Pet sitter just didn’t show up

[Anonymous]

We are out of town for 4 days and on day 2 she just didn’t show up. No text, nothing. We have a ring camera so know when she comes and leaves. Texted her in the evening once we realized and her phone was silenced and no response. I thought she was in a car accident or something.

Day 3 (today) she responds saying she had an emergency and then goes to our house to finally feed our cats.

I get that emergencies happen but she never let us know so we could try to figure out alternative arrangements.

Our cats won’t die from one day without food but it probably wasn’t pleasant for them. One of our cats (thankfully) is in remission from diabetes but what if our cats needed medication?

We won’t be using her again and won’t be paying her for the day she didn’t show up obviously. Part of me doesn’t want to pay her at all, but I will because that seems like more trouble than it’s worth.

We’ve used her several times before and we noticed she’s gotten lazier each time (she’s suppose to feed them AM&PM) and was coming at set times (9am & 6pm) but then kind of came whenever (11am & 5pm). Our cats are older and have weight issues hence why we don’t leave our food for them and have someone come feed them.

Anyone have any suggestions for cat-friendly pet sitters in Fredericksburg?

[Anonymous]

Please no suggestions for boarding them next time. They haven’t ever been boarded and that would be too stressful. They love their home.

[Anonymous]

Also yes. She is a profesional pet sitter. That is her full-time job.

[Anonymous]

I know you dont want to board but if your vet does boarding and you trust them I would use them. That’s what I did after our pet sitter just didn’t show up and left our dogs with no water for over a day. I had my neighbor break into our back door to get them out as we flew home early. We won’t be using a pet sitter ever again.

[Anonymous]

The next sitter you find, pay them a little better than they charge/market rate and give a small bonus after each gig.
I deal with a lot of low paid gig workers and they have a lot of gigs to choose from. They have the luxury of not dealing with difficult clients, and they have a lot of not great not terrible clients who don’t give them the reason to reject them but also no reason to really be a good worker since there are so many.
My strategy is to find a generally reliable person and make their job worth it - small extras, establishing rapport, never ever micromanaging, and bonuses! This is key I tell you.
Not saying it’s how it should be, just the situation on the market. Reliability is usually a built in feature but for retention, once you find someone reliable, treat them super well!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know you dont want to board but if your vet does boarding and you trust them I would use them. That’s what I did after our pet sitter just didn’t show up and left our dogs with no water for over a day. I had my neighbor break into our back door to get them out as we flew home early. We won’t be using a pet sitter ever again.

Most vets doesn’t have staff on site at night. The animals are caged from when they close to when they open the next morning. If there is a fire they’re stuck. It’s also stressful.

[Anonymous]

Can you ask a neighbor? Or neighbors kid?

[Anonymous]

I don’t understand why you booked her when you already knew she was flaky, coming “whenever.”

[Anonymous]

Yea, I’m sorry but there are no excuses here. What the pet sitter did is absolutely unacceptable. I’d be furious. And I don’t even like cats!

[Anonymous]

Pet sitters are so tough. We’ve had to cancel a vacation because one flaked. We found one who is golden so we literally plan our vacations around her schedule. Sorry OP.

[Anonymous]

Maybe hire 2. One as primary, one as backup?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pet sitters are so tough. We’ve had to cancel a vacation because one flaked. We found one who is golden so we literally plan our vacations around her schedule. Sorry OP.

We do the same. Sorry, OP. I have an elderly diabetic cat and when someone just failed to show up, I was really angry.

Ive had the best luck with vet techs who do pet sitting, and then I pay them more than their stated rate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yea, I’m sorry but there are no excuses here. What the pet sitter did is absolutely unacceptable. I’d be furious. And I don’t even like cats!

Why was this comment even necessary? Who cares if you don't like cats

[Anonymous]

I would definitely stop giving set times to feed the cats, more like a range. 11 am is too late for breakfast though.....

If you're going to do this as a job, you might have lots of cats to get through.

Consider hiring a kid who is responsible. This is what my kid does for work.

[Anonymous]

I live in VA and use a service called Pet Sitting By Susan. It’s a very professional service and there are a lot of pet sitters. You get assigned one but if they can’t show up for some reason there are backups. You can tell the woman who runs it is a cat lover so I felt pretty confident using her company.

I realize you’re in MD so this won’t help you directly. But I’d recommend finding something like this if it exists near you (also maybe this recommendation helps some cat owners near Falls Church).