The spay/neuter certificate redemption program is supposed to work thusly; that the purchase price of an intact dog or cat from an SPCA includes a sterilization partial prepayment ($30? for both dogs and cats). The purchaser gets his/her $30 back when the sterilization is performed by giving the vet the certificate. The vet reduces the bill by $30. The vet gets the $30 back from the SPCA by sending in the certificate.

The program is based on the (invalid) assumption that all purchasers of an intact dog or cat from an SPCA will actually have the dog or cat sterilized.

The SPCA has said that 36% of certificates are not redeemed. Anita says that in Victoria the percentage is 76%. No one will ever know the validity of any SPCA figures as there is no overseeing body to check the books: the fox is guarding the hen house (see link below to FALSE EUTHANASIA STATS).

The SPCA has known for many years that the certificate program was ineffective, but in spite of having its own clinic, it continued selling intact animals, knowing that a majority of them would not be sterilized. AAS was told that a vet in Surrey offered to do cheap pre-selling S/N for dogs and cats in the Surrey SPCA and was turned down. AAS also knows that the SPCA never (or seldom) makes follow-up calls to purchasers to encourage them to have the dog or cat sterilized. AAS also knows that when individuals who know that a dog purchased from an SPCA is still unsterilized and is being used for breeding or being allowed to breed, complains to the SPCA, that the SPCA has said there is nothing they can do, and has shown not the slightest interest.

Why would the SPCA turn down the opportunity to have dogs and cats actually sterilized before selling? Why would it continue for decades with an ineffective program? And did the SPCA realize before it adopted the certificate program that in fact there would be a large percentage never redeemed? Did it research the program in other places and know this?

An unredeemed certificate is money in the SPCA's pocket. How much money has the SPCA made from decades of unredeemed certificates? How many more pups and kittens were born to purchasers of intact dogs and cats sold by the SPCA? How many of those pups and kittens ended up at an SPCA to be sold in their turn?