@iamplankton , to follow up on the early arrival suggestions, you might want to consider having the sitter come the day before and stay in a B&B or hotel at your expense unless you are able to be there and provide a good orientation when they arrive.
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We actually do videos we send over WhatsApp to show the feeding routine for the dogs. The cats have microchip feeders that we do a picture guide for on how they open and close and the gerbils are super easy. Some times an in person handover would not be possible but I will take that in to consideration for the times it is
as a sitter, who does back to back sits, so travels on the same day, often, to the next one, and need to coordinate all details of travels, and sit transitions, I am able to put myself in his shoes, and honestly, he did pretty good!!! You say yourself that he was the only one to apply, after you contacted a lot of people who couldnāt make it, so already, he helped you a lot. He then went from a UK sit to another on the same day, arrived veryyyy late, fair enough, but made it.
He then took good care of your babies, house, without an in person intro (you might think all is easy, but he is just discovering your house at the same time as your pets, all in one, after travelling hours, leaving another sit prior to yours, probably in the morning, cleaning up for that sit, etc.), with a reference guide in another language than his mother tongue, and then was delayed leaving, while asking you not to lodge him, but to help him find a cheap hostel.
What comes across as a lack of organization and taking initiative to you, can be seen completely differently on his end. That sit doesnāt look that straight forward to me, so I think itās good to stay a little flexible with one another.
Iām simply recognising his efforts, from another sitter. It would have been a very different story if he had broken things, not cleaned up, and didnāt take care of your fur fam, but he did great on this, which is pretty good!
Thank you and certainly puts it in to a different perspective. I personally say itās an easy sit as only 2 dogs need walking once a day, the cats donāt need much or the gerbils and then itās just monitoring for any accidents from the dogs and letting them in to the garden but I guess everyone is different in what they see as easy or not so.
Thank you for the valuable insight
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