We had a cat sitter in while we were away (for a week). Basically she was supposed to come twice a day, feed the cats, apply lotion to one and give that cat a tablet. She was told she needed to break the tablet into quarters to give it to the cat.
There was a fresh supply of ground beef for the cats plus plentiful milk. She could let Keyser out for the day as long as he came in at night. We prepared spare kitty litter trays- all she had to do was empty the old one in the wheelie bin and use a fresh one.
The rate was $25 per visit or as it turned out $50 a day.
Came home.
Same amount of milk as when we left so the cats had no milk and probably have scurvy. Hardly any ground beef gone so heaven knows what they were fed.
Found a full size pill under the cats blanket- seems she tried to give the cat a whole pill instead of breaking it up so the cat spat it out. Now we are uncertain how many tablets the cat has actually swallowed and as they are anti-biotics we need to know so she can complete her course.
And she emptied the litter bin into the kitchen tidy - in a closed house- rather than the bin outside.
And the television and lights were going full bore- she stuffed up the video so all my pre-recorded settings didn’t record.
So we have cats who are scurvy ridden runts, are lighter in the pocket and have no idea whether she came twice a day or not.
On the flip side the cats are really happy we are home and won’t leave us alone. I am not sure that is a good thing.
Did she come from a pet-sitting agency? If so, you should complain very loudly, especially if you gave instructions for the cats’ care which obviously weren’t followed.
I’m lucky enough to live close to a couple of very good catteries where I know my mogs will be well looked after if I choose to use them. I am also very lucky to have a couple of good friends close by who can come in to feed them if I can’t get them into a cattery.
Let me put your mind to rest on one thing…they don’t have scurvy. That’s a deficiency of Vitamin C, and milk doesn’t solve that. And my vet says to limit milk for my cats (gives them the runs) so they rarely, rarley get any.
But for the rest…heck, I need a raise! I petsit/housesit for $20 a day…I am definitely underpaid!
I don’t have a solution. Just want to say that people who don’t do what they say they will AND take money for it stink out loud!.
Over and over and over again I do the right thing and end up hosed out of money anyway. At the same time people are getting $50 a day to do the wrong thing. Grrrrr.
I’m sorry your kitties weren’t treated nicely. That bugs me, too.
So…you wanted her to feed your cats milk and ground beef, and to dump the litter pans directly into the dumpster sans bag? I probably wouldn’t have followed those instructions either, to be totally honest–if the owners want a pet to get pancreatitis or osmotic diarrhea, they can make that happen on their watch when they can make the decision about when and if to see the vet, and hosing out garbage cans with week-old loose kitty litter sucks enough I wouldn’t inflict it on my worst enemy.
On the rest of it I’m right there with you. There is ZERO excuse for the cat not getting his meds. Absolutely ZERO, and none for her mucking about with your appliances, and none for her not taking out the trash on the last day she changed the litter. You go in, feed the animals, scoop/dump the litter into the nearest lidded trash can while they’re eating, give any meds that need to be given, and then play for a while. If you’re doing it right, you don’t have time to be dicking around with someone’s tv. Then on the last day you empty the litter trash can, replace the liner, and generally make sure everything’s as ship-shape as you found it. This is not a complicated job.
$25 per visit seems a little high to me, too. Now I have neighbors who will take care of the kitties, but when I didn’t, $20/day for one visit seemed to be the going rate for pet sitters, at least in the SF Bay area.
My cats do that when I come back from a vacation, too.
Just so you know even the vets may screw you over. My sister took her diabetic cat to the vet for a vacation the third day she gets a call that her cat is dead, because the vet didn’t give the cat it’s insulin. It was sick for a couple days, but nobody thought of the fact that they should give the cat it’s medicine. The only reason it went to the vet was so someone competent would care for it.
Yeah but to be fair, if you’re so concerned after the cat’s well being then you would just say "Hey, maybe you didn’t realize this but … " Or keep quite and not take the job. But if they took the job and the $50/day and said nothing, most likely they were just being lazy.
I live near a university where a lot of students have apartments and pets, the online adds for cat-sitters are nowhere near $50/day. Sorry you got taken. But at least the cats came out okay.
The cats eat milk and ground beef? Nothing else? (Still, she sucks.)
That’s an awful story, Harmonious Discord. I can’t even imagine how I’d feel if I was kicking my heels back in Aruba and got a call that hey, my cat died.
Boy, your pet sitter completely sucks, I’d be pissed too. If you did get this person through an agency, you should indeed complain loudly, as ScaryFaery suggests.
It’s tough to find a good pet sitter. Did you ask your vet for recommendations? I’d offer to sit for you, but I think the commute for me would be a bit much.
Check your liquor and medicine cabinets - I’m betting there’s a good bit missing.
I’m so sorry your kitties were mistreated. Have you confronted the pet sitter at all? Because he/she needs at least the discomfort as a deterrrent from doing the same to the next family . . .
Re the antibiotics, I’d just call the vet and start over. A long break in treatment may even mean a need to increase the dosage or change to a different medicine.
I’ve gotta agree with ScareyFaerie and others who say you should complain loudly and long at the agency (if there was one). You should also put a bad review of them on every business-review site you can.
I figured he fed them a homemade raw-food diet of some sort. Presumably, in that case, there would normally be other stuff mixed in with the ground beef. Maybe the sight or smell of that would squick out a cat-sitter (I don’t know, I’ve never fed my cats a raw diet), so he switched them to ground beef only while he was gone.
I’ll cat-sit for you during your spring and summer, but you’ll have to pay my travel expenses I have treats that can hide pills and come recommended by Luna the Treat Connoisseur.
You paid her before you left? At 50$ a day, I’m not sure I’d have paid more than a day or two upfront, and paid the rest when I got home and had a chance to see if my instructions were followed!
We’re lucky - our cats don’t gorge themselves on food and will tolerate a slightly less than clean litter box, so when we go on vacation, we only have to have someone come by every 2-3 days to clean out the boxes (we have 2 very large ones) and top up their food and fresh water. My best friend can usually do it, for a bottle of wine that doesn’t cost us nearly 50$!
Did you take pics of the disaster when you got home? Small claims court is too good for this - this - miserable excuse for a human being. (Yeah, I’m trying to be nice here.)
If someone is SO lazy about thier hired duties that they couldnt bother at least dumping the milk and ground meat (so you would at least THINK they did what they were payed to do) they may well be the type of person inclined to go thru your stuff, (booze, medicines, assorted crown jewels) and nick anything they thought would not be missed…
Sorry you had such poor caretakers, but hope you had a good holiday!!!
Are you sure there wasn’t a power outage or something that caused the TV and lights to go on? If they were on a timer or some other control device it might have reset. Leaving that stuff on just seems so blatently stupid.
My daughter used to work for a pet sitting agency, and her cut was a lot more than her friends made working retail. If anyone from that agency pulled the tricks in the OP they’d be fired immediately - in fact she knows some who were fired for not making a promised visit. The agency she worked for was bonded and insured, which is something I’d want to see. Expensive, yes, but professional. And payment was made after the visits.
If a private person did it, I’d ask for a big refund for non-performance.
I have