I’ve just had a bad review for a sit in a house which was like a death trap of health and safety issues. In fact, I ended up with an injured shoulder which required hospital treatment. I didn’t post a review of the sit, preferring to say nothing, as I didn’t want to rush to judgement without hearing the HO’s side of the story. I’ve just read their vitriolic review of me but it’s too late for me to review them. As my criticism involves health and safety, is there any point in complaining to HS about it?
You can still post a reply to their review. In fact, I encourage it
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@Rover yes, if future sitters are likely to face the same issues and these are serious or dangerous you can report it to member services.
THS Member services don’t routinely read the reviews - your option to get the situation investigated is to raise a dispute and include evidence (e.g. photos of the hazard & your injury, any medical bills and Dr’s letters etc )
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You should have reported the health and safety concern immediately and also posted a review. You’ve now done yourself and others a disservice because it will seem retaliatory instead of just an honest review.
Regardless, you can (and should) still report to TH and you can do a reply to the review left by the HO.
In future, just say what you need to say, states the facts and sticking to the truth as best you can. You don’t have to wait for the HO if there is something that clearly should be reported or captured.
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You’ve learnt the hard way that you should have posted a review to alert future potential sitters. Perhaps you weren’t aware of the new blind review system….Always post a review, whether good or bad
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This makes me go…hmmmmm…seems more to the story…?
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You are so right, all of you, in your responses. I did feel that I ought to post a review of the sit but, as I said, I felt that it would be unfair to do so without hearing their side of the story. I could have done that by contacting them directly. The reason I didn’t do so is that I’ve been feeling too sick and exhausted with the pain of my injured shoulder, which is particularly painful when I type, and befuddled with medication.
I’m so sorry this happened to you and hope that you will post a response to their review. If that response is written with the same integrity you demonstrate here I believe that future homeowners will be able to read between the lines and perceive you in a true light.
And If the injury you experienced was due to H.O. negligence then they or their insurance should foot the bill. My insurance policy covers any slips or falls on my property whether I am responsible for them or not.
Not going to give you any legal advice regarding your injury and liability, but you can respond to a review – factually is best and without a lot of emotion or vitriole. Think carefully. One bad review probably won’t sink you as a sitter, but an outburst against a HO even if they lied will make you look bad.
You could also at the least contact THS if you feel there were dangerous conditions in the home that need to be addressed.
Hi @Rover and welcome to the forum
There’s definitely some value in making a complaint to THS about the sit and the listing. While this doesn’t always result in the owner being removed from THS so no-one else suffers the same fate it should still be reported. This should be done though the main THS site and member services (I believe there may be an actual complaints process as well) as the forum has firewalled itself off from THS itself.
As others have suggested you can also post a response to the vitriolic review. Factual and calm is best. If I were an owner still I would always read a bad review to get the tone of the person who left it, especially a 1-star as reviews are often a weapon to seek revenge and an bad ones can put more light on the reviewer than the reviewee. Your response can help you in these situations. Also going forward don’t be afraid to leave a less than 5-star review or even put some negative things in a review even if it is 5-star. Facts matter and if you give yourself a few days to get clear of the sit you will find it easier to leave a more honest review but do please leave one.
You could try get THS to remove the review but the most common response seems to be that the can’t. I think it more that they won’t and without seeing the review your best chance may be to find something legally actionable that has been said that may encourage it being removed or something in it that violates THS policies such as the language used or identifying information. I would expect that if they don’t remove reviews to keep the sanctity of the system then they would be less likely to edit them so would remove if they violated policy.
Thank you, everyone. Below is the response I have drafted. The first paragraph is the owners review
I was rather disappointed with this house sit. Felt the HS should have been more self sufficient from the get go and taking the approach of ‘if an item isn’t visible in the house’ then look for it and if not found then we don’t have it. To have received messages every day at the start looking for household items or questions on how to work things was annoying. I was also disappointed that our house was rather untidy when we returned - furniture and ornaments had been moved and not put back, things taken from the garage and not replaced and there was leftover food in the fridge (some of which had gone off). There was also a plant in desperate need of a water - small point but….! I left instruction that our dog was to get frozen fish at some point during the HS for a skin allergy but sadly his fish remained untouched in the freezer. Was hoping for a much better experience and tidier and cleaner house upon return.
This was the most disappointing house sit I have experienced. There were a number of health and safety issues which rendered it quite a dangerous house to live in.
The weather turned very cold during my stay, with snow and ice. I was concerned about going out of the house as there were four steps down from the front door, without a handrail or any means of support. I asked the HO if she had any grit which I could put on the steps. She said no, and suggested I brush the snow away. There was no brush in the house. I thought I had seen one earlier in the garage but it was equally unsafe to go there as there were more steps at the back door and a slippery patio to be crossed. I asked the HO if [dog’s name] would be ok just going out into the garden during the icy period. She said no, he had to get outside completely otherwise he wouldn’t do a poo. I therefore continued to take him out, although it was very slippery underfoot. Several other people I met when out, one of whom had just fallen on black ice, told me that there’s a microclimate in the area because of its situation, and that the weather conditions there can often be much worse than in the town centre. The steps would be particularly difficult in icy weather with the dog pulling excitedly on the lead. A fall on them, with my feet slipping away from under me, could easily have resulted in serious injury. The HO should be aware of this and warn any future sitters about it. She should also provide an adequate supply of grit.
I wasn’t able to use the sunken jacuzzi which I’d been looking forward to as it seemed unsafe. There was no proper support for hauling yourself out of it and the tiled flooring was very smooth, with all that that implies in terms of slipperiness, especially when damp, and there were no bathmats. The HO was aware of this as she commented on it, saying that she would need to get a bathmat before her next housesit as the sitters included a ten-year-old child. She needs to have the same concern for adults. I didn’t want the HO to come back and find her dog sitter drowned in the jacuzzi and her dog dead of starvation!
The kitchen is badly designed and resulted in me injuring my shoulder, incurring both muscle and nerve damage, which required hospital treatment on my return home. It is still causing me pain. The microwave was so badly positioned – very high up, with the door opening in the wrong direction – that you would need the skills of an acrobat to reach it. I asked The HO if she had a set of steps. She said no, but there was a stool in the garage. This was not high enough and I was only able to open the door by stretching way beyond what felt comfortable. As the microwave only worked for a minute at a time, this meant reaching up to it constantly, leading to a significant repetitive strain injury. Plus, there was the risk involved in removing hot food from the microwave while tottering in this precarious position.
I had told The HO that I would message her every day just so that she could be assured that all was well. Most of the messages were about [dog’s name] being fine, accompanied by photos of him.
Regarding her statement ‘if an item isn’t visible in the house then look for it and if not found then we don’t have it’: First of all, here is a pre-sit WhatsApp exchange
**
I was surprised not to be able to find a toilet brush in either of the two bathrooms. The HO replied that she didn’t have a toilet brush, that she just used toilet paper. I was horrified at the idea of not having a toilet brush. However, a friend tells me that she thinks toilet brushes are disgusting, so perhaps I was too demanding about this. I was also surprised that the house didn’t have a table for eating at. I was having to eat on the sofa, with [dog’s name] jumping up beside me and showing a keen interest in my food, so I asked if there was perhaps some kind of folding table hidden away somewhere. No, there was none.
Asking questions about how to work things: When I’m on a housesit. I simply google the device in question if I need information about it, but I couldn’t find the microwave model which the HO had. I also had to ask about the washing machine. The HO described where the switch was; it was labelled ‘water heater’.
Whereabouts of the tea towels? I was directed to a cupboard which had a pile of cloths of an indeterminate nature, none of which I would have recognised as a tea towel.
I also asked for clarification about garbage disposal. There was only one bin in the house which seemed to have everything in it, with no facility for sorting the rubbish into the different categories required by the Council. The HO confirmed that she only had the one.
The unwatered plant? I hadn’t noticed this and the HO hadn’t mentioned plants. However, if the plant was desperately in need of water after two weeks in winter, it’s likely that it hadn’t been adequately watered before she left.
Things not being put back: I think this may have been two ornaments in the bathroom which I’d put on the floor because there was insufficient shelf space for my own things; there were possibly also one or two things in the kitchen not back in their original positions. But is this really a big deal?
The stool and a roll of kitchen paper were the only items which I took from the garage, and no, I didn’t take them back. But I find this is a very petty criticism.
Yes, there was food in the fridge when I left. Several lots of vegetables going mouldy, a half-empty bottle of wine and a carton of oat milk. This was all left by the HO herself!!! I left one egg and a half empty can of tomatoes. I had intended to put the last item in the garbage but forgot. Again, it’s no big deal. The tomatoes hadn’t gone mouldy and the egg was fresh.
Cleanliness: I cleaned the house as well as I could with my arm paralysed with pain.
Untidiness? I took away everything of my own except a jumper and a small bag which I forgot. Other than that, the house was so sparsely equipped and furnished, there was really nothing that could have contributed to a state of untidiness.
The frozen fish: Yes, I admit that I had been shown the frozen fish which [dog’s name] gets from time to time. I have no recollection of being told that it was necessary for his health either verbally or in the HO’s profile. As he seemed to really love his regular diet of raw meat I just continued to give him that.
I thought that I had established a friendly relationship with the HO and her husband during our pre-sit WhatsApp conversations. When I arrived they took me out for lunch and we again had a good rapport. They told me they’d been very happy to receive my application as they had several other applicants and hadn’t been impressed with any of them. Perhaps they are too exigent.
Although I felt I should post a review to warn future sitters, I decided it wouldn’t be fair to do so without hearing the HO’s side of the story (I hate posting negative reviews about anything, especially an individual). Now that I have, I stand by my original criticisms. My feeling is that the HO suspected that I might give her a negative review and posted this to pre-empt it.
(**edited by the Forum Team to meet Community Guidelines)
I would not recommend posting your response as it looks now. I am not going to take a lot of time to break it down into specifics but generally: it is too long and meandering, and frankly sounds whiny. I would suggest you take a day ot two to collect your thoughts.
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Needs to be much shorter. Maybe bullet point the issues. Non emotional and factual and no more than three paragraphs would be our advice too. Sleep on it or reword it as @MaggieUU says 
Confusing.
So that first paragraph was by the HO?
And the much longer part is a draft version of the response? It only serves to illustrate that the sitter indeed could have been more self-sufficient etc…
You don’t say how many stars the owner gave you but if that first paragraph is the sum total of the review I wouldn’t call it vitriolic.
And I would not post that response. it’s not doing you any favours. The part I managed to get through really re-enforces the actual review.
I gotta agree with everyone else here on this one…this reply would not do you any favours…really long and after reading it, it kind of validates a lot of what the HO said:
- the pet wasn’t given its fish
- sounds like you struggled to locate a lot of things
- and saying that a space is badly designed or laid out, or that you can’t reach things seems a bit low blow, especially when you can check the layout via images or a video chat, etc.
- I’m not understanding how the kitchen hurt you as what you wrote seems vague, and while I wouldn’t expect you to share personal details, I’m unable to connect the dots on how the kitchen could have hurt you to the degree you’ve described so maybe others may also have a hard time comprehending?
Your response also makes me think there are a lot of questions that didn’t get asked before the sit such as:
- Where are the cleaning supplies located?
- Anything special I should know about feeding your dog?
- I usually travel with X amount of stuff, where should I keep my stuff/are there any areas that are off limits?
- Any quirks about the house or appliances that it would be good to know?
- I see there may be some bad weather coming in…where do you keep shovels, salts, etc.?
- I’m on the short side (idk your physique, but I’m 6’ so can usually reach stuff…if I weren’t, I’d be asking something like this), before you leave, if there’s anything high up can you let me know where I’d be able to find a stool or can we work to leave things I’d need to reach to care for your house and pet in an accessible place?
While on the sit,
- I would either throw out or use stuff that was going to spoil, or just ask explicitly, “I see xyz is about to spoil, but didn’t want to touch your stuff without permission…do you want me to toss it out so you don’t come home to rotten goods?”
- Totally fine to move things, but it sounds like you didn’t put stuff back after they told you where things could be found cause you “didn’t think it was a big deal”.
- We do overlaps at start and end of our sits so that there’s a walkthrough of the property and pet’s routine, but even when that’s not the case, I try to explore the whole house in the first day or so of the sit so that I know where everything is at, write my list of questions to send in one go and then don’t have to ask for a bunch of stuff throughout the duration of the sit. I also red line those welcome docs both for info regarding the pet as well as the home.
TBH, I would keep any response you give back short, but it’s tough since most of what the HO has posted sounds valid and you actually validated it. If you incurred an injury and have proof for that, you can speak to that, but it seems rn based on how your response is written like a tit for tat. I would either try again at another response (concise and pure facts) or potentially just leave it and learn from this experience re:vetting/prepping your sits and tightening up comms with future HOs, as well as re-thinking expectations on a proper reset of the home.
Again, sorry to hear about your shoulder and please do proactively report and review on your future sits! X
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Agree with others that your response is too long and most people won’t read through it. Get some help editing – even try chatgpt to stick to the points, so that sitters see a list of possible dangers: no shovel, nothing to put on stairs if the ice over, no kitchen stool but high microwave had to use. And also a list of home conditions: no toilet brush, no towels left for you. Communication: basically told not to bother homeown when you couldn’t find stuff you’d need. etc.
Also take responsibilities for the things the homeowner says about you – leaving food, etc.
Thank you so much to everyone for taking the time and the trouble to respond, and in such helpful detail. It’s made me stand back and take a long hard look at the situation, especially as you are all in agreement. Your feedback is much appreciated! Will redraft.
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@Rover
I really appreciate your response. Lots of people get super-defensive so good on you for accepting the need to redraft.
I am not sure if there was no Welcome Guide (WG), a bad WG or a disregarded WG. Also, keep in mind that you do not have to discuss EVERYTHING in your response to the Homeowner review. I have drafted a suggested response. Do with it what you will.
Thanks for taking the time to complete this review. I think this sit illustrates how important it is for the Homeowner to complete a comprehensive Welcome Guide that covers all aspects of pet and home care. This would include pet feeding instructions, plant care, appliance instructions, where to find cleaning supplies. This would enhance the Petsitter’s self-sufficiency by eliminating the need to ask questions.
The weather was very wintery and I would recommend that the Homeowner supply equipment for snow and ice clearing such as shovels and sand or ice-melt.
Also, the sunken jacuzzi area would benefit from some anti-slip mats.
The microwave was on a.high shelf and the Homeowner suggested that I use a stool from the garage to reach it. I apologize that I didn’t put this stool back in its place.
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