Thank you Linda,
That is exactly how I was feeling. Its so good to hear someone mirror my worries and thoughts.
It is however the HO’s first sit. I do feel they could have sorted out the things they didn’t understand, or were having difficulty with, back in April. But I don’t know what else is happening in their life.
Right now I just feel really relieved that it is all sorted out now 
Thank you. Thats very kind of you.
I do at least have other peoples contact details now, just in case of emergency. I hope they are reliable !
Anyway, I’m hoping thats the worst of it over now 
Thank you very much for your advice !
I’m glad it has all worked out. I am sure you are getting lots of love from the two dogs.
I’ve gone so far as to google the HO’s name, city and phone if I have it to track down an address before I got the welcome guide.
It is needed so I can plan my transportation. Of course, I am in the US so it’s easier to suss it out than if it were in different countries.
Hi @PajamaJan thank you for joining in the conversation and welcome to our community forum … our members are very resourceful, sometimes we need to be but timely communication. from both sides, when arranging sits can avoid problems and is the way to ensure success and that every sit is the best experience for everyone involved.
Both sitters and owners have planning associated their pet and housesitting and it’s mutually beneficial to be able to manage this in the most considerate and efficient way. It really is all about communication, dotting the i’s & crossing the t’s.
Enjoy connecting with members around the world and we hope to see much more of you.
Angela and the team
How stressful for you!
That should be necessary, however.
Personally I’d be querying the sit by that stage.
Was thinking a bit abt this - I guess a HO may not want to give away an address too early (which is perfectly understandable), but clear comms is essential.
Thankfully I’m here now, and its worked out as well as possible, so all fine
Hello everyone, we are just reading the posts re difficulties in contacting a home owner. We have recently applied for a sit and got a message to say we had been chosen and asking us to accept the sit. We found this a bit odd as we normally exchange emails or have a chat before a sit is mutually agreed. We accepted the sit and I then emailed the home owner to ask if we had actually been chosen. We received a short reply to say that we had, the owner explained that they were new to the site. We then sent another email, providing our contact details asking for confirmation of arrival times as we needed to arrange a Cattery for our cat and sort out travel details, we again got a short response letting us know what time to arrive and depart the sit. We have now been waiting for over two weeks for a response to an email that we sent asking for a contact number so that we could communicate and a post code, so that we can plan our travel. The sit is over 4 hours drive from our home, we have booked annual leave from work and our cat is booked into the cattery and the last message that we sent over two weeks ago, has not been read by the home owner. The sit is due to go ahead three weeks from now. We have been a member of THS since 2015 and have never encountered this problem before. Does anyone have any suggestions? Thank you
Hi @Ashbash1 Welcome to our Community forum, thank you for being part of our community since 2015 I’m sure you have some wonderful experiences to share and I’m sorry your first interaction is with an issue, although I’m sure we will be able to solve this for you.
I’m going to pick this via DM as we can’t discuss individual members and sits on the forum.
I hope you enjoy being here and the conversations and we look forward to sharing in your THS journey over the years.
Angela & The Team
Thank you Angela,
Will you be contacting us via email?
thank you
There may be things going on at the other end (with the HO family), but I think you need to decide how long you can wait ‘in limbo’ (particularly in regards to your own situation).
I don’t live far away from the sit, and hadn’t needed to make nay special arrangements.
I hope Angela is able to help and advise you, as THS will have direct contact details for the HO.
Let us know how you get on
I hope it works out well!
I’m struggling to understand what your alluding to re your not living far from the sit/special arrangements comment.
I don’t have to arrange flights, or make extensive travel plans, and it would not have been a huge inconvenience to try around and drive home had the sit been cancelled.
I hope things soon sort out for you.
Ah!
Cheers Bridget.
Now that I’m onto my next sit, I just wanted to add here that, despite a bit of a stressful beginning, I really enjoyed this sit. I’m glad it all worked out.
Also want to say ‘thanks’ to everyone that offered tips and advice. I really appreciated your support.
That so good to here @BridgetC and we are really pleased to hear that it all worked out well. Lovely to hear also that the community here helped you with their advice - this is what we always hoped the forum would be… a place for members to connect and support each other. Enjoy your current house sit!!
As mentioned in another forum post it would be helpful if sitters could contact previous sitters for situations like these as well.
This is my pet peeve.
As a sitter I like to browse sits, if I see one I like I apply. I hold off applying for other sits until I get notice from the HO.
I don’t like applying for lots then having to say no to some.
I normally wait a couple of days and if no reply I then browse again.
How long do you wait?
I generally apply for mutiple sits. Once the homeowner has read my application, I give them 24 to 48 hours to respond, depending on when and where the sit is located. If I don’t hear from them I might do a quick follow up (depending on how badly I want the house sit). If hear nothing then I withdraw my application and move on. We are full-time housesitters and can’t afford to wait around for days or weeks for a homeowner to respond, so we work best with decisive and communicative people. We’ve completed 63 house sits over the past 3 1/2 years and this process has worked well for us.
We apply the same way you do.
We are not full time pet-sitter so we apply when we really want to go. We always apply only once sit at a time and wait for an answer before applying to another one. It can take more than 2 days to get an answer.
We are sometime disappointed not to be chosen but always find another listing appealing to us…
We “only” do 6 to 8 sits a year.