My first post here and hoping for some input. We returned from a short break away to find our house sitters have drunk all the alcohol left in the fridge and then gone as far as to go through our display cabinet to take more alcoholic. Our fridge was left with 2 shelves empty for the house sitters own things along side milk and butter we had left for them. At no stage were we asked if they could drink some £30-40 of alcohol. There was spilt alcohol around our kitchen including in the dogs beds and left over the kitchen work tops. We feel quite violated and upset. Where do we go from here? We have the same house sitters booked to return in a few months which naturally we want to cancel, we now don’t feel comfortable using this platfrom at all if I am honest.
That’s totally not OK. You might want to report them to membership services. Support@trustedhousesitters.com.
Your sitters not only took something that doesn’t belong to them and wasn’t offered, apparently they even left things messy. Insult to injury.
Sorry you’ve had that experience, but there are plenty of good sitters who wouldn’t do anything like that. How were your sitters’ previous reviews?
As a sitter, I’d never drink or eat anything I wasn’t offered. And even when I’ve been invited to hosts’ alcohol, if I want more than one drink, I’ll buy my own. My reviews speak to treating hosts’ home and belongings with respect, and not leaving a mess.
My current hosts are first-time THS users as well. As the wife said, she picked me based on reviews. And she’s someone who’s written a book and runs a group on how to be a landlord with rental properties — being selective with tenants, as well as THS sitters, is important.
But what had you told them? Maybe to use the stuff in the fridge?
It often happens that hosts show me where the booze is, without explicit limits or permissions. When they tell me where the wine etc is, I take that as permission, I am not going to ask about it.
Did you specifically state that they were to have only the milk and butter? Pet parents are really different when it comes to their food and beverages including alcohol. I’ve had some pet parents say nothing at all about what we can eat and drink and then there are the really gracious ones where they say “mi casa es su casa. Eat and drink anything you want” If you weren’t specific they it was up to their discretion. If you were specific and they went against what was agreed, then shame
We have written in our house rules to not drink our alcohol.
We do gift 1-2 bottles of wine to the sitters but other than that it is written and clear that they are not to touch our booze.
Did you have a welcome guide with house rules saying please don’t drink our alcohol?
My POV: It should be the other way around. Unless a host specifically says you’re welcome to something, it’s not available unless you ask and get an OK. Otherwise, going by the approach you suggested, hosts would have to laboriously go through everything in the house and say what wasn’t available.
And I say the above as a sitter, never a THS host.
They advised in their listing they were experienced sitters but new to this platform. I’ve since discovered they’ve actually had two other profiles in the past. We had a fab first sit a few months ago with another sitter and leave very clear instructions including that there is a cupboard they can use thats clear other than tea/coffee/sugar they can help themselves and 2 clear shelves in the fridge that has butter and milk to help themselves. The sitter has since denied taking anything so they absolutely know it was wrong otherwise they would have said they thought they could help themselves. They had 2 good reviews on their profile. If they hadn’t have stolen bottles of expensive alcohol I would have also given them a good review as the mess wasn’t the end of the world. All in all it just feels a massive shame on only our second time hosting to have found a bad egg.
They suck. Please note in your review that they drank your alcohol without permission and help other hosts avoid them.
Are you saying that they’ve had two previous THS profiles?
Is there anybody else with access?
I did a sit where the owner found the cordless vacuum cleaner broken and partially disassembled. And I know that I did not do that. That was about much more than 30 GBP.
I’ve left a review, that they’ve since commented on saying I made it all up. Considering the same sitters were booked to do our next sit in October it would be very odd of me to make something like that up! I would rather they had just said sorry, that they didn’t realise it was totally out of bounds. I’ve managed to find screen shots of reviews from previous THS profiles that they have used on their listings on other websites. One is in a different name and one is in the womans name. Their current profile is in the mans name.
Nobody else with access no and she told me while we were away that she herself hadn’t left the house. She has told me today that they had friends round mind you. From the state of my kitchen and the missing bottles as well as how dirty our hot tub was, I can only assume they had a party.
Wow, they sound like people to avoid in life. Of course, such people have little or no ethics and are actively trying to fool others, so it’s an outrageous situation. I hope you’ll find better sitters in the future, whether on THS or otherwise.
We don’t eat or drink anything unless the pet parents specifically state that we can and even then we most of the times don’t as we like to buy our own groceries. All I’m saying is that every sitter has their own opinions and discretions on what is appropriate or not if left vague
It’s terrible. Future HO’s will look at their poor response to your review of them, and realise that they are bad bad sitters. You already know we’re not all like that.
We’ve been told to ‘help ourselves’ to anything in the fridge or cupboards, but we’ve NEVER actually done that, a gift of a bottle of wine or two or chocs is appreciated & herbs & spices, & tea & coffee is the most we usually touch unless we replace things.
It’s true that people will have varying perspectives, but the problem with those who want to take advantage is that they’ll be the ones in life — not just sitting — who’ll say something like, well, it wasn’t expressly off limits (or such). They’re the kind of people who ruin things in society. They’re why we can’t have nice things and why rules and laws are created that actually unnecessarily limit other people, ones who aren’t jerks. Like the no overlapping rule wasn’t made out of the blue. The outlier, freak show sitters who ended up booking overlapping sits and neglecting pets led to that. SMH.
Yes our first sitter was amazing. We bought her gifts back from our trip and even met up again a few weeks later just for a catch up. These sitters made a last minute excuse as to why they couldn’t meet us the morning we left and then left an hour before we returned home. So many red flags in hindsight so I feel quite stupid. Just glad our animals were ok with whatever went on. Luckily it was only a 4 day trip!
That’s the sort of sitter you need, a natural connections, and you’s obviously got on great to meet back up again! Always trust your intuition as soon as you see a red flag.
So sad @Bickerley that your first posting on the forum was regarding such a bad experience.
Rest assured there are great sitters out there who would not take advantage of your hospitality and give your pets the care and respect they deserve.
Come on guys …… who in their right mind is going to think £30 of alcohol is up for grabs then rifling through cupboards to find more?
I’m fed up reading about what sitters ate or drank on a sit or what hosts leave or not leave for the sitters. Would you go to an acquaintance house and eat everything in the store cupboard? We are there to look after the pets and property nothing more, nothing less. If you can’t afford to feed yourself don’t expect the hosts to provide food (and drink). If you are that hard up I would suggest getting a job instead of pet sitting. People who expect (or take) things give the genuine sitters a bad name. There is no written rule we get free food. Go to a pet sit with your own food and be very grateful if the host has left something. But ask first!
Grrrrrrr.
Hello All,
Thank you for all the support you have given this home host/PP. This issue has been passed to Membership Services.
Regards,
Maeve