Have any other sitters felt it necessary to decline an invitation to sit, due to the cost of travelling there and back?
Absolutely. Or the timing, or the sit itself, or the pets, or the home… We have had to graciously decline invitations, at the same time wishing the HO success finding a sitter.
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Yes indeed, I always consider the distance, fuel cost, duration of sitting and attractions in the area before applying.
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Before applying ? you have no time now, you need to answerr fast… (see the thread “pause system applications”)
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Exactly. The new pause feature is annoying but it won’t stop me from applying for the sits that we want. I have a click and paste generic application which goes out immediately then I will do a personal one immediately after. We have already a rough plan of our travels in the next year and know approximately, how much it will cost. It’s in our budget so the green light has been pressed.
So come on pet owners from Mexico, Guatemala and Costa Rica you know you deserve a holiday! (Decided on sun after much thought on snow)
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@Caroline99 Yes I got invited to a nights sit in a great location and what looked like a fantastic fur baby but I had to decline as it was going to cost me just over ÂŁ90 in travel costs.
Wow…I’m not surprised you declined!
For me it’s apples to apples and oranges to oranges.
How much is that time if I had to pay rent or airbnb?
Always compare the things relative to the reality of living vs looking for cheapest or “best deal”.
What are the perks of that travel cost aka investment?
What are the opportunities that experience, investment, will provide?
new experience with animals? excitement of new interesting people, location? will it add increase to my experience, profile, or personal expansion such as people who I can learn from on a personal or overall growth goals?
I have learned more than I can ever express from sitting for people who have been outside of my regular circles. It has sparked fire in me to see and know what is possible.
And this has nothing to do with only people who are of higher social or economic status. I have learned a great deal from what some might say are simple folk. Sometimes you learn incredible things where you least expect them.
So I look at the total “package”. Sometimes it has more out of pocket expense initially but what I take away has far greater value.
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Pawtastic personally I have found that it can take quite some time to check out the cost of getting somewhere. I have often been shocked when looking for flight prices as they can vary enormously depending on the time of year and the length of time until the flight dates. I could book a flight for maybe 30euro if I am booking well ahead of time but it could be well over 200euro later.
Also, it very often costs me more to get from the airport to the sit than the cost of the flight and researching the cost of buses, trains, taxis can take a long time.
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@Amparo I appreciate everything that you are saying but if someone can’t afford it they cannot just magic up the money out of thin air. There have been hundreds of sits that I would have loved to do but I couldn’t afford to get there.
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The first thing I do is look at the cost of plane flights prior to applying on a sit. We did a wonderful sit in the Caribbean on the island of Nevis a few years ago. The homeowners arranged a taxi to pick us up at the airport and a speed boat to take us from St. Kitt’s to Nevis at their cost and took us out for a wonderful meal the first night. We had an amazing time in their oceanfront villa with pool and the use of their car and looked after their two adorable island dogs. Right from the beginning, the homeowners told us the plane flights were expensive but it didn’t deter us. The flights were very expensive but we had a wonderful stay and a great experience which you have to consider if it’s worth it when applying on certain sits. It definitely was worth the expensive flights for us to see a part of the world we hadn’t been and a wonderful experience!
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Absolutely, we are looking for Xmas sits in England and I have a list with costs to get to ones I am interested in, some are over a ÂŁ100 and some ÂŁ9, guess which ones I am applying for. After airfare from Canada, airport parking etc the costs add up.
I should add that doesn’t include the popular central London ones that reach the 5 applications and are gone before I have finished researching where they are on google maps.
While I totally respect and understand the THS guidelines for no money changing hands, I feel bad for HO’s who do not find a sitter due to sitters not applying due to this cost and end up putting their pets in kennels or cancelling their vacation.
I know I have HO’s inviting us to sits a few hours drive away that we would have accepted if our gas/petrol was covered to help them out, (of course we never mention this as it is not the THS philosophy) Currently we just don’t take the sits and decline as it is not a location we would seek out or more pets/higher needs that we would usually choose to look after.
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