Invitations received to sit when I am already booked

Especially this time of year, I receive invitations to sit even though I have a sit already booked for the date requested.
Just as sitters can’t apply to sits that overlap , Homeowners shouldn’t be able to send invitations to sitters that are not available.
I kindly reply that I’m not free, but what a waste of time for Homeowners. They should get some sort of message. ‘This sitter is already booked and you can’t invite them for these dates’
Part 2: I receive the invite/messages for dates I’m not available and then I am stuck with this message. I can’t delete it, I can only archive.
I would like to see invitations blocked for dates I am already booked.

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I asked the same thing back in October. My question as usual was ignored

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Very annoying and frustrating @ExploreDreamDiscover when this feature was supposedly to be part of the improved Messaging and Inbox.

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I get daily invites from people in my city and country to look after dogs when I have deselected dogs and home country from my preferences. The search for a sitter feature is basically trash and could be fixed by a beginner level developer so I think it’s deliberately left showing everyone so they can boost how many sitters they seem to have available.

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I’ve suggested it before, but will say again: I think it would be super helpful for sitters to have an option on their dashboard to click that they don’t wish to receive unsolicited invites unless they have favorited a listing. It would solve a lot of things.

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Just echoing what has already been said .
We have received at least 8 invitations to sit over the holidays when our calendar shows we already have a confirmed sit .

It’s annoying as sitters and must be equally if not more frustrating for the hosts who are reaching out to sitters . Time wasting for both parties.

This was supposedly on the radar for a fix in Nov 2023

Was the chosen emoji indicating “I’ll believe it when I see it ???

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Apologies @BunnyCat - that’s my fault. I’ve popped the thread over to the Product team and asked if they can give any advice.

I’ll pop back if there’s anything I can share.

So sorry I missed your tag back in October.

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Hello, just popping on to confirm that I left an update on @BunnyCat’s enquiry from October, the team are working on a bug fix :slight_smile:

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As a HO, I find the sitter calendar confusing and there are no explanations. While some sitters have x’d out their dates, many have not. There are also some that have highlighted dates with no x outs. For the most part, when I look at various sitters’ calendars, the dates aren’t marked at all. If someone could enlighten us on the sitter calendar system, that would be great. I do recall reading somewhere that the calendar isn’t reliable. This could explain the invites when you are already booked.

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Yes, the calendar is not user friendly for sitters or HOs. If a sitter tries to apply when they are booked it tells us ‘you are busy with another sit’ but if a HO invites us they don’t get a message that tells them we are ‘busy with another sit’
I think HOs would appreciate seeing only sitters that are available.

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@AdventuringBoomers2

  • If the calendar is coloured in blue/green, then the sitter has marked these dates as available .

  • If the dates are struck through, the sitter is confirmed on a THS sit on those dates

  • If the calendar is white, then the sitter is unavailable- (however this is the default colour so the sitter might actually be available if they haven’t updated their calendar )

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Sitters cannot and do not “X out” dates!

Wouldn’t that be nice? Sitters should be able to indicate when they are unavailable.

I get many invitations but usually have other plans during the dates. I have never accepted an unsolicited invitation.

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I only ever get invites from previous HOs
Well maybe 3 in 2 years from HOs I don’t know or haven’t favourite’d
What am I doing wrong?!

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I’ve gotten several invitations. Apart from previous host, all from unknowns have been cut and paste-invitations, that have seemed to come from sits with low applications. A few of the sits for obvious reasons as the workload has been pretty much for an unpaid sitter, or rural and deserted location or christmas sit. Have never accepted such invitations as it hasn’t been a good match. Except from previous host - none has seemed to be because they want me specifically. :wink:

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I really have no idea how these people “find” us or choose us, but we get a lot of invitations, at least 2 per month from complete strangers.

It would be interesting to hear from Owners who invite Sitters, how they approach the project. There must be filters on the “find a sitter” side.

@PVGemini

Find a sitter is a feature HOs can use.
The problem, in my opinion, is that they can send invites to sitters when we already have a booked sit.
THS doesn’t let sitters choose if they can receive invitations or not.
The’ find a sitter’feature doesn’t have any filters for looking for sitters interested in your area or pets so HOs often invite local sitters. Because most of us are looking to travel, and aren’t getting paid, we usually don’t want to sit in our own home town.
The other flaw in the feature is sitters can’t delete all these messages.

The calender is useless, mine shows my availability, yet I still receive numerous invites when I’m not available. It’s frustrating for both sitters and HO’s

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We never get invites either @outdoorsy unless it’s from previous HOs. My guess has always been our location (SW Turkey) but who knows? Calendar is super annoying as had an HO say “oh I checked your dates and you’re free so have booked you”. Errrrrr. Nope. THS can’t reflect our real life movements so we’re not free when you think we are, sorry! #calendarcalamity

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Just to add one thing to @ExploreDreamDiscover thorough explanation of the HO search feature .
The results come up with all the local sitters first - and this can be 1K+ of sitters , so pages to scroll through - which is pointless since generally sitters want to travel and don’t want to sit locally.

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We got an an invite one time from a HO who said they saw that we had recently sat near their location before and were wondering if we’d go back to that area again. We had just been near that town a few weeks prior, so I guess the results must also show them sitters who have sat near their location in the past? I have absolutely no idea how they found us otherwise, because our location was never set to anywhere in their country.