THS doesn’t vet sitters for reliability and such. That’s up to the HOs.
I do think they should track cancellations and help HOs with transparency, because sitters (or homeowners) who repeatedly flake are bad for the ecosystem.
I’m currently having a great sit after two sitters flaked on the HO. I’ve never flaked on a sit and will show up unless I’m incapacitated or such.
I made the same point recently on a forum and gave an example of a sitter that cancelled to take another sit. (I’ve seen the reviews and looked at our email correspondence, so yup.) I could do a report but I really dodged a bullet I think and I don’t want trouble. HOs are not the police. THS should track this stuff to look for patterns and make sure both parties have the same understanding of what happened. They would also know if the same HO or sitter were frequent cancellers. I don’t think it will happen because as with a lot of tech stuff it would involve some kind of system overhaul and I just don’t think thats where they’re putting the money. Instead it’s going to advertize pet sitting “jobs” with stock photos of beautiful people walking dogs in iconic surroundings.
If there was an option for sitter to cancel, in the system, then technically speaking, it probably would be doable for a developper to gather how many clicked that option. It’s probably possible now, to track HO cancellations.
If not, then I suggest THS reviews a few things, technically speaking, as this seems quite basic.
The issue is that in order for a sitter to cancel officially a sit in the system, the sitter needs to send a message (that can be off the books, example: by WhatsApp: " can you cancel the sit in the system please?") to the HO for the HO to cancel officially in the system.
This skews results and statistics as it will always looks like the HOs cancel instead of the sitters.
That said, if HO started systematically cancelling in the system and had a pop up box: “reason for cancelling” for example, someone could manually enter in a data base, the amount of sitter cancellations.
Honestly, lately, the amount of listings starting by “Help! sitter just let us down last minute” is overwhelming. Bit by changing this text, I assume the system doesn’t pick up on cancellations.
At the end of the day, I’m not sure that’s a priority for THS. They have a long to do list of system upgrades, including the review system, and from what I gathered from Ben’s input and poll, the messaging app overhaul is, but these are discussed internally and I’m not in a position to say what is prioritised.
Like many HO I have had people let me down but now, I feel, I have become quite intuitive regarding sitters, because of the ones who have let me down.
Those who let me down were in my’ formative’ days with THS and I lacked the experience in gauging the applicants. Now I find, a bell almost sounds off when I see someone I wouldn’t trust.
I never bothered in ‘moaning’ about being let down as it is a pointless exercise I simply ‘re-advertised’ and fortunately everything has been fine. Contact and communication with people is extremely important. From that a good appraisal of potential sitter(s) can be made.
I am so sorry this happened to you and I am so sorry for any negative comments you received as a result of your post. In my opinion, this is precisely what we pay to guard against. I would be very interested to know what THS does and response to this, this person simply should not be a housesitting candidate on this app and it is their responsibility to vet candidates before and after incidents like this happen I hope your poor cat is OK
Ken.
This HO trusted someone and left her pets thinking that they were in good hands and that they would be well cared for.
You are attacking someone that came back from her time away with several things that went wrong, not only with her home, but with her pets.
Things that didn’t happen in a few hours, but in a longer timeframe and yet somehow you keep making the homeowner out to be the one in the wrong.
Leaks that pool and cause damage and even mold and mildew. An abscess on an animals face? That stuff does not happen in a day.
And any average person can’t ignore those easy facts.
Why do you find it so satisfying to go after the HO who is simply bringing her own experience to the table?
It was her experience, not yours. Right?
I think what Ken is saying here has not been taken on board .Or at least, what I understand from his posts.
Has anyone ever seen or read “12 Angry Men”?
I would definitely report it. If you are a premier or above member, they should compensate you. I would ask. Can you tell us at least what area you are in? I am so sorry this happened to you. I am currently looking for a sitter to watch my animals in two weeks and no one has yet applied! I thought they had background checks of people? Maybe they don’t catch everything which is where my skepticism comes in. Total strangers in my house!
Background checks are done only on U.S. sitters and below is what they screen for. There’s no screening to figure out whether someone has common sense, is responsible or such. It’s up to the homeowner to vet for that.
You can look at sitters’ reviews and ask them Qs (and they can in turn screen you as well).
These are voluntary exchanges among lay people who’ve paid membership fees. Don’t overestimate what THS has done as far as screening.
By contrast, if you pay a licensed, bonded / insured sitting service, you’ll typically have greater recourse.
Many, many THS sits go well, and you’ll tend to see the problem cases on the forum.
Yes, I absolutely agree! I had a downright lazy–thank God no where near as bad as Kaltk but I left a gentle review for her after she and I “worked things out” in text only for her to retaliate which amounts to a really damaging and untrue review. TH refuses to remove the review. I have 5 star reviews all across the board except for this one.
I hope Kaltk has a much better outcome with TH
Yes, but I’ve found sitters can be retaliative for “honest” reviews
Hi @EASTBAYCA
Neither side now sees a review until both have posted. I agree it used to be like that until THS changed the review system recently.
Is the new system live yet? I don’t think so…
Hi @richten1 as @andrealovesanimals mentioned the new review system is not yet live but as per @Carla recent comment on another thread, ”we will let members know when it goes live.”
We utilize both sides of the platform. We had a petsitter who never stayed at our home for a 4 day sit. We only had a cat at the time and he was ok. I believe she popped in to feed him and scoop the box but I was mad at myself because my gut felt red flags which I ignored. I wanted to give someone new to THS an opportunity which I will never do again. All of our bad experiences on both sides, my gut told me and I ignored it. I will no longer make that mistake even if it means cancelling a sit on either side of the platform. She showed up without a suitcase and made an excuse she didn’t want to be late. I found out she was literally taking care of another animal while she was supposed to be at our home.
We sat for a woman who had a pet sitter abandon her two dogs and another who had a woman set up a “massage service” out of her home during a month long sit. We cared for 13 dogs where the homeowners did not respond to us while one was very sick and a couple others had concerning issues which were ignored. We were in a foreign country where we did not speak the language and the Welcome Guide did not provide emergency contacts or vet information. They did not want to be bothered while they were visiting family. We were so upset at the neglect and then criticized at being overreactive and communicating too much. The homeowners were from the same country as us so there were no communications breakdowns due to language or cultural misunderstandings.
When I posted about it, it was taken down and I was put on suspension from the Forum. My main concern was retaliation for writing an honest review. THS refused to offer any support or protection. I was told you cannot post anything that is considered subjective. Per your post it seems homeowners seem to be able to share more than pet sitters which isn’t ok. Both sides experience unacceptable situations that warrant sharing for support and awareness via the forum.
I stopped writing negative and honest reviews since THS refused to protect me from retaliation. I am glad they finally put a proper review system in place. I hope people write the reviews within the 10 days. I just had a pet sit end and pet sitters leave my home. I have not received emails or notifications nudging for reviews. In fact, when I went onto the site to write the review for my petsitter there is no longer a feedback or a review tab on the dashboard. I finally went to past pet sitters and that is where I was able to leave the review. I have not read anything from THS educating customers to the change.
I disagree. There is no way I would leave someone’s pets without an agreement from the HO, unless it was in an ambulance. Alternative forms of communication and local emergency contacts are important and I always make sure I have that info when I sit.
Had you laid out your expectations re use of the car beforehand? Acceptable mileage, responsibility for toll charges and parking tickets?
Were they toting your dog to the beach/dog park?
As for “basically had to put my dog down after the fact”, so many questions!
After what fact? Do you just mean, a couple of weeks after the sit ended?
Was having to put the dog down in any way related to how the sitter treated your dog?
Was the dog old/infirm/had issues before the sit?
Was the sitter informed of this?
Was a vet contact listed, with responsibility for the bill established beforehand? (Note: responsibility is usually with the pet’s owner)
In other words, if having to put the dog down had nothing to do with the sitter’s actions, why mention it at all.
It sure seems funny for a site that you pay for you can’t post anything till it gets authorized by THS !!!
So this tells me more things go bad than good!
They don’t want to post them
Various forums automatically do this to new members or those who’ve not posted to a certain threshold. That’s because they’re trying to avoid spammers. Sometimes, some forums enact this when they’re seeing a rise in spam.
I’ve not encountered that msg myself on THS, though, except maybe when I was new.
On THS, they award badges, some of which allow increasing latitude with what the individual can update or such, sort of like a lightweight form of moderating.
More info about the software: Censorship! - #18 by Carla_C
