The term, explained
What is an emotional support animal?
A pet whose presence helps someone feel better. No task training is required, because being there is the point.
The plain meaning
A relationship, not a status
The phrase describes what an animal does for the person it lives with. A dog that is waited for at the end of a shift, a cat that sits on the same lap every evening, a rabbit that has to be fed whatever else the day did. Nothing about the animal changes when the words are used; they describe the relationship from the human side.
It is not a breed, a training standard, a diagnosis or a qualification. Any animal that lives with you can be one, and in Canada it is a description rather than a legal category.
Who tends to have one
Most people who keep a pet, if they are honest
People who live alone. People who work from home. People renting a first apartment in a city where they know nobody yet. Older people whose routine is built around a walk. Anyone who has noticed that the house is different when the animal is in it.
We ask nothing about why. The register records the animal and the person it belongs to, and no question on it concerns anybody’s health.
The distinction that matters
Not a guide dog or a service dog
A guide dog or service dog is trained to do specific tasks for a person with a disability. Several provinces, including British Columbia, Alberta and Nova Scotia, certify those dogs under their own laws, and human rights law protects the right of the person to be accompanied by them. An emotional support animal is not trained to a task and is not covered by those schemes. The two are different things, and presenting one as the other is a serious matter; in some provinces it is an offence.
Service dogs and emotional support animals in Canadian law, in full
Where it does come up
Renting, and human rights
Whether you can keep a pet in a rental is decided by your province’s tenancy law, your lease and any condo or strata rules. In Ontario, a “no pets” clause in a lease is void; in most other provinces a landlord may refuse pets. The rules, province by province.
Where someone has a disability and needs an animal because of it, provincial human rights law may require a landlord to accommodate that need, short of undue hardship. That turns on the person’s need and the evidence for it, which usually comes from a treating health professional. It never turns on a registration, ours included.
What a registration is worth
A record, honestly described
No official register of emotional support animals exists in Canada, and the label carries no legal force here. A registration with us records your animal in a private register, gives you a certificate and a register card with a reference anyone can check, and does nothing beyond that. It creates no right of access and obliges nobody to accept it. People buy it because a proper record of a pet is a pleasant thing to own and a tidy thing to hand over, and we would rather you knew exactly that before you paid $35.
If you would like one
One payment. Current for 18 months. Prices are in US dollars. Any sales tax is calculated by Creem and shown at checkout before you pay.
Not a legal document. Canada ESA Register is a private service, not a government body, and no official register of emotional support animals exists in Canada. It does not give you a legal right to keep a pet, to housing, or to access with your animal.
Canada ESA Register is a private register. Two minutes, and you see the documents before you pay for them.