If you're facing financial hardship and struggling to care for your pet(s), especially with unexpected costs, check the resources below. These programs may offer help with vet bills, medications, boarding, or food, depending on eligibility and location. Hopefully, you find something here that fits your situation and eases the burden a little.

Veterinary Financial Assistance

• ⁠RedRover Relief – Offers help with emergency pet care and veterinary costs: https://redrover.org
• ⁠The Onyx & Breezy Foundation – Provides aid for vet care when there’s financial hardship: https://www.onyxandbreezy.org
• ⁠STARelief – Assists low-income pet owners, military families, seniors, and others in crisis: https://starelief.org/our-programs
• ⁠Help-A-Pet – Offers one-time assistance for veterinary care to low-income individuals, especially the elderly, disabled, and working poor: http://www.help-a-pet.org
• ⁠Frankie's Friends – Helps pay for emergency and specialty veterinary care for pets with life-threatening conditions: https://www.frankiesfriends.org
• ⁠Shakespeare Animal Fund – Offers financial help to low-income seniors or disabled individuals for urgent vet care: https://www.shakespeareanimalfund.org
• ⁠The Pet Fund – Assists with chronic or long-term care, not emergency surgeries: http://www.thepetfund.com
• ⁠Brown Dog Foundation – Helps when a pet has a treatable illness and the owner can’t afford care: https://www.browndogfoundation.org
• ⁠Pet Assistance Inc. – Offers financial assistance for urgent veterinary care, especially when it means the difference between life and death: http://www.petassistanceinc.org/
• ⁠For the Love of Alex – Provides emergency funding for life-saving veterinary care for cats and dogs of low-income families: https://www.fortheloveofalex.org/
• ⁠Heal Foundation – Offers grants for emergency veterinary care for spayed or neutered dogs when their families are unable to cover the costs: https://healfoundationusa.org/grants/pet-owners/
• ⁠Live Like Roo – Helps cover healthcare costs for cats and dogs undergoing cancer treatment. Grants are awarded monthly: https://www.livelikeroo.org/
• ⁠HandicappedPets Foundation – Donates wheelchairs to disabled pets whose families can’t afford mobility aids: https://hpets.org/

Medications and Low-Cost Clinics

• ⁠ShotVet – Runs low-cost pop-up clinics at pet stores nationwide offering vaccines, heartworm tests, and flea/tick preventives with no exam fees: https://shotvet.com/
• ⁠VIP Petcare – Mobile vet clinics inside Pet Supplies Plus, Tractor Supply Co., and other retailers; provides vaccines, microchipping, and flea/tick meds: https://www.vippetcare.com/
• ⁠VetIQ – Offers low-cost preventive care like vaccines, wellness checks, and flea/tick meds at walk-in clinics inside major retailers like Walmart and Meijer: https://www.vetiq.com/
• ⁠PetSmart Veterinary Services – Provides affordable routine care such as exams, vaccines, and minor treatments at select PetSmart locations: https://pvshospitals.com/
• ⁠GoodRx for Pets – Compares prices on pet prescriptions (and human meds used off-label for animals) at local pharmacies: https://www.goodrx.com/pets
• ⁠RxAssist – While human-focused, it may help with medication discounts if your vet prescribes human-grade meds for your pet: https://www.rxassist.org

Payment Plans and Credit Options

(READ ALL TERMS CAREFULLY, high interest loans can cause financial difficulty)

• ⁠Scratchpay – Offers payment plans for vet care, no hard credit check required: https://scratchpay.com
• ⁠VetBilling – Works with participating veterinary clinics to set up payment plans for pet care expenses: https://www.vetbilling.com
• ⁠ Cherry Credit – Ask your vet to consider signing up for this loan financing program if they haven’t already: https://withcherry.com/veterinary
• ⁠ CareCredit – This credit card can be used for routine veterinary appointments, grooming services, emergency pet care, or a variety of surgeries and treatments in network: https://www.carecredit.com/vetmed/
• ⁠ LendingUSA – Veterinary bill financing for good & bad credit: https://lendingusa.com/borrowers/veterinary/
• ⁠ All Pet Card – Healthcare credit card made specifically for veterinary expenses that pet insurance companies don't cover: https://allpet.com/

Crowdfunding

• ⁠GoFundMe – Widely used platform to raise money for emergency vet care or ongoing pet medical needs: https://www.gofundme.com/c/blog/help-with-vet-bills
• ⁠Waggle – A vet-verified crowdfunding platform specifically for veterinary bills, pays your vet directly so donors know exactly where funds are going: https://www.waggle.org/pet-caregivers

Pet Food Assistance

• ⁠Pet Help Finder – A nationwide search tool that helps you find free pet food, low-cost vet care, and support services near you: https://pethelpfinder.org
• ⁠Rescue Bank by Greater Good – Distributes pet food to organizations that support struggling pet owners: https://greatergood.org/rescue-bank
• ⁠Local humane societies or animal shelters often operate free pet food pantries. Call or check websites in your area

Emergency Boarding, Crisis Support, and General Aid

• ⁠Feeding Pets of the Homeless – Can help with emergency boarding, veterinary care, and pet food for unhoused individuals: https://www.petsofthehomeless.org
• ⁠PACT for Animals – Provides long-term foster care for pets of military members and hospital-bound individuals during deployments, medical stays, or relocation crises: https://pactforanimals.org
• ⁠Local Mutual Aid Groups – Check community resources like Reddit, Facebook groups, Nextdoor, or Buy Nothing for informal support with pet food, transport, or short-term fostering

Did you know?

Our mod team in r/donationrequest vets an average of 750+ posts per month. The public only sees about 8% of those, as the great majority don’t meet our rigorous requirements. Not only do we require 200+ karma and consistent long term Reddit activity, but we ask those making cash or Gofundme requests to provide proof of hardship as well as expenses. Hardship documentation might be verification of household low income status, unemployment, job termination/offer, full time student enrollment, or eligibility for aid such as SNAP, SSI, etc. Proof of expenses (bills, estimates, etc.) should match requested amount.

To encourage transparency, we don’t allow requests from accounts with curated or hidden post/comment history, or previously deleted requests in donation or loan subs. To foster fairness, we ask for a two month cool down period after any fulfilled requests, and no more than two requests (unfulfilled or fulfilled) in any two month period. Donors can feel confident that accounts have been screened for any chronic grifting activity, including findom/paypig/sugar participation, and are free of egregious drug or gambling activity.

Of course, all this means that since only a small percentage of requests go live, our sub may appear relatively quiet. After all, we’d get much higher engagement stats and likely grow much more quickly if we let more requests through. But we continue to seek a healthy balance between vigilance and engagement, and we believe it’s worth it to cultivate safe places where individuals and families experiencing genuine hardship can receive help from those who are able to offer resources and support. We also appreciate the other donation subreddits among Reddit’s giving communities, whose mods work hard to facilitate welcoming spaces for people in need. Check out the newest assistance sub r/CommunityDonations, founded by a DR alumnus.

Recent changes

All that said, we have decided to try out relaxing some sub requirements. Instead of screening out accounts with activity gaps exceeding 90 days within the past year, we now only screen out accounts whose activity gaps exceed 30 days within the past six months (~180 days). We’ve also decided to drop the requirement for proof of hardship for wishlist requests only. However, we’re capping individual items on wishlists at $30 each to cut down on the possibility of resale. As usual, no gift cards allowed, and wishlists are limited to $150 of essentials only. When requesting groceries and other essentials, users are strongly encouraged to post a wishlist instead of asking for cash. Check out our updated rules here.

Top 3 reasons posts get removed

•The number one reason posts are removed is karma (200+)/account age (3 months).
•Number two is lack of proof of hardship (documentation of household low income status, not just a screenshot of an empty account or refrigerator photo) and expenses (bills, estimates, whatever the funds are meant to pay for). Please redact sensitive info first.
•The third most common issue is not specifying an exact amount in the post itself for both cash and Gofundme requests.

Other removal reasons

•If your need is greater than $50, you may not just make a cash request for our maximum limit. Proof of expenses should match requested amount.
•No requests to pay down existing debt, for relocations, or new homes/vehicles.
•Like most donation/loan subs, we have a clear rule not to delete any previous requests in any donation/loan subreddit. This applies even if posts are unfulfilled or have been removed from public view by mods. When vetting a request, it’s crucial that we check how often and why someone has requested help previously. Donation subs aren’t meant to be sustainable source of support, and accountability is important to donors.

Commonly overlooked

•Photos are often included as proof without the required username/date verification. All photo proof must include a paper with handwritten username/date. This includes fuel gauges. Please do not submit photos of empty refrigerators or bank accounts. Medical documents are preferred rather than photos of injuries.
•Cash requests are one donor per request, no crowdfunding without a platform that provides recourse for donors in case of fraud, like Gofundme.
•Be aware, if you are making a request, we can and will screen ALL your history, including hidden and deleted posts and comments!