I should be happy that the couple ended this sit 5 days early, but it was unexpected, like much of this sit. The dogs were such a handful. One suffers from severe anxiety, and paced around the house for hours all night long, turning the motion-sensitive lights off and on. I’ve had little sleep for the 5 days I have been here. Also, one dog is far more incontinent than I was led to believe so it was constant pee clean-up. I don’t mind the work, but i wish people were more upfront!
So sorry to hear that.
Be sure to give an honest and factual review. That is important to inform other sitters and doing so also getting the pets a good match who is prepared for the tasks involved.
Sounds terrible and like a lucky escape. Please make sure your review is honest with both the stars and written comment.
Besides reviewing accurately to help warn off other sitters, have you considered in retrospect whether there were signs you could’ve noted or questions you could’ve asked that would’ve helped you avoid the sit?
That is such a terrible thing!
Were there previous reviews? What did those say?
Were there missing reviews? (you can only see that in the app)
Please mention it in your review and don’t feel bad about it
I’ve studied risk management and put it into practice in my regular job so I am aware of what to look for.
Unfortunately, some people don’t want to be up front as they risk finding a sitter, so even though one may ask the right questions, the answers may not be what we really need to hear.
The previous reviews were positive. I think what’s happening here is that these sweet dogs are just getting older and older and now rapidly declining. I don’t expect either one (at 15 and 16 yrs old) will last much longer.
I don’t think it takes studying or working in risk management for hosts or sitters to understand that sitting and life in general involve risks, including people who lie, etc. That doesn’t mean that we can’t pool learnings in retrospect, if there are any, though.
We’ve had two similar experiences where the HO misled us significantly about the care required for pets.
As others have said, little in life is guaranteed and not everyone is honest, considerate, fair, responsible.
On balance our experiences have been outstanding.
BUT I will say that the BIG advantage to the new Blind Review system is that it allows Sitters to post honest warnings to future sitters. And that is VERY important. We wish previous Sitters had been more honest about difficult sits we’ve experienced.
I suggest communicating any significant issues via messages on the THS platform. That way you have documented the issues in a way THS can monitor and the HO/Sitter cannot delete.
BOTH times we had issues the HO did communications via WhatsApp and one of them set their account to delete the messages after 24 hours.
Notes in any format shoud be factual and polite.
For example, you could have sent them notes via the THS Inbox from Day One: “Concerned that PeeWee may have a urinary tract infection: he’s had three accidents so far today - what can I do?”
"Is there anything I can do to calm Roamer? Last night he paced continually from 11 pm until 5 am setting off the motion detection lights. If that’s Roamer’s habit, is there some way for me to turn off those lights so I can sleep better?
“I’m sorry to learn you’re cutting the Sit short by 5 days. I will start looking for alternative accommodations and hope to be able to do that before the official end of the sit…”
Please see our forum listing of what sounds like a very similar situation. IF the dogs have undisclosed medical issues and you are not getting sleep from it, you have every right to submit a claim with THS and give notice that you are leaving. Do NOT feel like you have to stay. It is against THS policy for HO to not disclose medical issues. So sorry you had to deal with it…just know in the future, you have options.