone through the court system, Compliance officers are obliged to seize your dog(s) and impound it/them until the balance of the dog registration is paid in full. You, as the owner of that dog will incur a seizure fee and daily sustenance fees.

For registration fees, please see the Fees and Charges section of our website. You are welcome to pay by cash at the counter of the Council offices in Putāruru and Tokoroa or The Dog in Tirau or via internet banking payment options (listed on the reverse of the registration form).

Council supports regular automatic payments to make dog registration easier to manage. Please come and speak to our customer service officers about setting up an automatic payment.

In an effort to encourage people to take really good care of their dogs and be highly responsible dog owners, Council has a Selected Owner Policy. Council regards this policy as a privilege and not a right. As a result, the fees for this category are substantially lower than the standard fee.

A number of criteria apply:

• You are required to apply on the standard form available from the South Waikato District Council offices.
• You are required to have a suitably fenced property.
• You must have had no validated complaints regarding your dog(s) for the 12 months prior to your application. (ie, no barking, aggression or wandering complaints, or impounding)
• You must not have had a prosecution or infringement for a dog-related offence for the 24-month period prior to your application.
• Your dog registration fees must be paid in full prior to 1 August each year.
• You will be asked to sign a declaration form stating that you understand and agree to comply with these criteria.

A registered pig-hunter will not lose his SOP status, should his/her dog(s) be impounded after being caught in the forests during the prescribed hunting season. However, normal retrieval fees would be required.

Failing to comply with any of the above may result in your Selected Owner Policy licence being revoked.

You must apply to Council for an SOP inspection of your property prior to 31 May* each year so that we are able to set the appropriate fees to all dog owner files before the fee goes onto your account and are posted out to you. So make it a priority and apply now.

The Selected Owner Policy application form is available in our online portal.

If a registered dog dies, a refund will be made on request:

• where the dog dies before the start of the registration year, the full fee will be refunded
• where the dog dies during the year, one twelfth of the annual fee for each complete month remaining after the date of the application.

If you move house within the District, you need to notify Council by phone or in writing. If you move to another District, you need to notify the South Waikato District Council and the council for the District you are moving to. Registration tags are easily swapped between different Districts at no additional charge to you as an owner. Failure to advise local authorities in writing or phone of a change of address and registration details can result in a court fine (see Fees and Charges).