Hello! I’d love to hear from other Trusted House Sitters (THS) members about this polemic topic:
A sitter has agreed to a sit who they have been invited and it was confirmed by both parties (sitter and homeowner) within THS platform.
After the sit has finished the sitter writes a review to the homeowner.
The homeowner said their membership is no longer active and tries to write the sitter a review within the 14-day review period, but they are not able due to their membership status.
Homeowner contacts THS support and requests they want to leave the sitter the review.
THS support responds with this:
Inactive members can’t write the review, not even for a sit which was agreed and confirmed when membership was active;
THS considers this as a “private arrangement” as the homeowner was no longer an active member of THS;
THS recommend sitter to ask homeowner for an external reference instead.
This happened to us and this is our opinion:
We can’t understand how a homeowner is able to agree/confirm a sitter if their membership is not active.
We can’t understand how a homeowner invites a sitter to a sit and both parties accept/confirm it within THS platform and this agreement be classed by THS as a private arrangement if it was done totally within THS platform.
Among the three parties: THS, the Homeowner and the Sitter. We can’t understand why the sitters should be impacted by an issue on THS platform not allowing sitters to receive a review, even if the review was written and reported to THS support within the 14-day review period.
I believe the sitters should have the right to receive the review from the homeowner within the 14-day period no matter their membership status. The homeowner decided to not renew their membership which they have the right to do. They contacted THS Support willing to write the sitter the review and reporting this issue. When a homeowner’s membership is inactive, they should not be able to create new listings, add new dates, contact sitters, etc but they must be able to complete the final step of the process of a sit which was agreed and confirmed when both parties were active members and be able to write a review.
A review is not like an external reference. An external reference can be written by anyone, even someone who is not a THS member and can be forged. A review can’t be forged because only members can write it after a sit is finished! This is what makes this collaborative economy reliable and work so well.
In a hypothetical scenario, what if the sit was a total disaster, something bad happened to the pet or the house by negligence of a sitter and the homeowner wanted to write a review to alert other homeowner of a bad sitter not acting as expected during the sit? Should THS just ignore this?
Have this happened to you before? Or anything similar?
Should THS fix their process and their system?
Do you think leaving an external reference instead of a review is OK?
One alternative could be that one cannot confirm a sit in a period that membership isn’t paid for, or even that such a sit is cancelled if membership is not renewed before the sit.
In my opinion the real problem is not whether or not one can write a review. The real problem in my opinion is what is the status of the sit itself, and what responsibilities does the parties have (or have not) where one or both are no longer a THS-member, no matter what the reason is for no longer being a member.
As the situation is, I would think a review added to the profile as an external review is basically equal to other external reviews, as it is written also by a non-member at the time of reviewing.
I would agree that neither party should be able to confirm a sit if it extends longer than their membership but writing this code would probably be a bit of a headache. They should, at the least, allow the folks to leave a review but also, before they can confirm, whoever’s membership is going to expire should get a pop-up stating that there membership will expire mid-sit, at which time all THS support and services are terminated, including the help line, insurance, etc.
I’m curious how it impacts the other party. Like, as a sitter if my membership expires mid-sit, will the HO still be insured after that point or will their insurance stop once my membership stops. If it’s the latter, that’d be pretty unnerving I think. Or as a sitter if a HO ends the sit early and normally the premium support would kick in but the HOs membership expired so would the sitter then be left scrambling with no support/reimbursement for the hotel? If either party could end up being financially hurt by the other party’s membership ending mid-sit, then the potentially injured party should be made aware of that before confirming, IMO.
It’s an anomaly TBH, usually if one or the other memberships run out before the sit starts then it notifies both and cancels you on the platform. (At least that’s what happened to us) Did your membership run out mid sit and if it has run out, why don’t you just renew it so you can write your sitter a review? We agree with @Garfield that it’s other things that are more of a concern. For us it would be vet helpline, the insurance & support that’s more important than the inability to write a review. A reference is better than nothing. #puzzlinglogistics
I can see both points of view with this. I think THS should notify the other party if a membership stops so they can decide if they want to cancel a sit. I don’t do non-THS sits as I want the added protection/benefits.
I wouldn’t want to see the ability to offer/book sits outside of membership period removed though. I’ve just confirmed a very prime location sit for Aug next year, after my renewal date, and I don’t think it would be fair to restrict access to that listing to the very small number of sitters who have just renewed.
I’m the impacted party. The homeowner does not want to renew their membership at this time. Reviewing a sitter should be the last step in the sit process. As a sitter I feel frustrated since I did a great job and haven’t gotten my deserved review. Reviews are the most important part of a sitter profile!
Reviews are the most important part of a sitter profile. The reviews speak for the sitters. And a reference is not the same as a review since reference can be forged, reviews can’t be forged.
The point is, something is better than nothing and this is not a problem they’re going to solve any time soon. So you can either do a reference or do nothing. But I wouldn’t bother spending time being upset about something that won’t change.
True, but I would think that if a HO looked at all your great reviews, they’d realise this one isn’t forged.
The option for lapsed nembers to review isn’t going to be fixed soon (if ever), so it’s up to you whether you go for a workaround, stew over it or move on.
Got it! I read it the other way around and yes, totally agree. This happened to us but it notified us that we weren’t covered before the sit started. Clearly that didn’t happen for you guys. Def get the reference. #sorrywirescrossed
