Does anyone have any thoughts on a reasonable latest leaving time?
I’m due to leave a sit tomorrow from a first-time HO. He was quite vague about his return time when I spoke to him to agree the situation, as they have a roughly 5 hour drive home. Trouble is, so do I. I’ve tried to agree a time for me to leave by messaging this morning and it’s been radio silence. I’m getting a bit worried that in theory, I suppose, they could return any time up to midnight. I can’t drive through the night and work tomorrow.
I’m also getting paranoid that as first timers they have misunderstood the end date, thinking it’s like a hotel booking when you actually stay that night, and not understanding it’s the day I’ll leave. Has that ever happened?
Yes and we negotiated leaving at midday when they suddenly announced it would be 8pm and we were due at another sit the same day. (But they were new to sitting and just assumed we’d stay that night too) Classic comms issue where it’s not pinned down early, it was annoying but solvable fortunately with a friend stepping in for the evening walk and feed. Did you agree anything with him?
You need to be more firm, to get a firm answer. Your drive home isn’t the HO’s fault, as you agreed to do the sit, and end it on the day. If it was a problem or something that needed both of you to be flexible, then you should have discussed it upfront, which you haven’t as you would have already agreed on a time.
So you need to take the leading hand now, for example, if it’s cats that are fed twice per day, then you could say you will leave after they have had their breakfast, and if there’s any problem with that to let you know sooner rather than later.
But with dogs, it’s totally different, as they need you to be physically there for longer, so you should have been firm about a time before the HO left. So lesson learnt. But it’s probably okay to leave the dogs for 4 hours (but it depends on the dogs), so I would say, if he said 5 hours then you could safely leave about 2 hours before they are due back, and then even if they are delayed, there is plenty of flexibility.
You mention he has been quite vague, but so have you, as you ended up in this scenario, you must have been just as vague. So make a time suggestion to him, and ask him to get back to you quickly if he has any problems with it. But don’t word it as though you are asking him if it is okay with him (as I have a feeling that is possibly what you have done so far), word it as though this is the way it is going to be, unless you hear back from him quickly. So that if there’s no response, it’s whatever time you said.
Not yet. When we had our video chat I said I understand that due to their journey home I wouldn’t expect a definite time, but that I also had a long drive home, so we could sort out the details nearer the time.
I’m probably worrying unnecessarily, but I think he’s read my message this morning and not responded.
We I messaged this morning I said I needed to leave by 2pm and expected they would be back an hour or two after that so okay to leave the dog. I also asked if he thought that was a reasonable time. I could leave a bit later than that if need be. He does have a son locally for back-uo plans if he needs to get him involved.
@UKSITTER1 Because I work and often have someplace I need to be next, I put my approx. arrival and departure time in my profile. I explain that it’s part of our agreement, unless the HO negotiates prior to confirmation.
For the most part, it’s worked out well. I can’t be on call until 10p and franklyI really don’t want to be there upon HO return. In fact, on my current sit the HO actually commented that when reading my profile they considered the fact I put that in my profile a plus. For them it showed clear boundaries and good communication.
Did they leave an emergency contact? Maybe that person could watch until pet parents come home. I usually square away what time I will get there and what time I will leave before the confirmation is completed. I ask ask if there is an emergency contact in case they get delayed. There was a time I stayed one extra day because my next destination was a cabin (not petsitting) that was only a few hours away, but most of the time I do have to leave at the agreed upon time and the pet parents know that
@UKSITTER1
Glad that this is now resolved for you .
I am leaving the following post for any new THS sitters reading the thread for information-
Having completed 15 house sits with THS and with 5 more confirmed we have learned that there is no “usual time “ or “usual” approach to this .
Early on we didn’t think about checking on this information and as a result we were mid sit when we asked the HO about their return time and were thrown into a state of panic when the owner replied that they would actually be coming home several days earlier than agreed date …
From then on for all of our sits we have been the ones to proactively ask about the exact arrival and departure times . We have found that the replies can be surprising as
“oh we actually back at 5 am so you might as well leave the evening before “ … which means sit will actually end a day earlier that the confirmed sit date and
“Oh I made a mistake with the dates on our listing -we’ll be leaving a day later / arriving back a day earlier “.
This has happened on at least 7 of our sits !! - so we are glad that we actively asked prior to confirming or very soon afterwards and were able to plan accordingly. When the dates differed to the listing we also asked the homeowners to change the dates on THS explaining that it prevented us from booking another sit if the date (that they didn’t actually need us ) was confirmed on the platform . They weren’t aware of this and the issues it would cause us .
Aside from the HO coming back 3 days early- the rest of these have turned out to be 5 sits -
However, if we hadn’t proactively communicated very early on in the process about their return date and time -and planned accordingly -these all could have been quite disastrous with homeowners arriving back unexpectedly a day early or in the early hours of the morning when we were still in bed !!
So from experience we recommend a proactive approach- asking these questions about arrival and departure times prior to agreeing a sit . There is a lot a sitter can do to make sure that there is good communication before and during a sit .
sits -
