Hiya, I’ve just joined THS as a host and am really happy to have my first sitter arranged for next month and another sit in April. I’ve loved connecting with the sitters by video call already and looking forward to hosting them. Any advice is welcome re hosting well- I’m bit nervous about hosting my first sit. The sitters both have lots of good reviews so I am sure they will be great.
My friend also joined THS as a host and had 3 cancellations for her first sit. I am assuming that is is very unusal?
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Welcome to forum, @Fluffycats !
It seems you have done the right moves, doing a video call and got an experienced sitter with good reviews. It bodes well and I hope - and believe - it will be a good sit for both of you.
I don’t think cancellations are very common when a sit is confirmed. But of course - life can happen to all of us.
For new hosts there are sometimes the misunderstanding between application, invitation, withdrawal and cancellation. So just for clarification:
Sitters are encouraged by THS to apply for multiple sits at a time. An application is showing interest in a sit. It is advised for both partners in the mutual exchange to do due diligence - decide what you are looking for, talk and ask and be transparent on what you need, what you’d like and what you can commit to or not. Not everybody does that. Follow your gut feeling and don’t go forward if it feels «off».
If a host want to go forward, the host will then send an invitation to sit. The sitter will also do an assesment of the host and sit and decide if one still is interested. If yes, the sitter can accept the invitation - and the sit is confirmed. Before this point both parties can withdraw at any point. It is before this point NOT a cancellation, but the party is no longer interested and withdraws. The withdrawal can be for multiple reasons and is really nobodys business.
After the final confirmation of a sit, the agreement shouldn’t be cancelled unless for reasons of weight. After confirmation, it would then officially be a «cancellation» of a sit. I think most sitters (but might be wrong…) would go the extra mile to try to honor the agreement if possible. But it is a voluntary service and not a paid job, and there could be reasons why it is not possible to do this voluntary petsit. If your friend has experienced four official cancellations, I would think that is rare. It could be interesting to look into how the host could do the due diligence better in finding a good match.
Sometimes it is taking to long from listing/ application and to the confirmed sit. Many hosts miss out on sitters because they take too long reaching out and going forward. For my sits, the host has usually reached out within 24-48 hours, and often both videocall and confirmation within that timeframe. Other hosts use weeks - and many sitters would move on if it takes to long as it is not good communication and is a red flag for a sit.
Just a few thoughts. Regarding your prep - think of it as an old classmate, a coworker or other guest is coming to stay a few days. Prepare so they feel welcome, and prep so that they have the information they need to stay in the home and care for your pet. A clean home and a thorough welcome guide goes a long way.
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You have obviously got a very good feeling from your sitters, given you’ve loved connecting with them, and it’s ALL about that feel-good feeling. So it sounds like you’ve picked great sitters.
Three cancellations is definitely not normal, so your friend on the other hand, perhaps didn’t trust her gut, the vibe, and intuition, it’s all about the feeling, and NOT tick boxes or number of reviews. As sitters, we have a lot of fantastic reviews, but owners need to trust their intuition over and above that, to choose their perfect sitter/s.
On the other hand, most sitters do the same, we do! We trust our intuition about an owner, as there are plenty of cute pets on here, so it becomes more about the owners for us, as it’s them that we are helping, and them that write our review. So maybe there was something whereby the sitters just felt uneasy about your friend. IE the sitters trusted their gut, especially if there were three cancellations.
We always trust our intuition about owners and we’ve had fantastic owners with none of the problems you hear about on this forum. We’ve also never cancelled once a sit is agreed.
However, there are three main things that put us off an owner. IE where we have trusted our intuition!
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For us, we like owners that want ‘us’, and who aren’t speaking/video’ing to multiple sitters, because they should trust their initial intuition, and if they don’t think we are perfect for them immediately, they need to go with who is.
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Some owners treat a video/telephone chat as an ‘interview’, like an employee, instead of an easy-flowing chit-chat between each other. To see if our/their initial feel-good feeling about each other is still as good when we chat. It needs to be simply a friendly free-flowing chat. Because sitters are doing a good deed by caring for their pets, because they don’t have to, they could just couch surf instead, or home-swap. Pet sitting is such an enriching life for sitters, so owners that decide to treat things as an ‘interview’ like an employee just aren’t on the same feel-good wave length as us. It’s not a job.
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We prefer owners that confirm everything quickly, and don’t drag their heals, because it’s totally fine for them to drag their heals in their own life, but not in our life.
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