Research and Findings
Original research into how often pets go missing, how rarely they come home, and why.
Before Peeva was a company, it was a question: how many pets actually go missing, how many come home, and what decides the difference? No national reporting structure exists — shelters and rescues are not required to record intakes, reclaims or euthanasia — so between 2015 and 2016 we gathered the data ourselves. Two original studies came out of that work, and a body of analysis on why identification fails after a pet is found. This page summarises what we investigated, how, and what we found. Every section links to the complete research.
How common is it for a pet to go missing — and how often does it come home?
Why we investigated. The widely quoted figures were either very old (American Humane Association, Coalition for Reuniting Pets and Families, 2005) or, in the case of a 2012 household survey, defined “lost” so broadly that a dog found in the yard an hour later counted as recovered. Neither answered the question a pet owner actually asks: if my pet is gone long enough that I report it, will I get it back?
What we found. Of the 1,409 dogs and cats in our qualified sample that had been reported missing, 86% were never found. Cats fared far worse than dogs: 704 of 733 cats (96%) never came home, against 521 of 676 dogs (77%). Among the pets that were recovered, a scanned microchip was the single most common route home — 78 of the 155 dogs and 17 of the 29 cats — followed by owners calling shelters repeatedly and neighbourhood signs. Only 54 of the 733 cats and 115 of the 676 dogs had a microchip at the time they went missing.
Methodology
In-person survey, June 2015 – November 2016
Who
4,048 shoppers surveyed face to face entering a PetSmart in Buffalo, NY. 1,356 qualified as owners who had lost a dog or cat in the previous ten years, accounting for 1,409 missing pets.
Why there
Buffalo sits mid-table among the top 100 U.S. markets, is financially and culturally mixed, and the store draws from working-class, middle-class and affluent neighbourhoods. The region is also free of hurricanes and other disasters that skew loss rates.
What was excluded
Respondents who had never owned a pet, pets relinquished to a shelter, and foster animals. Online and random-dial methods were rejected because they pre-select for people already searching for a lost pet.
The complete study includes the earlier data it was checked against, the qualification rules, the full breakdown of how each recovered pet was found, and the study’s conclusions.
Are pets entering veterinary facilities actually scanned for a microchip?
Why we investigated. A microchip only works if someone scans for it. The missing-pet study showed that scanning was the most common way a recovered pet got home, so the next question was whether scanning is routine.
What we found. In late 2015 we surveyed a pre-vetted national list of veterinary professionals — managing DVMs, practice owners, veterinarians, licensed technicians and assistants. Of 1,826 respondents, 11 said every pet seen at their practice is scanned as standard procedure. The remaining 1,815 were asked why not, and could choose more than one reason.
Why veterinary professionals said they do not scan every pet
1,815 respondents, multiple answers allowed
Not standard procedure
Scanning is not part of the practice’s daily operating procedure.
Only on request
They scan when someone brings in an animal they found and asks.
Scanner limitations
They were unaware their scanner is not universal, or do not have a scanner at all.
Cost
Scanners are expensive, and practices do not want to buy a new one each time a chip company or standard changes.
Time, staff and resources
Reading a chip, then searching multiple registries and waiting on hold, is a workflow they cannot absorb.
Scope of the job
Their job is to treat animals, not to police ownership — and a belief that microchips do not work.
The reasons are operational, not technological. Read correctly and registered to the right owner, the chip itself is highly reliable. What fails is the process around it: the scan does not happen, the scanner cannot read the chip, or the number leads to a registry that cannot be reached.
Why identification breaks down after the scan
The lost-pet problem is not simply a microchip problem. Identification only works when four things happen in sequence: the pet is scanned, the scanner can read that chip, the registration record can be located, and the right people can reach each other quickly. Our analysis looks at each link in that chain — competing chip frequencies and scanners, registries that do not share data, number ranges that cannot be traced to a distributor, and the absence of any U.S. standard the Animal Welfare Act would let USDA-APHIS enforce.
The analysis
Peeva’s working papers on compatibility, standardisation and data
The issue with microchip scanners
Why no single scanner reads every chip, and why that stopped scanning altogether.
Strategic incompatibility: a timeline
How competing frequencies and encryption were introduced, and what each one broke.
The data problem
Why the missing-pet problem is ultimately a data problem, and what a workable system needs.
Cleaning up the microchip mess
Registry fragmentation, and what it costs the animal in front of a scanner.
The problem with 900-prefix microchips
Chips that cannot be traced to any manufacturer or distributor, and why that matters at intake.
Registries compared
31 companies and registries measured against the same five criteria.
Reference tools built from this work: the microchip prefix guide and the microchip number lookup.
How Peeva applies these findings
Each finding maps to a design decision. Because scanning is not routine, Peeva gives veterinary professionals a reason to scan: a pet’s complete record appears when its chip is read. Because not every scanner reads every chip, Peeva reads all frequencies and issues ISO 134.2 kHz chips that any scanner can read. Because the record behind the chip is where recovery fails, Peeva registers any brand of chip, notifies the owner the moment a scan happens, and answers the phone around the clock. Details are on the scanner, microchip and lost pet alerts pages.
About this research
Both studies were designed and run in 2015–2016, before Peeva was incorporated, to test whether the problem was real enough to build a company around. Findings were published in 2021. Peeva’s cloud, referent-tracking and medical-records components were developed with the University at Buffalo’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering — the faculty explain why they chose the project. Questions about the data: contact us. For practical answers about microchips, registration and recovery, see the FAQ.
