12 Things that currently annoy me on the platform

Owner Questions, Advice & Chat
1

I’ve added this to the Feedback post too.
Didnt realise you could only upvote in there and not comment. Was hoping for engagement/feedback from other users.
Or maybe any other things thwt people have issues with.

Using the THS website really grinds my gears. I feel it has so many areas for improvement (or at least from a HO perspective) and I’ve only been using it for a few months.

These are all based on my experience as a HO.

Here’s a list of some of the things that really irritate me.

In no particular order.

  • Cancellation Cover [#1]
    When you take out a premium policy you get the cancellation cover that protects both the HO and Sitter. This means if someone cancels then will provide you with funds to secure a new sit elsewhere upto X value (I think £1.5K). However what I didn’t realise but it’s in the T&C’s is this is only applicable within 2 weeks of the sit.
    So if I have a sit all booked, and someone cancels 3 weeks before (for example) I am not covered. And if I cannot find a replacement person then I need to sort out cover with my own funds. I believe there should be a cut off, but 2 weeks seems a little short to me.

  • Cancellation Cover [#2]
    This one really annoys me, and I will put a #2 & #3 for it, I had this happen to me recently. Once the sit is agreed the platform encourages you to do a video call, they have no functionality for this so suggest third party apps. Which is fine and then encourage you to continue your engagement with one another outside of THS.
    I was doing this, and randomly went into my THS account to check something and noticed the person I have been dealing with, their profile has gone ‘Inactive’. After checking what that meant THS said their membership had lapsed.
    They told me, they if I go ahead with the sit, now that I have membership and they do not have a valid one my cancellation cover is not longer valid. My options are to cancel the sit and find a new, encourage the person to renew their membership (so i’m their sales person now?) or go ahead with it knowing that I am no longer covered by the platform.

  • Cancellation Cover #3
    If I had not checked the platform and noticed the sitter was inactive I would so easily of done a sit without any support from THS as I am technically going outside of my T&C’s. If this is the case I think THS should email their the Sitter or HO to tell them that this has happened their agreed sit. And their options are… “THS explaination…”

  • Searching for a Sitter [#1]
    You can search by Date. However this just shows every date possible providing the sitter does not already have a current booking. From what I understand following replies I have had the Website does not allow sitters to book of personal leave.
    i.e.

They might be working all week and unable to sit.The might just not want to sit at the momentThe family might have children at school and cannot do sits during term time.
But I get every single person on this site, the only exception is people with existing THS bookings.

  • Searching for a Sitter [#2]
    Again searching by Date, Sitters can specifically identify dates they are available, these are highlighted Green. As a HO there is no functionality to allow me to search by just the profiles who have specifically identified the dates they want, instead I get the above scenario results.

  • Searching for a Sitter #3
    When I reach, as I tab to the next page I am constantly greeted by people who I have just seen on the previous page. Happens non-stop. I guess what is happening is new profiles are being added. As I move to the next tab the site updates and pushes those people from the previous page onto the ‘new’ page.

  • Searching for a Sitter #4
    I for example have 2 Dogs, but could very well have 3. I would not feel comfortable having a sitter who’s on their own (as a personal preference) as it can be a little overwhelming when walking them. Again in my opinion a filter to view profiles by Couple or Singles would be helpful.

  • Searching for a Sitter #5
    This ties a little bit to #1 & #4. If sitter has children, I personally wouldn’t have an issue but maybe a HO wouldn’t feel comfortable with their pets around children. Plus most families with children will not be able to commit to a sit away from their close proximity due to school terms restrictions. I think some kind of search mechanic around this would be helpful.

  • Searching for a Sitter #6
    While you can search by Dates (but that’s kind of useless in my opinion based on the above) and pet type. It would be helpful if you can search by ‘New Profiles’, ‘Active Profiles’ (maybe within the past week for eg.), by closest first, etc.
    I think this would help tremendously narrowing down a search.
    i.e. I can search by UK, or England, or Wales, etc. But I am very close to Wales. So by searching England I miss a large area of people very close to me. But then I also get people from Scotland, and East London, etc it’s too far for alot of people (at least in my experience for feedback).

  • Searching for a Sitter #7
    Again a personal preference (as all of these are) but I think you should be able to remove people from your search, i.e. you can add them into a ignore/block/“Not for Me” (as you might of identified their not a good House Sit and dont want to see them in your search anymore) queue.
    For example: I am seeing people on my search who have already told me they cannot sit for me, it would be helpful to remove them from future searches for those dates. Or I just do not feel the person is a good fit for what I want, and I may never want to see them come up on my search (seems a bit harsh but sure it happens).

  • Misc [#1]
    If you message people you can archive their message should they not be interested or decline (or for any other reason you see fit). If you then cancel your trip, it throws everyone you achieved for that trip into you inbox with a new updated message saying ‘Dates Deleted’ so then I need to archive everyone all over again. It’s just annoying. Whats the point of doing that…

  • Misc [#2]
    When looking at a HO profile on my phone (this might by a problem specifically for me S23 Ultra) but the ‘Pets’ section, you can select the pet and it shows you all the pictures uploaded for that specific pet. But at least on my phone it only shows one third of the screen with a picture which can you scroll through. It’s always extremely cropped and I cannot see all of the picture, and in some cases cannot see anything relevant. I cannot select the picture or zoom in on it. Just feels like a oversight/poor coding.

2

Sorry but your post is too long for me to read thoroughly. However, what does stand out are your complaints surrounding searching for a sitter. This has been discussed a lot on the forum and, by and large, there is really little point searching for a sitter. The calendars are rarely updated by sitters (search the forum about this and you’ll see why). The best way is to post your listing and wait for sitters to apply to you.
Communication is key, so do regularly check in with your confirmed sitters. Best to communicate outside the platform via WhatsApp

8 Likes
3

This can be easily solved, stop searching for a sitter! @Smiley is entirely correct, personal invitations for sitters to apply are rarely successful. Make your listing as enticing and clear as possible, tell us why we should apply for your sit, then wait for applications to come rolling in. Specify clearly at the beginning of your listing that you only want couples to apply (best to state rationale) and that you’re happy to accept families with children.

It’s an imperfect system, but it does work very well for most of us.

Best of luck, going forwards.

3 Likes
4

Searching for sitters doesn’t work. Even if someone knows dates I’m available, they have no way of knowing where I’m looking for a sit. The majority of the invitations I’ve received have been for dates that I already have a confirmed THS sit (indicating that most HOs don’t look at the calendar). The couple times I’ve received invites for dates that I was available, I was on another continent, so not available to sit in the location of the HOs. If sitters could put available dates AND the general area that we would like to sit on those dates, then the calendar would be useful. Until that happens, inviting sitters is useless.

1 Like
5

As a sitter, I took a look at your listing and it looks very inviting. Great pics and description of your area and your pets look adorable! There are so many sits in the U.K. which is what you are up against but best of luck in finding suitable sitters! As others have said, it’s a waste of time searching for sitters - better to have them apply on your listing.

6

I see you’ve also posted your sit on Facebook.
Small thing but ‘cockapoo’s’ should be ‘cockapoos’ - no apostrophe

1 Like
7

The thing is. I’ve had the post up for May for what feels like ages. I even deleted it to repost in case aonething was messed up in the algorithm. I’ve had 2 applications over 3 weeks from waiting for people, and they’ve not been the right fit.
Feels like i should be actively doing something instead of just reactively waiting.

Plus, the longer i wait, the more stressed i get knowing i have no sit confirmed for a holiday I’ve all paid for

8

@Stu With 150+ new listings being added daily in England, it only takes a couple of days for your listing to “disappear” from the sight of sitters. Each day sees it going further and further down the list. Currently there are just under 3000 sits advertised.

If there are still suggestions from sitters you haven’t implemented, then consider doing them then delete your dates and repost them. Yes, you may have to do this weekly but if you don’t, it’s not going to be seen and therefore you won’t receive new applications. There’s no guarantee for any owner that they will get a sitter so having a Plan B in place is a must. I do wish you well as you live in a lovely location with gorgeous cockapoos.

9

@Stu There are no guarantees that you will find a sitter, this is simply a matching site so it entirely depends on whether your listing appeals to sitters who are available for your given dates. That’s why it’s so important to ensure listing pics, title and content are as good as they can be. Basically, you have to sell your sit.

10

I personally think this a good platform that attracts a lot of attractive sits for me. I am grateful for this site and don’t expect perfection. Even if they make the changes you want it may not be changes other people care about and may think they would like a different feature. Nothing about this site annoys me. If anything I would rather they save their money with techs and spend their money on marketing. I would love to see sits in Iceland. They have many past ones but do not see any current ones since I joined. I would like to see them market in many different countries.