Sunshine here as well☀️
Have a great day!
Honest reviews are essential as well for sitters as for HO. How can you choose if the basics for it simply aren’t there?
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As someone who has done dozens of sits, I guess we have been lucky in that we have never had a bad one where we would feel compelled to leave a negative review. There may have been little things here and there, but nothing worth mentioning on a review for sure–some things are a matter of personal opinion and taste and not truly some objective problem. When I read about some of the experiences here, it truly surprised me since we have always had lovely people and lovely homes.
I have always found the star rating to be kind of useless in that most people probably aren’t going to leave less than 5 unless something was truly wrong-kind of like how most people rate their Uber drivers. I like the options a couple of other sites I have used have where there are different ‘labels’ you can leave like tidy, good communication,etc…
I see the discussions on this have gone back quite some time…I’m sure there may be some reluctance to change the system. From a business standpoint, the AirBNB type probably has its downsides for a site like this. Badly reviewed sitters and owners wouldn’t renew memberships because they can’t get assignments and sitters respectively. This isn’t to accuse the site of nefarious intentions–I think it is great and I can tell they are always looking for ways to improve the experience --but just acknowledging the basic human nature of preserving self-interest.
And while it is a good idea overall I think, it might end up being a ‘be careful what you wish for’ scenario!
In a perfect world, where people only behaved as they ‘should’ --in this case, not leaving revenge reviews–there wouldn’t be a problem but that’s life!
I am also a big believer in things happening as they should so if I ended up on a bad assignment --that I didn’t know would be bad because of lack of sitter feedback–that is the experience I was supposed to have for whatever reason, and I would decide how to handle it from there!
There is always risk in life, including housesitting , for both parties. There is no way to remove that fully, even with a different type of review system.
Paying attention to your gut instincts is really helpful in this regard, whether it’s when reading the profile or during the interview, especially for sitters.
I think there is a lot of fear of competition, and not getting sits, that lead people to take on assignments that may not be a good fit, that they may have reservations about,etc…but worry they won’t get something else, and then it ends up being a bad experience.
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@KC1102 yes I really like your thinking on this and like you I would only be hair spliting by leaving one person a five star feedback and another a four star…I have been lucky in the same way as you sitting mostly for really good people who have treated me respectfully. I have given one HO a three star feedback which was generous given the circumstances and I kept THS member services in the loop in the lead up to that; interestingly the HO gave me a five star review so I think she had taken on board what was wrong with the sit and that despite considering leaving I saw it through and looked after her animals and home regardless. You are right no review/feedback system is perfect and going with a gut feeling and being able to roll with a situation gets us over the line. If I am in a home that for whatever reason is not up to scratch (and of course it might be for somebody else) I look for ways to brighten my day and knowing that its only for a week or three, takes the edge off of any negative thoughts I might be having. I would only take on a sit of three weeks plus though having been there before for a shorter sit and enjoyed it. We take a real risk with long-term sits that might have major issues!
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I agree 100%…you get swayed by the review or trying to be nice or diplomatic. I’m not good at reading through the lines and I don’t think I should have to. From my last three pet sitters tho (out of 4 this past year), I don’t trust reviews at all. I’m honestly going to try to find someone in my city to take my cat to rather than have people come into my home like I have in the past. It’s not a great solution but I’d hate to list all the things that sitters have done that have cost me money and cranky women that refuse to take simple instructions without being offended. And NO phone help from trusted housesitters. I’m really frustrated. Do sitters really not see the home owners reviews until AFTER they have posted their review? I’d like to double check that.
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@barb.minnie I am truly sorry to read that you have had 3 out of 4 negative experiences with sitters. I can only say that this will be incredibly rare as by far the vast majority of sitters are genuine, trustworthy animal lovers!
The reviews are published as soon as they are submitted so if the home owner reviews first the sitter sees that review BEFORE posting theirs…and visa versa
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I just typed this up under another topic, but it seems applicable to share here as well.
I had a recent sitter who was wasn’t a failure - but only barely. She was really new to THS and had only one sit under her belt. I should have read closer between that reviewer’s lines, as well as taken more notice of what the sitter wrote (and didn’t write) in her profile. In essence, she was newly retired and “wanted to meet people”. Her focus wasn’t enough on the animal part of the Sit.
Her inattention led to mass chaos with my cats’ eating (two of the three are on special diets) that could have had serious implications. It was fortunate that it was only a four day sit!
In the end, I left her an “honest” review. She was very nice, very earnest, but I commented on my cats’ needs and that she would probably be more comfortable with “less complicated” sits. I did this because I wanted other HOs to be fully aware of this sitter’s limitations, since they could have serious repercussions.
Sadly, the sitter before this one was also a failure. More chaos with the cats’ feeding (honest, it isn’t THAT difficult!) but she was really a bit of a flake and had no attention to detail. When I returned, the water dish was almost empty and one (of the two) litter box lids was on backwards (no access!). There were a lot of other “little things” that added up to a bad sit. I didn’t leave her a review at first, and by the time I went to write it, her account was inactive.
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In addition to upvoting this thread, I’ll chime in with my own 2 cents:
Like many others, I strongly believe THH should have a double-blind review system similar to AirBnb. We’ve been burned twice now with rough sitters, and failed to review them as such for the fear of a retaliatory review of their sit. This is unacceptable, and I believe the time taken to implement such a system is also unacceptable. It’s hard enough to trust strangers, but with ratings inflation, it’s quite difficult indeed. Especially given the ever-increasing annual fee (agree with others: well worth the peace of mind of the contracts/insurance), there’s no excuse for this not to be implemented. I personally wrote the THH team about this over a year ago expressing my concerns.
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Hi @lizandjon thank you for joining the forum and for contributing to this conversation it is so important to get the views of of members from both sides of our community.
The review system is under discussion and all member feedback is contributing to those discussions.
Thank you again for joining and we hope you will become a regular contributor and forum member.
Angela and the Team
Hi @NGC and thank you for taking the time to put together your feedback on the topic of reviews. We’ve moved it to this ongoing topic about the fear members have around making negative reviews to continue the conversation here all in one place. As @Angela_L says
I am sure the team working on this will take your comprehensive suggestions onboard. All the best.
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This thread, with 94 posts, started on April 7.
Another thread, Why do sitters choose not to leave a bad review even after they have recieved theirs - I feel let down by my fellow sitters
with 202 posts started on July 1.
(@Colin , I took the liberty of changing recieved to received , even though I had kind of enjoyed that typo 
)
There have been many excellent suggestions of ways to improve the review system, including this latest post from @NGC that has, imo, a very good template
When are we are actually going to see some constructive changes to the review system?
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Hi @mars we assure members that the review system is a priority under discussion and development. All feedback is being taken into consideration and as with all changes the product team will update members accordingly.
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Well we’ve been waiting months, maybe years, for some improvements to the review system….not your fault I know but it’s frustrating
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Hi All, the review system is on our roadmap for 2022. This includes private, blind reviews and quite a few other improvements. Thank you for all the feedback. Ben
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@Angela_L - On July 2nd - just shy of 7 months ago your response to my post was -
" the review system is a matter of discussion within the product team with the objective of finding a fair and transparent system which works for both owners and sitters."
Today, you say
“we assure members that the review system is a priority under discussion and development”
Surely it is now time to stop discussing it and make a decision whether or not THS intend to do anything about it?
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Hi Colin,
Member and pet safety are at the heart of everything we do at TrustedHousesitters. You might not be aware but over the last 3-6 months we have been making improvements to references, verification and membership service tools.
The review system is a top priority for next year.
Many Thanks, Ben
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Yes, and this is appreciated.
I hope it will include a rating system with categories such as those in @NGC ‘s template.
We’ll be anxiously awaiting the new review system. I hope it comes soon.
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