Frequently asked questionsEvery question, answered at the step where you'll ask it.

Pawrade is a puppy-placement platform run by Pet Media, Inc., in business since 2003. We connect families with breeders we've screened, put a licensed veterinarian between every puppy and its trip home, route every dollar through PetPay so no one ever pays a breeder directly, and stand behind each puppy with a Health Guarantee administered by an independent third party. We don't breed dogs and we don't own the puppies. We make the process safe, transparent and puppy-first.

Pet Media, Inc. has operated since 2003 and was named #2 fastest-growing Consumer Services company on the Inc. 5000. We have 18,917 verified buyer reviews and a 4.7 on Trustpilot that we can reply to but can't edit or remove. Every payment runs through PetPay, Inc., a real company with a merchant-onboarded breeder network, and the odds are good someone you know has used us.

Through us, yes, and we don't recommend doing it anywhere else. The FTC's advice on pet scams comes down to three things: research the seller, insist on seeing the animal, and never pay by wire, gift card or payment app. Our process builds all three in: a screened breeder, a licensed-vet exam before travel, payment through PetPay that the breeder can't withdraw until delivery, and a person reviewing every transaction.

Pet-store puppies are typically sourced through brokers from commercial kennels, sold before a buyer ever sees a health record, with a store-backed guarantee decided by the store. Every Pawrade breeder is identity-verified and signs a Code of Ethics; every puppy is examined by a licensed vet before travel; and the guarantee is administered by PetPay, not by whoever sold you the puppy.

You can, and many good breeders exist. What you give up is everything that sits between you and a stranger: a licensed-vet exam of the actual puppy before it travels, a written Veterinary Health Report you can read before you commit, payment that can be reversed if something goes wrong, and a guarantee decided by someone other than the seller. Buying direct means trusting a photo of the parents and a promise.

That the puppy's health outranks every human deadline, ours, the breeder's and yours. If the pre-travel exam finds something, travel pauses until it's addressed and re-checked, even if that means a delay you didn't want. It also means transparency: the findings are shared with you before your puppy moves.

Browse by breed, size, lifestyle collection or location, or skip the browsing and call. A Puppy Concierge will ask about your home, kids, other dogs, allergies and schedule, then steer you toward the breeds that will actually work and away from the ones that won't. It's free, and it's the same team that answers this page all day.

No, for the puppy's health. Before its vaccine series is complete, a puppy is protected only by antibodies from its mother that fade between 6 and 16 weeks, and a litter is most vulnerable to parvovirus, distemper and kennel cough during exactly the weeks people want to visit. Parvo survives on shoes, clothing and hands for months and is often fatal in puppies. That's why responsible breeders, veterinary guidelines and Pawrade's Code of Ethics limit outside visitors to the whelping area. What you get instead is better than a visit: a licensed veterinarian examines the actual puppy 3–5 days before travel and writes it down, and the breeder can share video and photos through the message center. Local pickup happens at handoff, after the exam.

Because breeders choose families as carefully as families choose puppies. It asks about your home type and yard, who lives there and the children's ages, other dogs, allergies, and why your family wants a dog. Fill it out once and it travels with every inquiry. A breeder who has raised a litter for eight weeks reads it before accepting your reservation.

Before a single puppy is listed a breeder is identity-verified (government ID, SSN, bank account, credit check), onboarded to a merchant account, and signs our Code of Ethics covering socialization, health protocols and care standards. Breeders are audited annually, every Veterinary Health Report across their litters is reviewed by our staff, and a violation closes the account. With 60,000 breeders in the network, references and breeder relationships matter: other breeders know.

Credit or debit card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, 4 interest-free installments with Klarna, or third-party financing you can pre-qualify for without affecting your credit. Never wire, Zelle, Cash App, cryptocurrency or gift cards. If anyone claiming to be Pawrade or a Pawrade breeder asks for those, it isn't us. Hang up and call (888) 729-8812.

PetPay is our payment platform, built for pet placement. Every breeder is paid into a merchant account they had to qualify for, the same onboarding and identity checks a business passes to accept card payments. PetPay provides the security around every transaction, a person reviews every order, and the breeder can't withdraw funds until your puppy is delivered.

The listing price is the puppy. Travel is chosen separately at checkout: local pickup is free; ground and air options are priced on the Journey Home page. Optional add-ons like the 10-year Health Guarantee extension* are also offered at checkout, never required.

Yes, within specific windows. Because you are reserving a living puppy, our refund terms are time-based and set out in detail in your Puppy Reservation Agreement. Talk to your Customer Advocate as early as possible, and if the pre-travel exam finds something you're not comfortable with, you decide before your puppy travels, so you're never locked in blind.

A named Customer Advocate is assigned to you from acceptance to arrival, one person, reachable by phone, SMS and email. They confirm travel dates, relay the veterinarian's findings, and answer the "is this normal?" call at 9 p.m.

Three to five days before travel, a licensed veterinarian examines the actual puppy you're bringing home, not the parents, not a photo. Heart and lungs, gut, bones and joints, eyes, ears, skin, weight and body condition, age-appropriate vaccines and deworming, a required fecal test for parasites, and a signed health certificate. Every finding is written into a Veterinary Health Report.

It's the written record of the exam: every system checked, every finding, the vaccine and deworming record, and the fecal result. Our Health First team reviews it, your Customer Advocate calls and explains it to you, and a digital copy is uploaded to your PetPay account before your puppy travels. A hard copy travels with the puppy.

Travel pauses. The vet reports to our staff with photos, the breeder and their veterinarian address it, the puppy is re-examined, and your Advocate tells you everything before you decide. A positive fecal test or an incomplete vaccine record stops travel cold. The sole purpose of the screening is the puppy's health and wellness. Nothing moves until every step is done.

A veterinarian can note minor findings in a young puppy, a small umbilical hernia, a low-grade murmur, a grade 1 patella, a retained testicle, that are disclosed on the Veterinary Health Report so you can decide informed and have the breeder address them where possible. Parasites like giardia or coccidia are things any litter can pick up playing in a backyard; they're treated and re-tested before travel. Anything that affects the puppy's fitness to travel holds the trip.

A puppy is a newborn. Its immune system doesn't mature until roughly four to six months, and the stress of leaving its mother is exactly when a low-level exposure becomes symptoms. Farm-raised, outdoor-socialized litters are exposed to the world by definition; that's a sign of good raising, not bad. It's why the exam, the fecal test, the 72-hour vet visit and pet insurance from day one all exist.

No one can guarantee that. A puppy has a developing immune system, like a human baby. What the exam guarantees is transparency: a licensed veterinarian has examined this puppy, written down what was found, and you know it before your puppy travels. That's the insight you cannot get buying direct, and it's what the Health Guarantee and MetLife month† are built on.

Local pickup (free), Pampered Ground Delivery with a ground nanny, Standard Air with a flight nanny to your nearest airport, or Airpanion, a chaperone who flies with your puppy in the cabin. Your puppy always travels with a person, never as freight.

Puppies fly in a pressurized, temperature-controlled cabin, not cargo. Snub-nosed breeds (Bulldogs, Frenchies, Pugs, Shih Tzus and others) don't fly well in cargo, so for them we use in-cabin Airpanion or ground delivery. Travel is only booked after the vet has signed a health certificate.

Yes. Local pickup is free, and we'll arrange a meeting with the breeder at their location or a nearby public place. You still receive the health certificate and Veterinary Health Report, and the exam still happens before pickup.

Congenital and hereditary conditions diagnosed by two licensed veterinarians, for 3 years, extendable to your puppy's 10th birthday at checkout for most breeds.* Year 1 is backed by your breeder, Years 2–3 by PetPay, and every claim is decided by PetPay against published terms, not by the breeder who sold you the puppy. It is not pet insurance.

PetPay, Inc., an independent third party. That's the difference from a breeder's or a store's guarantee: the party deciding your claim isn't the party that sold you the puppy, and the exclusion list is published and identical for every breeder.

Findings already disclosed on the Veterinary Health Report before travel; breed-specific conditions the breed is known for (published, same list for all breeders, a congenital defect the breed isn't known for is still covered); parasites, infections and injuries after delivery (those are what pet insurance is for); and claims outside the deadlines. The honest exclusions are on the Health Guarantee page.

1-Month Included with every Puppy!† Only with Pawrade, you receive a pet insurance policy with no waiting period included for immediate accident or illness coverage. Activation is by calling MetLife; instructions arrive near the time your puppy travels. We strongly recommend continuing coverage after the first month; a puppy's immune system is just beginning, like a human newborn's. NH, NY, RI, SC and TN residents excluded.

Because with most pet insurance, nothing is covered for the first 14 days for illness; some plans wait longer, and orthopedic conditions can wait 6–12 months. Anything that shows up in that window is on you, and can be excluded as pre-existing afterward. Only with Pawrade, coverage begins immediately following policy activation:† the day you call MetLife, your puppy is covered for accident or illness. That matters because the first two weeks home are exactly when a newly transported puppy is most likely to show a giardia, coccidia or cough that's been incubating, the visits that typically run $150–$400 before treatment. It also means a condition found in week one is a covered claim, not a pre-existing exclusion for life. Call MetLife the day your puppy arrives; instructions come with your travel details.

Common arrival ailments (giardia, coccidia, kennel cough, ear infection) treated on us, up to a published cap per condition, when diagnosed at your 72-hour vet visit. These are things any litter can pick up; the program exists so a normal first-week prescription never becomes a fight.

Through PetPay: diagnosis from a licensed veterinarian, a written report within 5 days, claim submitted within 30 days. Year 1 claims route to your breeder, Years 2–3 to PetPay, both decided by PetPay against the published terms.

Three things: call MetLife to activate your included month,† book a wellness exam with a licensed vet within 72 hours (this also keeps your Health Guarantee valid), and let your puppy decompress: quiet space, the breeder's food, water, sleep. The Puppy Guide walks you through the first nights.

Because the exam before travel is a snapshot, not a promise about tomorrow. A puppy is a newborn: its immune system isn't mature until 4–6 months, its mother's protection fades between 6 and 16 weeks, and the vaccine series is still catching up. In that window a puppy's condition can change in hours, and leaving its mother, littermates and home, then traveling, is the biggest stressor of its life.

More than almost anything else in the first two weeks. In a puppy, stress is a physical event, not a mood, and it is why a puppy can pass a licensed-vet exam on Tuesday and have loose stool on Friday from organisms it always carried.

Normal: sleeping a lot, a smaller appetite for a day, one loose stool, some whining the first nights. Not normal: refusing food and water for 12+ hours, repeated vomiting or diarrhea, lethargy you can't rouse, coughing that persists. Call your vet, and call your Advocate; that's what they're for.

Not until your veterinarian clears it, usually one to two weeks after the final puppy vaccine, around 16–18 weeks. Here's why we make such a point of it. A puppy is born protected only by its mother's antibodies, and those fade unpredictably between 6 and 16 weeks, which is also why vaccines are given as a series rather than one shot: until the last dose takes, there's a gap where the puppy looks healthy but isn't protected. Parvovirus lives in that gap. It survives in soil, on sidewalks and on pet-store floors for months, it travels home on shoes, and treatment runs into the thousands with no guaranteed outcome. Distemper, leptospirosis and kennel cough ride the same high-dog-traffic places. Little paws, big precautions: until your vet says go, carry your puppy in public, skip dog parks, pet-store floors, rest stops and sidewalks other dogs use, keep shoes at the door, and socialize at home: visitors, sounds, surfaces, car rides, vaccinated adult dogs you know. Your own yard is fine if no unvaccinated dogs use it. Every Pawrade puppy travels with its vaccine record so your vet knows exactly where the series stands, and the Puppy Guide has the full checklist.

A 21-page take-home guide: checklists, puppy-proofing, feeding and potty routines, the first vet visit, vaccine schedule, parvo precautions and training tips. Your Advocate sends it before your puppy arrives so the house is ready.

See your vet. If it's a common arrival ailment (giardia, coccidia, cough, ear infection), the Prescription Reimbursement Program covers the treatment up to the cap, and MetLife covers accident or illness from day one.† If it's congenital or hereditary, that's what the Health Guarantee is for. Either way, tell your Advocate; we track every report across a breeder's litters.