Let’s Make the Welcome Guide Work for Everyone!

Dear Pet Parents,

Please, I kindly urge you not to reinvent the Welcome Guide. It’s a vital tool for your sitter to ensure your pets are happy and your home is cared for exactly as you wish. To make sits smooth and stress-free, I ask you to fill it out completely—include as many details as possible about your pet’s routines, habits (both good and bad), and behaviors.

While tips about local food and wine spots are nice, they pale in importance to understanding how your pet behaves and what care they need. Every small insight into your pet’s quirks—whether it’s a preference for certain toys, nervousness around strangers, or specific routines—makes a big difference in how we provide the best possible care.

To TrustedHousesitters:
I’d also suggest reviewing the format of the Welcome Guide to make it easier for pet parents to update and modify. A printed Welcome Guide should be mandatory, with critical information—like the internet password and emergency contact numbers—front and center on the first page.

As a sitter, I’ve noticed a growing trend among pet parents here in the U.S. to overload their sitters with non-pet-related chores. For instance, during one recent sit, the homeowner requested that I wash and fold a large bag of her housekeeper’s rags. When I respectfully declined, I was made to feel like the bad guy. This is where a clear, thorough Welcome Guide would help establish boundaries and expectations ahead of time.

Additionally, last-minute updates can sometimes be problematic. On one sit, a pet parent messaged me saying they’d updated the Welcome Guide, but when I checked, the guide displayed a block of garbled code. When I asked for clarification, they dismissed it, and upon arrival, I discovered a handwritten list of “last thoughts.” To my dismay, it included a note that the gardener would arrive the next day- early Saturday morning at 8:30 a.m., and I was to unlock the door in case he needed to come inside to use the restroom. This type of situation is entirely avoidable with a properly filled-out guide shared in advance.

To the TrustedHousesitters Community:
Have others experienced challenges with incomplete Welcome Guides, poor manners, or unreasonable requests? Are there solutions being worked on to address these issues? I’d love to hear your input.

As sitters, we want to provide the best care for your pets and homes. A comprehensive, clear Welcome Guide isn’t just helpful—it’s essential. It ensures a better experience for everyone involved.

Thank you for your input and consideration!

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This is all very well but I doubt it will make a jot of difference.
In my experience very few home owners bother to complete the Welcome Guide and, if they do, leave lots of gaps. I find I get more information from video calls where I ask all the relevant questions about the pets.
THS has, as usual without our request, amended the Welcome Guide but not yet bothered sorting out other things we’ve been asking for. They will also not read this. You’ve also put this in the ‘sitter questions’ instead of ‘owners’ category, although as a sitter I read the ‘owners’ category

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As @Smiley says the forum isn’t read by THS HQ so that’s where you need to send the request for WG changes and updates. Personally we’d have no issues with washing & folding some rags for the housekeeper (we do it in two of our repeat sits) or letting the gardener/cleaner in. (We also do this). Will caveat it with these “chores” are for super nice HOs who leave us goodies, have great pets & comfy homes and because of the housekeeper and gardener we have very little cleaning too! However when an HO asked us to supervise a team of gardeners for a full day (we spoke no Sinhalese and they spoke no English) for some returfing then it was a resounding no on all levels. Totally overstepping boundaries. You have to do what suits you @TidyCat and it’s different for all of us. #lifeislikeaboxofchocolates

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Hi @TidyCat

I’ve popped this over to the Owners category as I think it fits better here :slight_smile:

As always, the Forum team can’t promise any changes, but are always happy to pass over feedback wherever we can.

Jenny

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What I really do not understand is why it’s not mandatory to fill out the welcome guide before listing. There could be feasible options to address this. For example, it could be made mandatory to submit a completed welcome guide before a listing can go live. This guide could then be reviewed—something that could easily be handled by AI nowadays.

Additionally, I see no point in sitters only gaining access to the welcome guide after they’ve agreed to the sit. Let’s be honest, only a pet owner can cancel a sit—what kind of nonsense is that? This inevitably leads to more unnecessary conflicts than needed.

Instead, there could be a mechanism where the homeowner can only confirm the sit once the sitter has read and approved the welcome guide. Since the welcome guide would already need to be completed and submitted beforehand, this would result in minimal delays. It could even work like this: after the video call, the homeowner clicks a “Send Welcome Guide” button, unlocking it for the sitter to review. The sitter reads, agrees, and then the homeowner can confirm the sit. Done.

Sitters should be valued just as much as homeowners. Otherwise, the platform loses its purpose.

PS: Of course, it goes without saying that all personal details, such as addresses and phone numbers, would be greyed out in the unconfirmed version.

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I’ll add the HO perspective - I update my WG before every sit, just because I’m kind of extra like that. And even though I do sits through THS at least 2x a year, there are always new things to fill out that I’ve gotten NO NOTICE about.

So, to sitters, I say - those incomplete WGs are not necessarily a sign of negligent HOs. If they’ve been around a long time, they probably don’t know about the many, many changes in WG fields even in the last 2 years.

And yes, I wish that there was a function that would bar a listing from going live, and a WG from being shared, unless new fields were filled out.

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One of my hosts forgot to update their welcome guide to reflect that they’d moved to a higher floor. Luckily, I asked them about the trash chute or such and they went to look or add to their WG and then realized that their info was outdated.

Personally, I ask for the WG early and read it right away. That way, if anything’s missing or off, I can ask promptly. Lucky for me, I dodged a bad sit because of that — host mentioned dealbreakers in their WG, which they should’ve shared at the outset.

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You make some excellent points. If only THS would listen & implement them

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This is a fantastic idea! It makes so much sense, because HO’s can only squeeze so much info into a listing and keep it concise enough not to scare sitters off. And, as mentioned, it’s difficult to update and keep straight, especially as old information still crops up unexpectedly.

It would also have prevented an issue where our sitter waited until parking at my house to read the welcome guide. She’d given herself a few minutes before our walk-through. Had she read the WG she’d have known that she would not have cell service when she arrived and wouldn’t be able to retrieve it. The WiFi password was also in the WG. That was frustrating and made the walk-through laborious, but thankfully the sit went well enough.

Sitters should mention incomplete WG’s in their reviews, and I guess I could have knocked a star off self-sufficient? Maybe that’s the only way to enact real change.

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Yes, we recently had the ‘oh, don’t worry, we’ve done our own book of words’. There was very little info in the welcome guide and certainly not enough info about the animal. I want to know what the dog’s day looks like: timings/food/furniture rules/treats/how many poos to expect/where to walk etc etc. I’d also like to be able to print the whole thing out as one document without wasting paper or having to do a cut and paste, just in case I can’t access it electronically.

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Having the THS Welcome Guide mandatory would be a problem for us as we find that a Word document is much more practical and convenient. In our document we have all important contacts, 4 pages on our cats, 6 pages on the apartment and appliances and electronics, info about the car, info about the neighbourhood, a calendar of the important stuff, maps to nearby trails, etc. It’s up to 20 pages now and we would have a hard time splitting that in a different format. We share it as soon as the sitter is confirmed and we update it as soon as anything in it is outdated, at least once a year. There are no surprises in there that would have a sitter reconsider after being confirmed. And we certainly wouldn’t hold it against a sitter if something wasn’t done appropriately when not mentioned in the guide. As with anything it’s all about communication whatever the format or the sequence of events.

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I completely understand that some people may find this structure too rigid, but I still believe it’s a great template, especially for those who are new and need guidance in creating their guide. Additionally, having information presented in a consistent structure is very beneficial.

For those with extensive guides like yours, the platform could allow users to upload their own documents as a supplement. It would be relatively simple to use AI to process these uploaded documents, extract the key information, and place it into the structured template automatically. This could be fully automated and would maintain flexibility for homeowners while ensuring sitters always have access to the essentials as well as additional helpful details when necessary.

The platform could also include a feature showing when the Welcome Guide was last updated, reassuring sitters that the information is current.

Additionally, sending reminders to homeowners before a sit to check if their Welcome Guide is still valid and up to date would be another way to ensure accuracy and reliability.

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The welcome guide as it exists is cumbersome, but man oh man it would be great to have a shortented nitty-gritty “repsponsibilities” section that sitters could see and then have a think about – maybe 24 hours possible to negotiate or go over with the homeowner before actually accepting.

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No Welcome Guide was provided on our last sit. The tiny dog suffered with ‘reverse cough’ something I knew nothing about - it was worrying experience. Added to that there were no contact details for the vet. I even had to call the owner for the address - but you live and learn!

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I am a HO and I try to keep as much info as possible in the Welcome Guide but sometimes there’s only so much one can write into it. Of course everything about the behavior of my pets is a must (luckily they are very easy going and undemanding) but about the surroundings, shops etc. is just too much to fill in. I write a very! detailed WG and leave it with as much brochures and entrance tickets to great locations. Also a detailed description where to find certain ‘stuff’ for the day-to-day living in the house and garden. I think that makes living in my house much easier for the pet sitter.

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Add it to a list of things to ask the owner during a video call, if not in a Welcome Huide

I 100% agree with your entire response (but since this forum doesn’t indicate to whom we are responding, I had to have a quote)!

Absolutely—I understand about having your own document but I think everything should be viewable through the THS site.

As an aside, I suggest that sitters take screenshots or otherwise save the guide/s, as HOs can edit and change it after you have read/agreed to it.

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@TrustedTeam please consider a welcome guide that you must fill in before posting your sit. If there’s a longer document, allow it to be supplied as a digital link.

This extra step will save all of us a lot of headaches. Many owners don’t provide basic information that is integral to deciding to do a sit or not.

The full list of responsibilities should be fully disclosed PRIOR to posting.

Sitters: Please post public reviews about this issue until it’s addressed, so THS understands the extent of the damage caused. It’s hugely costly when a sit is not properly briefed.

They may not realise how much this lack of detail is creating so much drama and loss of safety, funds and viability for sitters being taken advantaged of without the support of fully disclosed information about their sit, before they accept and spend money to honour a sit.

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As a HO with an extensive Welcome Guide I’d like to mention that I update mine before each sit just to make sure TH hasn’t added new fields that I need to update. If Owners could get a notification from TH when there are new fields to update in the Welcome Guide it would be great! I also print a copy of the Welcome Guide to leave for the sitter just in case. But I also want to mention that while it should be mandatory for Owners to fill out a Welcome Guide, it should also be mandatory for a Sitter to read it. Our last sitter admitted the day they arrived that they hadn’t read the Welcome Guide and it made me feel some kind of way because I took such great care in making sure it was updated and then I felt like I had to tell them everything that was in it the night they arrived because I didn’t want them to miss anything. So it goes both ways. But I truly appreciate all our sitters that read the document and ask questions if they have any. Also note we book most of our sitters out 3-6 months before a sit so there is plenty of time for them to read the Welcome Guide before the sit.

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