I had a sitter that kinda bailed on us for an upcoming sit. She applied, we talked, I sent her a confirmation and she said it would take 2 days to confirm. Not a problem. After not hearing back after three weeks, I asked her of she was still doing the sit(I had plenty of time at this point)she said she needed two days. SHe got back to me and said she could not, in fact, do the sit. Fine, Whatever, but I was bummed because even though she only had a THS review, she sounded like a DREAM!!! Oh Well. SO, just out of curiosity, I have been checking her reviews because she had months of sits booked up. OMG!!! The reviews are HORRIBLE. The last folks had to call the police! I sure dodged a bullet with this one. My point is, check your sitters reviews even AFTER you have booked them. Yes, we all know that some people can’t be pleased and I think most can read that but I don’t know what I would do if this woman was going to sit for us. Can you cancel someone for their poor reviews?
If new serious information comes to light that wasn’t revealed at the time that you agreed to the sit - then it must be possible to unconfirm them .
Is this the same sitter you posted about previously?
No it is not
Your story is a bit weird to me.
Why would you wait 3 weeks for her to officially confirm the sit before checking with her?
You say she had one review when you confirmed her but after her delay you read other reviews. Where were those other reviews? I can’t understand why you wouldn’t have read everything about her before your chat as I’m sure most owners would and, as a sitter, I read feedback other sitters have given the owners.
Did she tell you she had months of sits booked up or did you check her calendar.
She wasn’t booked as she didn’t accept…
We do this with HOs as well. Recently that paid off as a critical review from a sitter raised a big issue for us which we ironed out with the HO before we arrived.
@Smiley
I think the chronology is that during the 3 weeks of waiting (which is an alarm bell in itself since the sitter said they would respond in 2 days) – during that time other sits were completed and reviewed by pet parents. All @catdad would have to do is keep checking the sitter’s profile to see if more reviews had come in. Remember, with the 2 week window to do reviews, that is potentially 5 weeks of sits for more feedback to come in.
And yes, the sitter wasn’t booked because they didn’t accept. Thus, the OP dodged a bullet. I think this is good advice.
It is always a good idea for both sitter and owners to do this especially when a sit is confirmed months in advance.
It’s also wise to do this to check that the other party is still a THS member .
As sitters we do keep an eye on any additional reviews and the listing ( which can be re-written and updated at anytime between a sit being confirmed and the start date )
This can flag up new pets or medical conditions which the owner may have forgotten to update us on ( not necessarily deliberately )
As sitters we are happy for owners to keep up to date with our recent reviews for reassurance . We are proud of our consistent and growing record of happy owners and well cared for homes and pets .
This was a big red flag. It would be for anyone, whether host or sitter.
@catdad I revisted a confirmed sitters reviews 48 hrs before they were due to sit. They had become very evasive about their arrival time telling me it wasn’t necessary for me to know what their travel plans were… As we had agreed to pick them up from either from the train station or the airport depending on their mode of transport we needed to know. The conversation left me very uneasy so I rechecked their reviews…
A couple of new 5 star reviews but a 1 star review from HO that had previosly left a 5 star review for the same dates.
The sitter had double booked and completed 2 sits with at 5 day overlap. They took the pet to the other home without permission.
As you can’t amend an exisiting review, the HO was allowed to leave a 2nd review for the same sit period.
Now I always revisit reviews for confirmed sitters on a regular basis.
Reviews are important for sure. Both from sitter and homeowners.
So if a sitter has a review, I also check that homeowners other reviews.
Because we are all different.
And after some reviews it is rather clear what kind of sitter/homeowner it is.
@Manunited were you able to cancel the sitter and fins a replacement ? Did they remain a sitter on THS ?
I am aghast!
Definitely dodged a bullet @catdad. I always agree that as soon as I get offered a sit we agreed on I’ll confirm asap and send screenshots of my flights/train bookings.
@Manunited perhaps we have this sitter to thank for the introduction of “no overlapping sits”!!!
I once came upon a HO review of a sitter that complained about the sitter putting over 6000km on their vehicle during his 3 month sit for them and getting a speeding ticket in a city that was 600km from their home. Looking at the sitter profile, I could see that this sitter did THREE other sits during those same 3 months. 1 was 150km away and the other 2 were in the city 600km away. I cannot even imagine the pet transporting shenanigans that must have occurred. I attempted to report it to THS but was shut down because I was neither the HO or sitter involved. Obviously, this was all before the no overlap policy was introduced. This sitter appears to have let his membership expire. Unbelievable
@MaggieUU but why did/do people do this?? Is it just to increase their review count? I just don’t get it, and your example was just so disgraceful!
I have no answers for you @ziggy. It had to have taken all the joy out of petsitting.
I was quite literally nauseated when I put it all together
Taking multi-tasking to a whole new level.
@MaggieUU . That’s horrendous, unbelievable. It least there’s no chance of that happening now, with the no overlap rules.