to everyone who has replied - I was simply checking in after confirming the sit 2 months ago for one month away confirming everything was in order. Then there were a series of excuses for not communicating, and missed stated actions for doing so, which raised red flags for me. There were enough of these to raise my doubts about this person.
And, about the address - I always ask for it, and never get pushback. As some have agreed - having a perfect stranger staying in my home, it is the least amount of information that I would like to have about them. When I travel in Europe all the airbnb hosts there ask for a copy of oneâs passport. I never worry about complying. I donât agree that this is intrusive and if someone doesnât want to provide it, then they are not a good fit for me.
But youâre not an Airbnb host and THS already have contact details for all of us.
Iâm surprised that youâve had no push back on asking sitters for their address. Iâd withdraw my application immediately were a HO to ask for those details!
I donât understand this discussion. If you want the sitter to communicate, wouldnât it be better to contact them directly? Strangers on a forum cannot decide for you if this person is the right fit for you or not. You say that they donât communicate well, but perhaps you need to tell them more clearly how important it is to you to hear from them by a certain date?
Iâm not going to further defend the way I handle this - we have a difference of opinion on it. Your withdrawal of an application for any reason is your choice of course. Trust is a tricky thing and it is VERY individual. I am not ever going to bend my tolerances that are my values because others donât happen to adopt the same values. To each his own. Pets and homes are our castles and like our kids - and how we choose to protect them is nobodyâs business other than our own.
Yep, this is happening, and has been happening. Hence the discontent. Iâm not at liberty to post the entire engagement here, but was just looking for input on how to handle my doubts and have gotten such input here and with loved ones and now I know how to proceed.
This all sounds to me like you have created the problem that you are now attributing to the sitter.
You had them booked in for the sit so Iâm assuming you did everything you wanted to do before offering them the sit and they satisfied all your criteria. Everything is arranged and everyone is going about their lives. You contacted them for no reason other than because you desire a check-in from them in the middle of one of the most stressful things a person can do which is to move home. Itâs christmas and new year which is another massively stressful time of the year. Now they havenât acted in a manner that you have decided is required and youâre trying to label this as a problem.
If you had simply sent a message saying âHi, just checking in to see if everything is still on track for next month. Hope you had a good christmas.â They could have replied after a few days and everything could continue as normal. Instead you are stressing out because it wasnât quick enough, demanding a scheduled call to essentially discuss nothing. As my mother would say âYouâre getting in your own wayâ
And, about the address - I always ask for it, and never get pushback. As some have agreed - having a perfect stranger staying in my home, it is the least amount of information that I would like to have about them. When I travel in Europe all the airbnb hosts there ask for a copy of oneâs passport. I never worry about complying. I donât agree that this is intrusive and if someone doesnât want to provide it, then they are not a good fit for me.
You want their address but you already have it. Youâre now unhappy and want another one. Youâre not an airbnb and the reason they want a copy of a persons passport is the same reason hotels want it - itâs required by law for the business they operate.
They provided everything you asked for. Stop creating more âtestsâ ahead of the sit.
Thatâs okay, Iâm not expecting you to defend what I find indefensible. As this is a discussion forum and you wanted advice, hereâs mine; if you stipulate your requirements for address disclosure in your listing, then the sitters who find it an imposition can simply avoid applying. No one should have that requirement appear as a surprise at a later date.
Thatâs good advice. The HO should make it clear in the listing that they require proof of the sitters address. Not happening here. Iâve gone through a professional background check. My address is part of an address confidentiality program.
I had another HO ask for my license to be sent via email. I explained to him that I had been background checked and that email was not confidential. So we both wasted a lot of time when he could have posted that requirement in his listing and I would not have applied.
Just for clarification - the phone call has been requested by me many times. The sitter has been obfuscatory about âschedulingâ that call. This is part of the problem. Thank you for your sage advice - very much appreciated.
@tortimom no problem at all, all we can offer is advice. I really hope this works out for you, I really do. Iâm sure we would all love to know how it goes if you get a chance on your return. If you want to close the thread as mentioned, just request a mod to do so, Iâll tag them here @Carla@Therese@Sam_F
If you are going to have some strange request like address, you need it in your posting not 3 months after you have accepted the sitter and want to suddenly change power dynamics.
She literally has their address. Stated so in the first post. However this is no longer good enough.
Has also stated that she just wants to cancel because she has cold feet but doesnât want any repercussions for herself:
And, I also read that both parties have to agree and there will be repercussions if not. Maybe a moderator can tell me here what happens when an owner just gets cold feet after they have confirmed a sitter?
The poor communication that is supposedly a âred flagâ isnât really that bad by their own admission:
This personâs non-communication isnât as bad as it seems. It just isnât as good as I would like it to be.
So there is a sitter out there having their sit cancelled and travel plans potentially wrecked at a cost to them whose only reported âfaultâ is that they didnât didnât respond fast enough to an unexpected and possibly unneeded communication request.
Iâm going to fall back on one of my standard responses here. If you want to be able to cancel a booked sitter who hasnât broken any rules, T&C or guideline then this may not the platform for you. Hire a sitter and establish an employer-employee relationship and you can demand all the last-minute, pre-sit conversations you want. Just donât be surprised if they cancel on you.
Ditto from Ziggy. I have gone into pet sitting situations where I knew it would be bad but honored my commitment. My gut was right and I regret not canceling. I also had red flags with a pet sitter. I wanted to give someone a chance with no reviews. I had some red flags in our communication leading up to the sit. When she showed up without a suitcase, my gut was screaming at me. Long story short I am confident she never stayed at our home. Nothing was moved in an inch in the kitchen etc⌠I am grateful nothing was stolen and our cat survived.
@tortimom I see it as a red flag. I had a sitter once who was very responsive until I confirmed the sit! After that I had to keep following up. Make sure you communicate your expectations when you do your handover as there is nothing worse than being on your holiday and wondering why the sitters takes 1 week to respond to a simple question. Good luck!