I’ve got more feedback if THS is still listening. I have premium, but I noticed in this forum and the other away one, there is so much hostility to the premium tier. So many members are outright dismissive of the cancellation insurance pointing out to begin with that it is not insurance.
It’s not, but it is a “plan” and the information inviting people to join the plan describes the plan with words like “will” and “cover” and it sounds insurance-like enough. Plus before I upgraded, I asked around and checked and found members – both sitters and homeowners who’d gotten their claims processed so I had enough faith that it would work.
HOWEVER, after seeing so many people dismiss it, I took a good look at the actual numbered terms – not the description that you sign on to, but the terms. I could understand exactly why so many people who have never paid for it think it’s a joke. In fact, it made me a little sick and I thought I might have to rethink a few things.
The wording doesn’t describe WHEN the plan will payout. The wording says it’s always at THS “sole discretion” and then goes on to list the times that they “absolutely will not” pay out. As written, some of those conditions could be applied to almost any sit if THS decided not to pay out, so I completely get why it is a nonstarter for so many. When you go through the terms as written, THS could always find a reason not to pay and there is no transparency. It really is a gamble in a way that most actual insurance is not a gamble.
Most of this is a language issue. It really looks like they coud run it by an attorney again to spin the language in a more positive way without actually being forced to pay bogus claims. “Under the following conditions the plan will pay…” sounds much better than opening with “the plan absolutely will not pay” and then listing conditions which absolutely could absolutely apply to any sit!
For instance:. Clearly the party who applies cannot be the party who initiates the cancellation – except that there is a big exception. There are sitters and homeowners who have in fact gotten the payout because the other party breached serious terms and the sit needed to be cancelled because of that breach. That is not included in the actual terms. Possible examples similar to ones I remember reading about in forums include: A homeowner who cancelled and claimed because neighbors called the police on the wild party the sitter was holding while the dogs were locked up in the yard howling. OR A sitter claimed after arriving at a sit and finding dangerous term breaching conditions that they were misled about. To not word this to include the breach of terms by the other party is not only problematic, it could put both homeowners and sitters in jeopardy.
Another reason for denying is if the cancellation was agreed to by both parties. I think they mean if it was fraudulently agreed to by both, and that conidtion exists later in the list. The thing is any cancellation is ultimately “agreed to” by both parties. If I’m a homeowner and I tell a sitter, “Sorry, the dog is very sick so we’re canceling the vaction and the sit,” the sitter is in no position to “disagree” with my decision. Similarly, if I’m a sitter and I break my leg a week before a sit and cannot walk the dog or even travel, and won’t be able to do a sit, the homeowner will agree that I cannot do the sit. I understand why my premium won’t help me with my broken leg, but it certainly shoud help the homeowner who paid for this very thing!
If the corporate goals are to both scale up in numbers AND raise prices, it woud seem to me that one area that both sitters and homeowners have issues with is cancellations. Ideally, getting “everyone” to sign on to a “cancellation plan” might help scale up even with a higher average membership price. Forcing people to sign up for a plan that may double what they are now paying when they don’t believe the “cancellation plan” is actually a tangible benefit is not going to go over well. It’s not going to work for new members and it’s not going to help with retention. It’s an actual problem for THS.
Even airlines that have raised rates using tiers offer something tangible for the tier – seat selection, early boarding, “free” luggage. The problem with premium is that many users see the key benefit as a scam and minor language changes could change that without changing the actual conditions of payouts or even meaning there would be more payouts .(There are also other steps THS could take to help avoid some cancellations before they happen or to help find sitters or sits to avoid the payouts.)
Anyway, I’m not going to bother emailing this to the company where it will be read by AI and I’ll get a form letter back if that. I’m going to put this out here and hope a moderator will forward it to the products people. @Jenny
