Since I mentioned that I’ve had a high rate of date changes, I decided to look back and see where they were or if there were any other commonalities. The majority were in the US (not all, but most) and most were sits where the HOs were driving to their destination (not this particular sit). Much easier to change dates when you’re driving. Might be a good idea to reconfirm dates a few times with HOs who are driving.
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Wow, that is pretty bold of the Owner. You are well within your right to tell her that you cannot be there on the new start date. And you should not feel guilty about it!
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I agree with you & find it hard to understand the chopping & changes of dates by HOs. We’ve all busy lives & I’d be very unhappy about these sorts of changes as our schedule is very tightly managed.
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We have been caught out a quite a bit in the early days of Sitting, I always check several times, If it is a sit that’s booked a year out, I send each Month, sometimes, they have changes that out of their control or their Travel agent changed it, the airlines, tour company etc. When we were sitting back to to back full time, I had to make sure with the HO that if their flight was delayed was there someone that could come over etc. I just sent to my June Sits to check dates and what time they would like us to arrive and their ETA home, sometimes they honestly just forget and updating the THS site is not on their mind, “we have a sitter in place”
There might be a few who change their plans and then get upset because you can’t just drop everything and meet their needs, however I think they are the exception.
After we have confirmed the sit, I WhatsApp them and keep in touch that way, I send each Month depending on how are out they are and then a Month before, 2 Weeks before, a Week before and then 2 days before and the day before to say " we will see you at … time etc or let you know when have arrived and Pets are accounted for"
What a lot of HO don’t think about is, many of us are doing full time, some back to back sitting and we have other things going on in our lives too. Eg sending house notes and the sit is 4mths away, it’s great, however things change, a gentle reminder has anything changed about a Month beforehand and 2 weeks before.
We had a HS where we knew that they had 1/4 Pets pass away before our sit a Month before, we knew about that, we got found 2/3 pets, it was common for this Pet to only show up for Food and then sleep in cupboard, we checked the cupboard, nil, we checked everywhere, I even sent the Teens walking either ends of the Rd looking just in case, before I was going to ring the Vet’s and I thought I will just call their CP, who asked “what colour one is that?” If I had of rung the Vets they would have told me that it had indeed passed away a week before. The HO was pre occupied and upset with loosing another beloved Pet so soon, they just forgot to tell me and because we don’t seem them, we arrive and leave without seeing them, they just simply forgot. We saw them on return and told them I had called their CP before my next call was the Vet, just so they knew that I had called them. I didn’t say anything while they were away, they really needed the break, they just wanted to be sure that the 2 remaining pets were happy, healthy and having a lovely “staycation”.
Happy Sitting
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@BonnyinBrighton did you get replies are there any unexpected date changes ?
None so far 
although some arrival departure time adjustments agreed to make things work better on both sides.
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I booked a sit months ago in AZ, on the way back from winter in CA. 3 weeks, looked great. I knew that she might add a day on the back end. Then over the holidays, I sent a message if she knew what her dates were to come back. She still had not booked flights. First she started asking if I could come earlier. No, I had a month long sit ending the day before in southern Cal. Then it became 3 days on the back end. But I had booked a sit in Toronto, for my return and wanted to stop at the dentist in Detroit on the way. It was getting crazy. Finally I am leaving 2 days later, at noon, when her plane arrives 8 pm, so someone will have to check on the dog. But that is kind of crazy.
fabulous reply. We must stand up for ourselves, always.
Sitters expect hosts to honor their published dates, however in my experience, many sitters apply for our listing, shutting down other applicants by filling the que, and then during a subsequent communication, often when we’ve prioritized them and put other sitters on hold, during the videochat they say “oh those dates don’t work for me, can we change them?”.
If sitters expect respect and consideration from hosts, they oughta do the same for them.
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As someone who had this happend to me as a sitter – and I don’t even sit that often, I get the frustration. BUT I don’t think the small number of homeowner who might regularly come to the forum are going to see this and change their tune.
To me this one of those things that involves some work around. I always ask about how concrete the plans are – Have the plan tickets been purchased? etc to try to pin homeowners down as much as I can. The sit that did have a change had it becaue the host completely messed up and made reservations for the wrong week so it was tougher on them then on me!
I don’t think you can avoid this happening entirely, but you I think you can lessen the odds each time before you confirm by making sure hosts are aware how this works and that they risk going through the entire process again if they change things. I don’t think all hosts are aware of that.
The system itself doesn’t encourage this. Hosts get warnings when they change the date and understand the sitter might not be able to do the new dates and doesn’t have to accept them.
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Am wondering whether a change of sit dates with the same sitter agreeing to the change will mean the booking fee will be charged again. @Jenny is this something you could get clarification on please?
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I thought it would work as a cancellation and new listing but yesterday, I asked a host to cancel a confirmed sit. When the sit was confirmed, I got the message: “if you are charged a booking fee and the sit is cancelled, it will be refunded”. I am a premium member, so no booking fee but the sit was then published again with a change of dates and I was asked if I still could make the dates, it appears as though they declined my application for the new dates even though I didn’t apply or accept the change, so I guess for THS is the same sit.
That’s interesting @Newpetlover. Hopefully we can get some clarification through Jenny.
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For some reason, I thought that if you change the dates for a confirmed sit, the Sitter has to re-confirm by re-accepting the invite. If not, sure seems like it should be the case…although I expect that getting people to update their sit dates on the platform might be even more challenging, then.
Oops; just saw @Newpetlover’s comment. Still a bit confused tho; can they change the dates, or do they have to cancel & post a new sit, thus making me re-apply?
Yes. Hosts get warnings that they this shouldn’t be done without an extraordinary reason since it requires cancelling the initial dates. Then the sitter gets a notice that the dates have been cancelled and they can accept the new dates or not. This is assuming the homeowner doesn’t just give the sitter new dates, which the sitter thinks they have to accept.
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I hope so because I am a bit puzzled.
They have to cancel but I don’t know about reapplying, it may be just confirming the new dates, just as we do when the dates change before confirmation.
In my case, it was me who asked for the sit to be cancelled because I was only informed after confirming that there would be a third party overlapping my sit, I only realized there had been a change of dates because I got the message through THS and despite the fact that I didn’t confirm or reapply, I still got the message that my application had been declined, even after I had been informed of the cancellation. It’s a bit ridiculous but the same happens if I withdraw an application, when the sit is confirmed by someone else I still get the condolences message that I wasn’t chosen.
Everything seems a bit messy so I don’t think it’s going to work “smoothly” when refunding the fees.
Hopefully @Jenny or another moderator can shed some light on this.
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how is that relevant? She booked me with specific dates, though mentioned in the chat that it might be extended a day. Which I could accomodate, then asked for a 3 day extension on the sit, which is a bit much.
She is not canceling the initial dates. I have had that happen before and once, declined the new dates. I do not want to have to look for a new 3 week sit during that period on my way back, so I am taking it and we agreed on the date and time of my departure, which is out of the system. I think that happens a lot.
I was speaking to the topic in general not you specifically. Hosts aren’t the only ones who may try to change sit dates.