Sitter canceling after confirming

Hi, I’m interested if many HO have had the sitter cancel (apart from covid related cancellations). It seems to me once you have confirmed a sit, that only under extraordinary conditions would a sitter cancel. Otherwise a sit can be confirmed months in advance only to be cancelled if they find something better? Is there some way of noting this on their profile, or showing some feedback? Appreciate any input from sitters/HO, again, this has just happened to me and it is non-covid related. Thank you!

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Hi @collinsara I’m very sorry that you’ve had a sitter cancel and I see that you’ve had many great sitters over the years. I’m going to pass this over to the Membership Services Team to pick up with you directly, also @Therese for when she is back online.

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Hi @collinsara, we are sitters and pride ourselves on never cancelling a sit. I believe any reputable sitter would say the same. We are a couple so that does give us the advantage of having one of us available if the other were incapacitated due to medical or other issues that would prevent either of us coming. Since Covid began we have had 3 cancellations, all by mutual consent as HO’s were unable to travel and/or borders were closed after the sit was agreed on. It sounds a though you have been unlucky to have a sitter not fully committed. I am sure you will be able to find a sitter to fill that gap :slight_smile:

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Hello @collinsara I’m sorry to hear of this situation. I am a sitter and have been with THS for more than 7 years. Some years ago I had a sit booked that was a couple of months away. All seemed good and I was so looking forward to it. Then I had news that my mother’s health had gone rapidly downhill. Although she was in her early 90s, she had been extremely fit, walking about 3 - 5 miles a day and active in so many ways. I was told it was likely months, and that I should be prepared. My sit was in the Hamptons, NY, and my mother lived in Wales. Even though I didn’t know an exact timeframe, I knew my mother had to be my priority. I contacted the homeowner, who was extremely understanding and supportive, for which I was truly grateful. Sometimes circumstances do warrant cancelling. As was the case then, I would only do so in extraordinary circumstances, but sadly they do happen.

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Hi @collinsara , like @liz we are sitters who don’t cancel, once the sit is confirmed it’s locked in and we move our lives around those dates. We pride ourselves on being reliable trsutworthy sitters as ultimately it’s our reputation that would be damaged. We also had 4 sits cancelled in 2021 due to COVID-19, 3 were initiated by the owners and 1 by us, all due to government border changes & closures preventing travel. We agonised over the fact that we would be disappointing our HOs and they were the same when they cancelled us. In all cases we were all very understanding with each other as this is the world we currently live in (my mantra is “be flexible & adaptable & have redundable airfares!”). Thankfully now that’s all settling down and giving us all more confidence to travel. There should be no cancellations other than in the most extreme circumstances, change of heart to do a better sit is not one of them. Regards, Jenny

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I’m going to close this post to allow the Membership Services Team to manage on a one to one basis with the members involved.

Thank you everyone.

@collinsara I will email you directly from membership services. Kind regards Therese

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