Very often the date indicated on the new ads has nothing to do with what is written on the owner’s listing.
Why?
Example to day in Charleston .
Date given for potential sitters march
Needs on the listing : december
augustAnd in Staines . Search for 10th of april
Need 2 weeks
15 applicants have answered…
For whatever reason, HO sometimes do not update the text of their postings when they have a new sit. They talk about needing a sitter for the Christmas holidays, but their dates listed are in the summer. I have even seen posts where one of pets has died and they are still mentioned in the instructions and pictures.
Hi @Provence, hope you are having a good Monday so far.
This is something that we have noticed as well, like @Southernsitter has said often owners log back in after months away from the site and just add new dates rather than updating their listing, for example, if a pet passed away, or they added a new pet or they mention a specific holiday time.
We are currently working on improving how owners can be reminded about updating their listing to reflect the current house. pets and dates, however, we don’t have a timeframe on when this will be implemented.
Thank you for bringing our attention to these listings, when we do become aware of a listing with outdated information we reach out to the owners to advise them how to change this or change it ourselves with their permission.
Hope that helps.
Katie- Membership Services
It is a fundamental problem, you can find it in so many topics. HO can do whatever they want. No response to applications, not maintaining their profile, false information. If the location or the house is good, the HO will always get sitters. But even if it is not so perfect, maybe a full-time sitter will come to bridge the time to their next sit.
But if sitters misspell the HO’s name or one of his pets on the application, write a standard copy/paste application referencing their maybe perfect profile, don’t maintain their profile or have no to few reviews, they will be sorted out immediately.
And since we can’t or won’t ask every HO for their reasons, we personally sort those sits out.
@Katie-MembershipServices
For over 20 years, I have made my living with software. And I have learned in 20 years just saying “please don’t do that” doesn’t change anything. Only challenging barriers like annoying popups, checkboxes to acknowledge operations or “if you don’t do that, you can’t do that” helps.
And in most cases, it is easy to implement. For that topic here, the solution is easy. If a HO tried to set up a new date, show him his profile, ask if it’s up to date and let him active confirm that.
I asked the owner in Staines @StefanK what were her dates (10th of april, one day not more ?) she did not reply (but she read my message)
Conclusion ??
Sometimes owners don’t take the time to correct the title on their ad 
.
Hi @Provence thanks for this insight, as I imagine this causes confusion. We will keep an eye on this. To re-list an owner adds dates and then it goes live. We will look into the flow and prompts to make sure owners review the listing when adding new dates.
@Ben-Product - As @StefanK says I also think when adding new dates a simple “Review your listing” page with “I confirm everything is up to date” checkbox would at least decrease the occurrence of this. Similar to how when you order something online there is always a review your basket page before paying.
Additionally, perhaps a “Flag this profile” button on the listing where sitters can alert the TH team to a listing which may have incorrect information, or even listings which don’t comply with the TH T&Cs.
