How Fareham, Gosport and Winchester license dog boarders here
Every one of the twenty-one dog day cares, boarding kennels and home boarders listed across Fareham, Gosport, Wickham & Southwick and Bishop's Waltham needs a council licence to operate: this is a legal requirement in England, not something a business can opt out of. Three councils cover this page's four areas, and they publish their registers in very different ways.
Fareham Borough Council: Fareham (6 listings)
Fareham Borough Council does not publish its own scrapeable register online; its licensing page links only to a search form that was not fetched for this research. All six Fareham listings — 4 Muddy Paws, CB Canine Care, Fareham's Dog Day Care Ltd, Just Like Home, Lone Valley Kennels Ltd and RSPCA Solent Branch (The Stubbington Ark) — were instead confirmed through animal-licensing.uk, a national third-party mirror of council data. That mirror gives a licence type for every one of the six, but no star-rating field for this council, so no Fareham listing on this page shows a council licence rating.
Gosport Borough Council: Gosport (1 listing)
Gosport Borough Council is the same shape: no register on the council's own site, so Kelly's Pet Care, the one confirmed Gosport listing here, was checked through the same animal-licensing.uk mirror. The mirror lists dozens more home boarders under personal names for Gosport, with no trading name or phone number to publish against most of them — a genuine gap in coverage, not a sign Gosport has few licensed boarders.
Winchester City Council: Wickham & Southwick and Bishop's Waltham (14 listings)
Winchester City Council covers Wickham & Southwick and Bishop's Waltham under this page's postcodes, and publishes its own PDF register directly on winchester.gov.uk, with a phone number and a 1-to-5 star rating for every operator it lists. All fourteen Winchester-licensed listings on this page — Posh Paws in Wickham & Southwick, and Harfields Pet Retreat, Three Oaks Boarding Kennels, Bishops Waltham Pet Services, Daves Pet Care, Tina's Pet Care, Primrose Dog Care, Wickham Walkies, Happy Days Animal Care, Elite Canine Services, Oak Villa Boarding and Daycare, Phoenix Trained Dogs Ltd, Hampshire Dog Care and Durley Grooming Parlour in Bishop's Waltham — carry a star rating on this basis: twelve rated 5 stars, one (Tina's Pet Care) rated 3 stars, and one (Wickham Walkies) rated 1 star, the lowest found on this register.
What the rating means, and what it doesn't
A council licence rating is the council's own inspection score against England's statutory welfare standards, not a customer review, so read it the way you would a food hygiene rating rather than a Google star. Where no rating is shown, as for every Fareham and Gosport listing here, that reflects the register format used to check the licence, not a lower or unknown standard: Fareham Borough Council and Gosport Borough Council simply do not publish a star field on the register this page could access.
Questions worth asking
- Which council issued the licence, and what is the licence number?
- Can I see the certificate itself, not just a claim made on a website?
- If a star rating is shown here, when was it last checked, and is a more recent inspection due?
See our choosing guide for more on what to ask before you book.