Hi THS Gang,
As a two-year THS Sitter with our own dog that we’ve taken on several fantastic THS sits, it seems odd that Home Owners are now able to select their ‘sit essentials’ to include ‘sitters cannot bring pets,’ yet potential Sitters aren’t then able to use that criteria as a filter when ‘searching’ for potential sits.
Consequently, we’ve had to trawl through our 1,000 plus ‘favourites’ and scroll down each individual Homeowner’s listing to find out whether or not they allow Sitters to bring pets.
Come on THS IT team, you’ve missed an opportunity!
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Maybe there is hope that these things will be added. At least mods asked for opinions about search function just recently. Definetly a missed opportunity if it does not change. (I am not hopeful, though…)
That does seem to be the obvious other side to the equation. Oh those search filters could be so improved.
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@mrjonscott We can only hope but don’t hold your breath as THS consistently favours the needs of hosts over sitters.
I have read about numerous items that hosts check off on their listings yet the sitters cannot see what has been selected.
It makes no sense, it’s a waste of time and effort by the hosts and fails to deliver useful information to the sitters.
It’s yet another glitch among literally dozens, not the least of which is the two factor authentication debacle as well as several other bugs that members constantly complain about on the forums, for good reason.
It’s been suggested that the software is out of date and was designed for a much smaller platform and to upgrade it is going to be a long, gradual and expensive process that needs to be done by a company that is apparently already struggling as per recent financials released.
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Words like ‘suggested’ and ‘apparently’ are doing a lot of work in this post.
We don’t usually respond to claims like this, so at the risk of protesting too much, I’ll just say that TrustedHousesitters continues to grow and is investing in every key area in order to continue offering our members a fantastic service.
Hi @mrjonscott
Thanks for your post.
Last week, we shared an update in the forum confirming that work is underway to explore opportunites to improve search functionality. - see post here.
All the best,
Mark.
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Also not forgetting all the work involved in calling pet parents by another name 
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More filters would be helpful to the sitters. I would like to have a filter, can have occasional overnight guest. I wouldn’t mind if PP FaceTimes and approves first or screens them anyway they are comfortable.
I too bring my own dogs on sits and have been doing so for almost 3 years with 35+ sits.
I’m certain that some of the sits I have done had probably never considered having a sitter with their own pet but once we had spoken and they had seen my reviews they gave me a chance and they’ve all worked out brilliantly.
Now, if a homeowner has ticked the ‘no sitters with pets’ box would that stop you from making contact at all or do you think it’s still worth taking a punt?
I feel like this has really narrowed my options and with the booking fee, it’s really making me question my future with THS, which is such a shame because it’s been great so far.
I hope you don’t mind me asking your opinion as a fellow sitter with pet.
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Hi Jimmysmum,
Hi Jimmysmum,
Yes, like you we’d always contacted homeowners and let them know we had our own dog, and most were very happy for us to bring Reg along with us on our sits.
However, since the ‘sitters may not bring pets’ option has become available to homeowners, we’ve seen a marked change in how homeowners respond to us.
We’ll keep going with THS until this year’s subscription finishes, but it’s certainly made us consider whether we continue with THS, or look for another ‘house sit’ provider; which is a shame because we’ve loved it.
It’s just a bit frustrating that we keep spotting great looking sits within our own search criteria, but then have to scroll down each individual sit to its ‘sit essentials’ and check whether they accept sitters with their own pets, and then have to reach out to the homeowner individually.
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Yes..I agree 100%…it’s very frustrating.
I think the addition of the “Guests Allowed” and “Sitters may bring pets” filters will reduce the number of sits some experienced sitters apply to. This will inevitably affect some hosts ability to find a good match, particularly at busy times like Christmas.
I was interested to read @jimmysmum and @mrjonscott comments about the pets allowed filter, as they echo my thoughts about the “Guests” filter. The only time we ask to have a guest visit is on a sit that includes Christmas Day, when we ask in our application message if my elderly mother can join us for Christmas dinner. No host we have applied to has said no, and they can see our reviews and experience. However if many hosts automatically choose “No guests allowed”, we won’t apply to their listings. It will be interesting to see how this affects the number of suitable sits available to us over Christmas. We may need to explore other sources of Christmas sits, there will be plenty available elsewhere.
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