After following this topic for about a month now, I just left the following somewhat critical but constructive feedback for a homeowner we house sat for last week:
“The best part about this sit was the wonderful pets, all with loveable and distinct personalities, and how they all live in harmony. We spent a lot of time petting and rubbing the dogs and cats bellies.
The homeowner was away for 2 months, but wanted different sitters every week and hired a cleaner to “deep clean” between sitters. We were the 3rd set of sitters and when we arrived, supposedly after the ‘cleaner”, we found dirty towels lying around, a dirty refrigerator, spoiled food and an unclean dog area. We reported the situation to the home owner, since she had paid for a cleaning service. She responded immediately and put us in touch with the cleaner she had hired who was also on vacation 3,000 miles away and had delegated the cleaning to “her girls”! The homeowner had a talk with the cleaner and assured us this will not happen in the future. We are sure this mishap and challenges will make for better handover conditions for future house sitters. After spending some time the first couple of days cleaning up, we were finally able to relax and enjoy the wonderful animals and outdoor surroundings. Thank you for trusting us with your adorable animals.”
The homeowner left me a 5 star, raving review, right after the sit.
I left her a 4 star feedback 2 days after the sit.
In the past, I did not mention in my feedbacks when a house was dirty, but after 127 housesits over the last 7 years, I believe we owe each other’s the truth!
Sorry to push on on this but your reply is somewhat vague which concerns me. I hope never to be in that situation again but if I am, and refuse to stay ( which I would ) I would be hoping for the support of THS not to be punished!
Does THS have a policy of what a sitter should do if they arrive at a sit that is filthy?
Hi Colin, apologies if you felt the response was not clear, we will and do support our members and consider every situation which is brought to us on an individual basis.
If a sitter arrives at a sit and they find a situation they are not comfortable with, for any reason, we advise firstly to connect with the owner to discuss the concerns directly if this doesn’t bring a resolution the next step is to contact Membership Services.
Each situation is treated on an individual case by case basis, there is no automatic suspension. The ultimate goal is to find a solution which benefits everyone and always the care of pets is at the heart of any decision making.
Pre sit communication is so important to determine if the sit is right for everyone and we produce educational blogs and communications to help ensure each and every sit is the best possible experience advising owners how to prepare for their sitters and for all members on how to manage their arrangements pre, on and post sit.
Thank you for the detailed response - that is all very reassuring.
@Colin @Angela_L , I wouldn’t be reassured that easily Colin; for the last 6 months or more, membership services are unable to respond due to being “very busy” and as everyone knows, it’s impossible to speak to someone at THS as the automated recorded message says that because they’re so busy, “please contact membership sevices” - welcome to the merry-go-round!
The last time I contacted membership services they took a week to respond. They explained in their response that each enquiry is dealt with in the order that they are received, so the urgency of your message will have no bearing on the speed of their response.
Pre sit communication is not going to have the HO telling you that their house is a filthy mess, so this last paragraph platitude should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Hi @Reubendog & @Colin … there is a system in place for prioritising urgent messages this has 24 hour monitoring, myself and the Membership Services Team have just dealt with one 15 minutes after the member’s request for help.
Each and every member’s question or concern is important and we realise there is a delay for many at the moment but the situation is being prioritised.
I can see why a new sitter wouldn’t want to criticize – s/he realizes that s/he is short on experience, and doesn’t want to be thought a complainer. But by the time you have 10 sits, you should be up front, even if polite/subtle: “the animals were delightful but the home not too clean” or “be sure to confirm dates and details with homeowner.” Anything important in the HO’s listing that is NOT correct should be mentioned.
Hi @Angela_L @Colin , I certainly didn’t get the impression there was any prioritising - below word for word is the start of the response from THS to my last request :-
Thank you for getting in touch with us at TrustedHousesitters, I hope you are well.
I’m very sorry for the delay in responding, we’re currently experiencing exceptionally high levels of correspondence. However, we are doing our very best to get back to everyone in the order they’ve contacted us.
Apologies again and thank you so much for your patience and understanding.
get back to everyone in the order they’ve contacted us. Is there something I misunderstood here?
Then this afternoon I telephoned the number on the website :-
-
To speak with one of the team;
Give us a call on one of our local phone numbers. We are currently available Monday to Friday, 7am-7pm (BST). 0808 178 5384
The recorded message went as follows … *“Thank you for calling THS.com. All of our team are currently busy, if you’d like to send us a message or visit live chat, please visit THS.com and visit our help centre"
All of our team are currently busy…? The 'phones have not been answered for months. Live chat is always “very busy” and membership services is always “very busy”.
What’s going on at THS? Without trotting out the “due to covid” excuse, the service from THS two or three years prior to the pandemic has been abysmal.
You have stated that there is a system for prioritising urgent messages. How does a member get into this system because, as shown above, messages are dealt with in the order that they are received.
We realise our members are frustrated with the lack of service and for that we sincerely apologise and we thank everyone for their patience, Bringing the team back to pre COVID strength and service is a high priority.
No company uses COVID as an “excuse” it happened with devastating results for everyone and lasted far longer than anyone ever thought possible, an unprecedented event the world is still recovering from.
I will pass your question to the Membership Services Team to respond.
Thank you.
Maryse, I am astounded that for a two month absence, the HO insisted on different sitters each week. Those poor pets- although dogs and cats are mostly quite forgiving, having different people in their lives every 7 days must have been very disruptive for them.
Hi
I do sincerely apologise that there are currently such long wait times for support from our Membership Services team.
I know that it may not be the popular answer, but the truth is that we are doing everything we can to respond to our members.
We are indeed prioritising urgent requests. With all other requests, we are replying in the order that we received them.
I’d imagine hearing that this delay in service is Covid related is rather frustrating. For some context around this, we had to make the heartbreaking decision to drastically reduce the size of our team at the start of the pandemic. We are now in the process of onboarding many new team members and expect to be back at full strength in terms of size of the team and response times, within the next few weeks.
The current team are working flat out to respond as soon as possible and I thank you and all members for your patience and understanding.
Paul
Head of Membership Services
yes its a crazy idea…just the logistics alone for the HO and most importantly the distress it causes to the animals is just not right…what useful purpose does it serve?
sorry thats not been my experience of using the THS chat support or reply system…prior to covid i always had good support from THS…true that has dropped of in recent times but we really should factor in the covid situation which has hit hard…things will pick up and in the meantime if urgent issues can take priority i think most members will be ok with that.
Thanks for the quick response @Paul-Head-MS but you haven’t answered the question - “You have stated that there is a system for prioritising urgent messages. How does a member get into this system ?”
You say in your response that you are prioritising urgent requests - how?
Hi, apologies if I didn’t fully answer the question.
We have automation that makes us aware of any correspondence that may be urgent. This may include a rare case where someone needs to leave a sit at short notice, a pet becomes unwell, etc.
If you are happy to DM me your membership ID, I would be happy to find your correspondence and do my best to prioritise it on this occasion if you are desperate for support.
Thanks
Paul
Thanks very much for the update @Paul-Head-MS
I don’t need to DM you as I did eventually receive a response over a week later (weeks ago)
The reason why I was querying the process for submitting an urgent request was to see what any member who may find themselves in the situation highlighted by @Colin should do.
Hi Angela – wondering if there might be some way sitters could contact THS directly about more extreme problems (like a legitimately dirty house or dangerous or unhygienic situations). It would then be up to THS to address the situation with the HO, so sitters wouldn’t have to worry about getting retaliatory bad reviews. Perhaps since sitters are required to jump through all the verification hoops, HOs could meet some basic standards too? Could THS set up a simple survey for sitters that is only used internally? Then THS could contact HOs directly about situations that should be corrected, without anyone getting bad reviews and tanking their whole experience on the site.
Hi Sally sitters can contact membership services for any issues they have throughout their membership. When it’s a sit issue we encourage direct communication between the owner and sitter if this fails to resolve the issue then Membership Services will give support, help and advice. That’s why we have Membership Services to support our members with every aspect of their membership, from sits, to tech issues and everything in between.
We have welcomed 4 new members to the Membership Services team just this morning they are in the process of being trained and we should be back to our full compliment of team members in a few weeks … as a result of COVID the last few months have been challenging however we are well on the way to having our excellent “Normal Service” resumed.
Thank you
I’m a bit late to the discussion, but I’d like to add that it’s a red flag for me when I see multiple sitters who have not a review for a listing. If there are one or two omissions, it’s easy to think maybe the sitters are busy and have forgotten or not gotten around to writing a review. But more than two sitters not leaving reviews screams to me, “Better pass on that one!”
Savannah
I agree, however, any sits that were booked during pandemic and had to be cancelled will show with no review, unless the homeowner asks THS to remove it. I’m on a sit and felt it was important to ask why her previous two sitters did not leave a review. I also saw it was a time when we were in lockdown. She had not noticed, but then contacted THS to have them removed. I felt a little uncomfortable asking, but realized I would feel worse if they truly didn’t leave a review because it was a bad situation.