Set up your tag

It takes about five minutes. You'll need your tag and an email address. If you bought it online or by post, keep the card that came with it too.

Get started

The steps are the same however and wherever you bought your tag.

1. Activate your tag. Find the card that came with it — in the pack, or handed to you at a stall. It shows a Tag ID (10 characters) and a claim code (12 characters, like AB12-CD34-EF56). Visit tagsquad.co.uk/activate, or tap your tag on your phone, open the link and press Activate. Type the Tag ID, the claim code and your email address, then press Activate. Capital letters and dashes don't matter. Keep the card safe: the claim code proves the tag is yours.
2. Open the email from TagSquad. Press the button, then press Continue. The link works once and lasts 15 minutes. Not there? Check your spam or junk folder.
3. Add your details. You're taken to your dashboard. Add your pet's name or a description of the item, a photo and any notes, and choose exactly what finders can see. Press Save.
4. Attach your tag in the right place: see where to attach it.
5. Test it. See how to test your tag.

Where to attach your tag

A tag only works if the person who finds it can see it and tap it. Put it somewhere obvious on the outside, not hidden away.

Pets: on the collar

• Attach it to your pet's collar (or harness), next to their engraved name-and-address tag.
• Use the supplied ring or a strong split ring, and check it is fastened securely.
• Cats: use a breakaway (quick-release) collar so it can't catch on anything.
• Dogs: the law (Control of Dogs Order 1992) requires a collar with your name and address on it or on an attached tag. Get your TagSquad tag engraved (free, below) and it satisfies this on its own. See the details.
• Check the tag and ring every few weeks, and after swimming or rough play.

Engraving

Tell us your name and address and we'll engrave them on the back of your tag, free, before it reaches you: at a stall if you bought there, or with the details you post alongside a remote order. It's done once, so check it before it's engraved. Engraved tags are made to order and can't be returned or exchanged.

Bags, keys and school kit: somewhere prominent

• Clip it to a zip pull on the main compartment of a school bag or sports bag: it's the first thing someone touches. A zip tag is ideal.
• Other good spots: the carry handle, a keyring on your keys, or a loop on the outside of a kit bag or lunch bag.
• Put it on the outside, in plain view. Not inside a pocket, where nobody will see it.
• Don't write a child's name on the outside of a bag. The tag lets a finder reach you without it.

Test it

1. Hold a phone against the tag (iPhone: near the top; Android: near the back, centre), or scan the QR code with the camera.
2. Your tag page opens. Check it shows what you want a finder to see, and nothing more.
3. Try sending yourself a message with Contact the owner. You'll get an email.

Tag doesn't open? Try another phone, remove any thick case, and scan the QR code instead. The QR code opens the same page.

Worth doing next

• Add a mobile number in Account to get text alerts (up to 5 a month).
• Pets: make a short link like tagsquad.co.uk/t/buddy-7k for lost-pet posters.
• If your pet or item goes missing, open the tag in your dashboard and press Mark as lost.

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