@ABGM yes, thought I would throw “bun fight” into the discussion to keep everyone on their toes for googling slang 
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As a sitter, I may be one of the few that really like the 5 application limit. It forces the homeowners to make a timely decision on the five applicants. I don’t appreciate sitting around waiting for a homeowner to wade through 50 or more applications. If I was a homeowner, I would find it overwhelming to have to go through more than five applications so I think there are positive points to this change.
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My thought is that membership is so very unique and subjective and diverse and with the platform being conducive to customization, home hosts should be able to click a box for their own application limits: 5 10 15 20 25… before the listing pauses.
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In theory yes that’s plausible, but our experience has been the opposite. A lot of sits that we have applied for are sitting in “reviewing” status for weeks and months. Someone replying within 2-3 days now is a pleasant surprise.
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That’s unfortunate. Most of our experiences with homeowners have that they “read” our message within 24 hours and reply. We’ve been confirmed for some sits immediately after applying with no messaging taking place. We’ve sat for homeowners we’ve never met. As sitters with THS for eight years, we’re not impressed if two days go by and our application hasn’t been “read”. Then I feel it’s time to move on.
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Heheh… exactly what I did. (I shouldn’t try to read forums on a tiny phone screen; thought it was on the previous thread.) And I am totally stealing this; I feel like this term needs much wider use in the world today!
So, following on from sayings about bringing knives to gun-fights or guns to knife-fights …
–>Trying to insert healthy common sense into a big kerfuffle of an argument should be “bringing a salad to a bun fight”. 
…run with it, my friends…
Wow, months?! I don’t appreciate waiting around either but that’s exactly what I’m doing right now after hurrying to write a great application eight days ago. I thought that was bad! So if they’re gonna stall, maybe they’re gonna stall at whatever number.
I’d make other applications if I could find something that matches the date & location I want.
It would indeed be overwhelming to have 40 or 50 applications to wade through, but… … 
…and (see above) you brought a salad to a bun fight. 
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Ok, I can understand this.
The problem is, due to this feature, that a lot of sitters are applying who can’t on the dates, just to get in contact. I’m very sure that THS didn’t consider that.
It took me weeks or months to understand that I have myself to actively unpause. There is a lack of transparency about that.
10 applications would be perfect.
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Ah, no wonder you are one of the few 
Not my experience at all. On the contrary, the whole process of (eventually) securing a sit takes forever (as opposed to minutes before), and I find myself wasting much too much time (unsuccessfully) looking for them, as I no longer have access to listings that would fit into my puzzle. I am declined at least twice as often as before, but above all, the stress level is beyond acceptable. In short, nothing short of a nightmare
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Agreed; I have HOs who wait for weeks/months to even respond now. That was definitely not the case a few years ago.
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I think the lack of transparency is intentional to get the results THS is looking for. There are work arounds possible but THS is hoping to prevent that.
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HelloOutThere, That sounds like a sensible, logical compromise.
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My experience, and that’s been reflected by several others as well, is that there’s absolutely no difference in response time of HOs before or after the 5 appl rule. Sometimes they’re fast, sometimes slow, sometimes they don’t respond at all. This was all the same before the rule came into place
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Yes, it’s a pain in the … So much time wasted these days unsuccessfully looking for sits due to the 5 appl rule - can get pretty annoying at times
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Man, I hear that. 
I am looking for a specific date/location and I have spent SO many hours on here checking if there is anything new!
I cannot / do not want to carry my phone with its short-lived battery everywhere listening for an app that might ‘ping’. 
(Edit: actually I can’t even figure out how to set up notifications on the app. I mostly just use the website and get e-mails the day after I’ve looked at the “new sits” there. 
)
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What’s what i’ve wondered about: are home owners all informed their listings will automatically pause after 5 applications are received, but that rejecting and un-pausing will allow others to apply?
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Good questions…
Absolutely not, owners are not informed about that in transparent way. I found it out myself.
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Hello, @Happypets This might be helpful for you to view the screenshots on this thread Withdrawn application back on the market? - #5 by RadarInc as it shows you the directions/pop-ups owners get about their listing pausing and declining applicants, they also receive an email. It’s always nice to see what the other side of the network see 
I completely understand the reasoning behind this and fully support it. My frustration is that many times when we first see a sit there are 4 applications already, and we rush to submit ours, only to find we are too late. We aren’t seeing new listing alerts and have no idea how many properties we are missing out on. We have realtime/instant alerts on, and have raised this with the support team.
When I see that there are 4 applications for a sit that I might like I almost reflexively open an application window. When that is possible, I am not too late.
So then I can start reading the listing etc. In most cases I then close that window again. But if I would like to do the sit, I can compose my application without any rush. And I can be quite confident that my application will come in, it does not matter whether that is as number seven or eight.
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Thank you for replying and for the tip. It is much appreciated, and we will start doing this. 
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