as soon as circumstances allow, I’m going to avail myself of those protections 
Hi @RCsits We are so pleased that you have now found sitters.
There is another thread here that discusses your issue.
As @Lucy-B mentions, we have brought this to our tech team.
Kind regards
Therese
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It’s interesting (and unfortunate) to hear that so many HOs are having trouble finding sitters. As a sitter only, I was waiting patiently during the pandemic for listings to come back up. Found one for early May which should be confirmed soon so I’m excited!
Would someone from THS be willing to share with us the percentage of sitters who have completed their required ID and background checks (where applicable)? Have things picked up since the deadline for completion?
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Morning everyone. I have been a member of TH since 2015 and have never encountered a problem finding sitters for my trio of dogs…until now. I live close to Hampton Court, a stone’s throw from the Palace and the River Thames.
Normally I would have received 10 to 15 applications, for my previous sits in February and March, just 2 applied. Luckily both sitters were fantastic, one had not sat previously for TH and came over especially from Romania!
I had to take down my dates for the end of April as only 2 applications in 2 weeks and one of the sitters wanted a longer term stay.
So I have taken all the advice above, tweaked my listing and will repost over the weekend, fingers crossed there will be some lovely petsitters wanting to stay in sunny Surrey!
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Hi @Briggyboy99 and welcome to the forum. It’s good to hear that you’ve taken the advice of forum members, as so many members are helpful and we’ve seen success when people act on the suggestions.
One thing that’s currently being mentioned frequently is to make full use of your headline, as a promotional tool, including making sure it’s not showing stale information e.g. ‘Christmas in London’.
Once you post your listing, it’s helpful if you embed it in your forum username/profile. If you’d rather not do that, then perhaps post the location as shown on your listing, and the exact date range, so that forum members can locate it.
After a few days of posting, if you still have not found a suitable sitter, I suggest you direct message Angela and ask her to share it on social media. I’ll add the ‘fine print’ for that below:
Francine,
Voluntary Forum Moderator
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We’ve been THS members since 2017 and had nothing but great experiences until the past year. We have a trip coming up in 1.5 weeks, and we’ve had two sitters cancel on us. The first a couple months back, and the second just today. Is this becoming more common recently? We’re worried that we’ll need to cancel our trip now despite planning for it half a year in advance.
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Did they give a reason for cancelling? As a sitter, I would never cancel unless it was an absolute family emergency. So sorry to hear this happened to you.
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One was to care for a friend in the weeks after a surgery and the other is due to an unspecified family emergency. Both for the same sit after having no issues for 19+ sits in the past 
Im a sitter and would hate to cancel once a sit was agreed unless for an absolutely genuine unforseen reason.
So sorry to see this happens.
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@austentalbot There are many active sitters on the forum. If you put your listing link in your profile, that may help with increased visibility.
You can see the instructions at the top of this thread: How to add a listing or profile link to your FORUM profile
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Hello @austentalbot and welcome to the forum. I’ll suggest the following, to help promote your listing:
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If you’d prefer not to do #1, add in this post the details of your listing - location as shown on the listing, and date range.
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Review Angela’s 10 tips in this post thread and see if you can tweak any details to improve your listing. Even creating a more dynamic headline can sometimes make a difference.
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If you get to within 7 days of the start date, you can add the details in the Last-Minute Sits category.
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If you have a standard or premium membership, after a few days if you don’t have a confirmed sitter, boost your listing to move it to the front of the listings.
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Consider having your listing promoted on social media. See the post before you in this thread (#150) for details. You would need to direct message Angela to give your approval.
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Thanks, just updated my profile with the link to my listing. Do I need to close and reopen the dates for people to be notified about the availability, or should it be advertised as it were new since it’s become available again?
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I can see the link but I can’t click it. It should not be in black but in green letters, so somehow it looks different than mine or others.
It works, however, if I do copy and paste…
I just looked at your listing. It’s a nice apartment, very tidy and clean and Charlemagne seems to be a very cute little dog.
I agree with @Snowbird to maybe change the headline of the listing but otherwise I think it’s absolutely fine. All essential information is to be found and there’s nothing which would raise a red flag for me (even if I am not a sitter 
)
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@austentalbot I was able to view your listing from your forum profile, so it is active. I’m going to tag @Lucy-B for her to confirm but I think it becomes similar to a new listing. I’m not a homeowner member, so I want to make sure.
I didn’t read your listing, but do suggest that you change your headline. From the search screen, someone can already see that the sit is for a dog in Seattle. Look for what may be a highlight of your sit and create a heading by keeping that in mind. I did notice that you don’t show that a car is essential, so maybe, for example, starting your headline with ‘Walkable …’ will draw in sitters who do not have a vehicle, as most find rental costs prohibitive these days.
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@anon39388349 when links become clickable is all related to what features are available to forum members, depending on how long they’ve been on the forum. It’s part of Discourse, which is the platform the forum uses. I only have a basic understanding of that. This member joined very recently.
Hi @austentalbot so sorry to hear that you had a cancellation. I have boosted your listing for you so that it goes out as a brand new listing on the platform.
Looks like @Snowbird has already given you some great tips there and I second all of them. You are also welcome to contact our Membership Services team at any time.
All the best
Lucy
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Ah, ok, that makes sense 
Thank you all for the tips. Just updated that. Never thought much about the title when we lived in Tokyo and Singapore, but I suppose those locations were just much more in demand for visitors 
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Charlie looks adorable. I suggest reordering your photos to have something eye-grabbing upfront - one of Charlie’s happiest faces or the one with him and Seattle in the background maybe. Best of luck!
While I would prefer that the people I sit for didn’t have any of those kinds of charges, only the animal abuse one would actually affect me since I’m not required to spend any time with the people themselves. If the HO has great reviews from previous sitters and I get a good feel about them in the interview, I feel pretty comfortable staying in their home while they’re away.
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