In the next App update, we have updated the search to match the desktop/web version, this means we now have parity between the platforms.
We have added the ‘recommended’ sort option and sort by ‘distance’ to the iOS and Android app. For example, if you search for New York City, you can now ‘Sort’ by
Recommended
Newest
Distance
To go into more detail:
Recommended feed is sits that are recommended as the owner has not confirmed a sitter and has had less than 3 applicants. The owner would like more applications, these sits we have identified that if you apply you have an increased likelihood of being selected for this sit. These sit are also tagged as 'low applications’
The recommended feed is your default feed. (In future it will be customised, be your personalised feed based on your preferences)
Newest is the latest sits posted and these are sits that an existing owner has added new dates to, or a sit that has recently been added to the site and has been approved by membership services.
Distance, these are sits which are closest to the original location that you entered. So covers the feedback about wanting a smaller radius on the city locations, now you can just select sort by distance and see the most central sits are shown first.
Ok so this sounds good in theory but I’m already having an issue. When I get a notification for a new sit in my saved search now, I click on the search and the first sits in seeing are the Low Applications ones not the new sit I’m being notified of.
I have to scroll through the old sits to find the new ones.
This takes precious time away from me getting in in time to maybe apply for a sit.
I am so so frustrated with THS and their 5 application pause making me a slave to my phone. And now my saved searches aren’t even effective. I do this full time but every new change makes that seem impossible.
OK, I just resaved all my saved searches on the web adding the filter “Newest” and, prior to this version the saved search would show the newest listings, now when I check the saved search listings it reverts to the “recommended” default with each opening. With this new change THS has taken away my saved search preference. I now have to change the filter to newest every time I open the saved search. This new change is not going to entice me to take an older listing that I have already reviewed and decided not to apply for, it is just adding an inconvenient step, often during the middle of the night when I will be trying to search quietly, in low light, so as not to wake up my husband. This is not an improvement as far as I can see.
No. The web interface still has a low limit on the number of Saved searches.
On the app, my limit (basic sitter) is 10, like it was.
On the web, it was 3, and I guess it still is. (I am not going to delete them all to find out.)
Edit: the daily email came just in: no changes, no parity. Saved searches created on the app still do not generate any alerts in the mail message.
@Ben-ProductManager hate this change on the app. All my saved searches now default to recommended (low applications) rather than newest listings. How can I change my saved searches so I can have MY preferred default search of newest showing first? I want control of how I search for sits please.
WARNING. Do not update your installed app to this version.
If you do all your saved searches will default to show sits in the order that THS want to show them to you and not show the latest ones first. This completely ruins the point of having alerts for your saved searches as you will not be able to see them.
YOU CANNOT CHANGE THIS SETTING.
The app had always been terrible but quite how they thought this was an improvement is just stunningly poor app development.
Hi guys in development. I think this was a good idea in theory. But instead of defaulting to ‘recommended’, I think it should default to ‘newest’, so sitters see new listings from their saved searches immediately. Then, if they choose to do so, they can search the ‘recommended’ listings. I think being able to see the recommended or low application sits is a great benefit for new sitters trying to establish themselves.
Likewise, when a homeowner gets an email saying X-number of sitters have saved your listing, I would like to see these in chronological order, beginning with the newest. It would also make things A LOT easier if I could search by page number (ie: “Go to Page 21”) or even “go to end”, instead of having to scroll down every page before I can see the next one. Maybe just adding ‘next page’ up to the top of the page would help. Well over 700 sitters have saved our listing! It’s overwhelming to try to see them all when they aren’t chronological, and when some of them are duplicated. I can’t keep up! It would help so much to be able to work through them page by page, but then take a break and start again where you leave off, knowing they won’t be all mixed in together.
@Keldin sheesh. Most of my saved searches are very specific so wont end up with many in it. But i just noticed this change in one of my more general ones. There are about 20 listing that meet the criteria and the new ones are at the bottom. I have already seen and disregarded all the current ‘recommended’ ones when they were new. We should at least have the choice OR be able to delete those we’ve seen and aren’t interested in so they don’t appear on the list (in most cases the recommended ones…) @Ben-ProductManager I have already seen those and either can’t, or don’t want to do them. Now they are just impeding my looking at the ones I might want!!! Feel free to go into my account and look at my oldest saved search labelled ‘Long Sit’ Stop trying to make us do things we don’t want to do.
@Ben-ProductManager for the love of all that is holy, stop ‘fixing’ things on the app that aren’t broken. It just keeps breaking things that are fine.
Like one of the other posters I’m now seeing a load of ‘low application’ sits at the top of my search, quite honestly that’s not a sitters problem, if I know where I want to go it’s irrelevant to me if they are low applications or not.
The map is now showing sits that are no longer available too.
STOP messing with the app and releasing updates before testing them, please!!!
Fortunately going back to version 2.26 means my searches and alerts are back to what they used to be. Unfortunately this means the parts that were broken are still broken but I don’t think 2.27 was meant to fix any of these anyway since they have existed since the beginning.
I guess it’s too much to ask that they stop using the family friend to develop the app and start using a company that knows how to do product testing since this is an obvious issue that should have been caught with even the most cursory testing.
@Keldin too late, mine updated automatically and now I’m stuck with the exact problem you raise The app is going from bad to worse with all the tweaks.
@Keldin I just found an easy and quick way around this issue of saved searches defaulting to low application listings first. Just quickly scroll down until the purple blobs (low applications) change to red blobs (new listings), don’t even need to look at any details until purple changes to red, then start checking out the new listings.
I’m finding the low application thing really annoying. It doesn’t make me read them as I have mostly seen them before so its just a waste of time. There should be a drop down box to click on newest. I feel as it is now I will miss things. We seem to gain something and loose more with every update. It shouldn’t be so hard to a get really professional APP done. Working on updates and fixes just causes more problems
And if you read them, you often understand reasons why they are on low applications: lots of pets, pets with issues, poorly written listings, strange photos, missing stars, etc.
As someone else wrote: THS should not put these owners’ problems on the sitters to solve.
Anyway: if there is a shortage of sitters, these listings will not attract more of them to the site.
The app is going from bad to worse with all the tweaks.