Has anyone refused to stay.
Did you make an excuse or just walk away
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How awful for you.
We had a sit on another site.
Spent 5 days cleaning it up.
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Hi @Windtalker welcome to our community forum, thank you for joining we hope you enjoy the conversations, connecting with members and making new friends, we can’t wait to get to know you better.
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Had a sit in Spain so couldn’t exactly walk away. Once the owner had left I realized how dirty the place was - dog hair on everything, kitchen yuk. So I just found the hoover, got the rubber gloves out and cleaned the areas that we would be staying in and kept it clean. The owner was delighted on her return and very grateful!
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Not sure what I would have done with this one - rats?!
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We couldn’t use the baking trays oven dishes etc
We Also used disposable plates and cups.
Like you there must have been months without a hoover.
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@Windtalker @TravellingWitch …
Hi everyone thank you for starting the discussion @Windtalker, it’s not an easy one to have because as we know standards can be subjective, with the exception of a very few that leave us in no doubt.
What protocols do you think we could put in place to help prevent this kind of extreme situation from happening?
Think more accommodation photo’s. Bathroom kitchen Bedroom.
Our last sit on another site showed pictures of several years ago.
Even the owner looked 20yrs younger.
Think they saved a fortune getting their house cleaned.
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Our first sit taught us a big lesson! We had even visited the lady at her home and not noticed the dirt as we were so keen to make a good impression ourselves. Luckily it was only a week but like somebody else on here, when she returned she was extremely grateful! We felt sorry for her as her husband had died the year before and we think she had just let the place go to pot. We left no review. That was a difficult decision but she would have seen it, wouldn’t she? After that we asked a lot more questions, looked carefully at photos and visited beforehand if possible, as well as updating our profile to basically say we like to keep things clean! Have had 5 since, all fine by and large.
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We haven’t done any sits where we’ve turned up and thought that we can’t live there for a week or two - but we aren’t the sort of people that need pristine houses. We are well aware that houses are lived in and we aren’t staying at a B&B or hotel and especially if we are looking after pets we expect a certain degree of dog hair etc…
But we have done sits where in particular, kitchen equipment (baking trays, pots, plates) aren’t clean. There isn’t much we can do really, apart from using foil on baking trays and cleaning ares ourselves where necessary.
We do try to avoid picking housesits where it looks messy or there are no photos and we try to video chat people as much as possible before agreeing to a sit, so I think we can get a good idea from that.
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Think generalised photos can by nessacary
It can give a rough guide to the accommodation you will be staying in
One guy has posted on a site.
For someone to look after 10 rabbits in a one bedroom apartment
No garden.
To me personally with everything that is going on with covid.
Won’t be my first choice.
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Some people disagree.
But you have paid for a ferry or a flight.
At least you except a clean bed etc.
Paris been a few years since we have been.
Just love to people watch.
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I did a sit where the owner specifically said that her flat was very clean, but when I got there, I had to do a lot of scrubbing, and actually had to move a mountain of dirty laundry which was next to the bed! I wasn’t happy about that at all! She was pleased at coming back to a “very clean flat”! I think this is hugely disrespectful towards the sitter. If I had known I wouldn’t have taken it, but once I got there and removed the offending dirty laundry and cleaned the offending bathroom suite, things were good. At first I wasn’t going to leave a review, but then, because of the pandemic, I thought it was important to let other prospective sitters know.
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I totally agree with you.
The sit we went on was so bad
That we had to ring relatives of the owners.
They were astonished they actual had someone to sit for them.
The family were totally embarrassed but it wasn’t there fault.
They took over the sit.
We had stuck it out 2 weeks we had another 2 weeks to go.
The owner was a top investment banker.
He had 4 different holiday homes.
Apparently he looked down on sitters as if they owed him something.
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I left a review and was actually contacted by admin.
We forwarded pictures etc.
It is not allowed to advertise on the site.
We wouldn’t want anyone else to go through.
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By video chatting with the owners (and asking for a quick tour) we can see what the house looks like and how tidy it is. As I said before we don’t need it to be pristine, but as long as we can see that there isn’t rubbish all over the place and it’s not covered in mould it should work for us!
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WOW - And here I was thinking my experience was bad. Just a day sit and the house dirty because they didn’t clean up after themselves but NOTHING close to this. I am now more cautious about the sits I apply for and accept
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The First Christmas sit for us
Its puurrrfect 
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It ended badly 
What do you mean ? Your purrrfect Chritsmas assignment ended badly ?