12-night sit, no overnights?
12-day sit, no overnights?
I am a sitter and I just got this request today and I really don’t feel good about it, even though I said I could do a drop-in instead.
Background: I’m in Canada. I do house-sitting and drop-ins part-time. I pick and choose who I sit for. However, this is still part of my livelihood and I wouldn’t want to put that in jeopardy- or worse, a pet in jeopardy.
Three reasons I’m uncomfortable:
If booking a house-sitting - In my mind, this means overnights. Having the owner pay for a service per night feels wrong when their request is pretty much for drop-ins. Also, I feel like if I am hired for this kind of request I am responsible and liable for the well-being of the animal during the entire period of time that is booked. If something were to go wrong overnight, I don’t know how I would for one; cope with that. It gives me anxiety thinking about it. But secondly, a potential complaint lodged by the owner to Rover would devastate me.
I feel like leaving the dog alone for such a long period of time over a span of 12 days is not fair to the animal and pretty outlandish. Only dropping in a couple times a day is not enough in my opinion. I also feel like this would be difficult for the dog and its daily routine, no?
Because I do have another part-time job (almost full-time) this request almost becomes inconvenient. In order to be at work for 7:30 am, I would have to wake up at 5:00 am, get my son up for school (13) (if you know, you know), be to their place by at least 6:00 am and leave their place by 6:30 am to make it to work for 7:30 am. Our schedule would be pushed to at least an hour and a bit earlier each day.
More background: my profile states in detail that I have a son, and when I get requests for house-sitting there are usually conversations about accommodating him during the stay - so we honestly prefer to house-sit than to drop-in (as we can usually keep most routines the same).
My question is, really a two part question:
Was my response appropriate in this situation - even if I am still a bit uncomfortable even with my suggestion of drop-in and add an additional $10/ drop-in on top of my drop-in rate, and am I crazy to think that 12 days is an insane amount of time to essentially leave a dog alone, for a majority of the time?
Note: owner has not responded and I obviously haven’t accepted this request, especially not without a meet and greet first.
Anyways, this whole thing just screams “run” or “headache”. I’ve never had a bad review and continue to have a 5-star rating for my high-level standard of care I hold myself too. I honestly take care of these animals like they are my own. This would probably be the one that ruins me, right?
Ok, rant over. Thanks for your comments in advance.
12-day sit, no overnights?
I am a sitter and I just got this request today and I really don’t feel good about it, even though I said I could do a drop-in instead.
Background: I’m in Canada. I do house-sitting and drop-ins part-time. I pick and choose who I sit for. However, this is still part of my livelihood and I wouldn’t want to put that in jeopardy- or worse, a pet in jeopardy.
Three reasons I’m uncomfortable:
If booking a house-sitting - In my mind, this means overnights. Having the owner pay for a service per night feels wrong when their request is pretty much for drop-ins. Also, I feel like if I am hired for this kind of request I am responsible and liable for the well-being of the animal during the entire period of time that is booked. If something were to go wrong overnight, I don’t know how I would for one; cope with that. It gives me anxiety thinking about it. But secondly, a potential complaint lodged by the owner to Rover would devastate me.
I feel like leaving the dog alone for such a long period of time over a span of 12 days is not fair to the animal and pretty outlandish. Only dropping in a couple times a day is not enough in my opinion. I also feel like this would be difficult for the dog and its daily routine, no?
Because I do have another part-time job (almost full-time) this request almost becomes inconvenient. In order to be at work for 7:30 am, I would have to wake up at 5:00 am, get my son up for school (13) (if you know, you know), be to their place by at least 6:00 am and leave their place by 6:30 am to make it to work for 7:30 am. Our schedule would be pushed to at least an hour and a bit earlier each day.
More background: my profile states in detail that I have a son, and when I get requests for house-sitting there are usually conversations about accommodating him during the stay - so we honestly prefer to house-sit than to drop-in (as we can usually keep most routines the same).
My question is, really a two part question:
Was my response appropriate in this situation - even if I am still a bit uncomfortable even with my suggestion of drop-in and add an additional $10/ drop-in on top of my drop-in rate, and am I crazy to think that 12 days is an insane amount of time to essentially leave a dog alone, for a majority of the time?
Note: owner has not responded and I obviously haven’t accepted this request, especially not without a meet and greet first.
Anyways, this whole thing just screams “run” or “headache”. I’ve never had a bad review and continue to have a 5-star rating for my high-level standard of care I hold myself too. I honestly take care of these animals like they are my own. This would probably be the one that ruins me, right?
Ok, rant over. Thanks for your comments in advance.