Lack of communication

Hi, my sitters got back to uk on Wednesday. They had messaged me about a month ago to say “not long now etc” I messaged them on Tuesday to wish them a safe flight, could we speak Friday or Saturday to discuss ETA, food allergies etc as I always cook the day they arrive. I messaged them again this morning, also still unread!

They confirmed ages ago and said we’d chat when they are back home, am I panicking unnecessarily, as starting to get a bit edgy. I don’t have any other way of contacting them other than messaging through the THS site

When is the sit scheduled to begin? It’s unfortunate you don’t have a phone number to reach them at. The last communication was quite a while ago.

No way to know what’s going on with them, your concerns are reasonable.

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If they messaged a month ago and all was well, they may just be settling back in from their travels and haven’t checked the app yet. What say are they expected to start their sit? If it’s Saturday or Sunday, I would wait through today then reach out to THS to contact them.

Really you should exchange Whatsapp numbers after the sit is confirmed.

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Many sitters have been locked out of their accounts until they accept the new Terms and Conditions and booking fees.
If you have no other way of contacting them and the sit is due to start soon I would contact Membership Services and ask them to contact the sitters on your behalf.
Good Luck

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Very good point!

They should arrive on Tuesday, I leave early Wednesday morning

I normally exchange numbers and have a video call prior to confirming. They said they were happy to confirm and would make contact when back in uk. . looking at their profile, they are booked through to April next year..

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I’ll do that in the morning if no response. I hadn’t realised people were locked ooh until accepting new T’s and C’s

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You deserve to be a bit freaked out about the situation but odds are everything’s fine.

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Fingers crossed! They are premium members and have loads of 5 star review, I’m just getting a bit twitchy!

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Hope all goes well.

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As soon as a sit is confirmed phone numbers need to be exchanged. I don’t always get an alert from THS when someone messages me. Hope things turn out well. Have THS get a hold of them for you.

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If you have their number, just give them a ring later today. It sounds fine, they are probably just settling back to the UK.

@ellieh, seems great advice from fellow Forum members. As @Twitcher suggested, contact THS member services by chat or email support@trustedhousesitters.com. Suspect that there’s also a learning experience afoot too - we’ve certainly had plenty of them too as we gained experience. Hopefully, via THS MS, you can reconnect with housesitters and gain comfort before your forthcoming travels.

We did not do this initially, but we now try to reach out to pet parents periodically between date of confirmation and start date. Takes but a few moments but seems good check-in for both parties. After sit confirmation, we tend to migrate comms from THS Message to WhatsApp as seems preferable to everyone that we’ve met.

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This is the problem, I don’t gave a number for them! They confirmed when they were overseas and said they would get in touch when they were back, which is now two days ago. This is the first time I have had a sir confirmed without a chat and number exchange prior to confirming.

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I’ve always had contact numbers and messages on WhatsApp with all previous sitters from pre confirmation. Won’t make that mistake again!

Did you have any success in contacting your sitters @ellieh ?

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They did come back to me today saying they would get back to me today ( nothing so far) with a time for us to chat tomorrow.. this is the first time I haven’t actually spoken to sitters prior to confirming, and not having a contact number. I won’t do it again! I’ll also refer to it in my review!

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