Hi everyone, I would like to hear your opinion on my last sit and the reviews we left each other.
Whenever I leave my house with a sitter, I make sure it’s perfectly clean, organized and ready to receive them.
For this last sit, met before I left, I explained them where things were, including cleaning supplies, vacuum cleaner, etc. In reality, when they arrived I was putting the vacuum cleaner away, and took the opportunity to show them where it was and how to use it, but they didn’t seem interested.
For the first time ever, my cat hid away from the sitters when they first arrived. She is always really sociable, and many sitters have said that themselves.
The communication was fine while we were away, although she would not always reply promptly.
But when I returned home, I was shocked to see my house so dirty. The house had not been vacuumed and there were crumbs, cat hair and all sort of dirt pushed to the sides. There were multiple plastic bags of different shapes and sizes around the house, food remaining on the floor, their hair everywhere, sheets had been washed but left in the machine for hours (so I had to rewash them because they smelled bad), literally all the dishes were dirty and had food stuck on them and were greasy. I ask my sitters to make the bed with clean sheets before I arrive, but tell them they don’t need to wash the new ones.
All of these instructions were given during the interview, in the welcome guide and in person. They agreed to doing them. And I always reinforce how important keeping the house clean is to me.
Not only the house was filthy, and I had to spent about four hours cleaning when I got home (which is the last thing I want to do when returning from a long trip), but my cat was not acting like herself. She seemed lethargic and was hiding. That has never happened when I come home, she is always at the door to greet me, even back from a long trip.
They asked if they should change the litter completely during our primary video call, I said yes, added the info in the guide, and reminded them in person. They didn’t.
The water bowl was also dirty. It clearly hadn’t been changed in some days.
My cat’s toys were all in a corner, in a place she couldn’t even play with them. They’re always around the house. I saw from the pictures they sent me that they were left in the corner the whole time.
I left an honest review, 2 stars, which I would have appreciated when screening her. She left me a 5 star review, but her reply to my review was full of lies. She said I didn’t have any cleaning supplies, that I had no broom, no pan and vacuum, which is crazy to think, because I showed her in person. I absolutely had all the cleaning supplies. Perhaps the only thing I didn’t have enough for the whole length of their stay was toilet paper, and it’s true the dish-soap was running low, but should have been enough for the amount of time they stayed. They didn’t even used the dishsoap, apparently.
She said my house was unnaturally hot, even though I told her during our interview that my house does get hot, which she said would not be a problem because they come from a hot place.
They left the wrong keys in the safe box, which would have been a problem had one of the doors been locked by my neighbor, which happens.
She accused me of lying in my review, when I simply stated facts about the state my house was left and how my cat was.
Am I in the wrong here? I’m upset about the answer she left to my review and worried about how that might affect my experiences with future sitters.
