Cat sitter bringing her grandchild

[Mseddy]

We've paid someone to cat sit for us for the week. Not used her before, was recommended by another cat sitter/dog walker who my friend uses as she was full. Not cheap, but that's irrelevant really.

Came and met us and the cats before we went, chatted to her for a while, she mentioned she looked after her grandchild who lived local, nothing more mentioned about GC in regards to visiting. One of the cats is on medication which he takes happily off a spoon, she was fine with this.

Qué first day we are away and she says cant get cat to take medication because he won't come near. Long story short this goes on for 3 days and my neighbour has had to step in to do it. My neighbour knows the cats well and usually does feeds/meds for us if we are away, but she's had major surgery recently hence outsourcing so to speak! I spoke with my neighbour and she said she wasn't surprised cat wouldn't come as woman had a child with her playing in the garden.

We've looked on CCTV in our garden tonight and her 4 year old grandchild is chasing after the cat and even screamed at him when he meowed at her. My 2yo DD has a lovely little wendy house that is mine and her pride and joy, we love it and it's special. She's just turned 2 the day before we flew on holiday so it's got a fair few new not yet played with toys in there. The cat sitter and her grandchild have been playing in the Wendy house completely without our permission and I honestly feel a little bit violated! I paid this women to come to our house, feed the cats and spend half an hour sat with them twice a day. Not to use my house as a play cafe for her grandchild.

So aibu for wanting to message her and telling her to leave the key and the money that would cover the remaining days and piss off out of my house? My neighbour is having to come daily to give the cat his meds anyway so she could throw some food in their bowl and I'd rather spend the remaining money on her!

She’s lucky you’re not asking her for more money - imagine the cat needed to be taken to the vet when not taking its medicine, because of being frightened by the grandchild.

Send her this thread and ask her to make a judgement on what she owes

If it's metacam (or similar named but same thing) it's sweet tasting and cats tend to like it.

I doubt she couldn’t fit in other work if it at all existed. It’s a pop in job, half hour at most - you could fit more in easily. It’s highly unlikely she was snowed u see and had to turn away work.

You need to pull her up on her using your house and stuff as a playground for the grand kid

Also make sure that everyone knows what she's been doing if they are looking for a cat sitter

I do cat minding. She has behaved v badly. Being trustworthy and reliable is so important- alongside being good with your cat and taking cues from him/her.
When I visit I make my footprint in the house as small as possible- I don’t open doors left closed by owners, I only go into rooms/spaces occupied by the cats, I take my lead from the cats as to what level of cuddles/company/playtime they want. I deep clean the trays and food bowls and wash/hover floors as needed, lift post, open/close windows and put out bins. There is no way I would bring a child with me.
I look after my various neighbours pets when they go away- they do pay me ( I give them discounted rates) as it means they get someone who is insured etc and it means they can ask as much as they want.
I would be v firm with her, she has let you down, taken advantage of your home and not acted in a professional manner at all. It’s not like you will be booking her again so you have nothing to lose

It's not metacam, it's atenolol, so massively important that he gets it to keep his heart rate low enough that his HCM is well controlled. He's a rare case that has actually responded well to atenolol and is 2.5 years down the line and has actually shown improvement on his echo. Saw your username so guessed you'd understand how important it is :)

For posters talking about paying my neighbour rather than just sending flowers. I completely agree with this and have already sent her the money, I was just waiting to have a face to face conversation with her first. Flowers and chocolates was just an easy show of appreciation that I could send whilst I was still away.

CF cat woman has done as I predicted and ghosted me, although I suppose she may still post some money back through the letterbox. Doubt it from her reply though. I'll post a screen shot of the conversation shortly.

So I'm now double the cost of a cat sitter down, unsure what we are going to do for our already booked break away for 4 days with both sets of parents in December, and have a very judgemental cat who is throwing us looks like we've left him for a year! You win some you loose some hey! Given that we will need to use a cat sitter again in the future I'm going to do some trial days I think. Book someone provisionally for the december trip but pay them to do and hoc days in-between now and then so we can all get used to eachother! If anyone has any stellar cat sitter recommendations in West Yorkshire let me know!

There's a couple of websites like this that I've seen recommended on here. There is another one that I looked at to get a sitter for my tribe but I cannot remember what it's called. You can read reviews on them and arrange to meet them beforehand.

www.housesittersuk.co.uk/house-sitters-pet-sitters/browse/cat-sitters-cardiff

www.pawshake.co.uk/petsitters

Thank you @RumNotRun I'll have a look. Love the username too!

Here is the message I sent in reply to her telling me I needed to consider she had turned down bookings.

What d'you think her illiterate response means?

Wow, she's a real charmer.

Oohhh that response means I'd name and shame all over social media, and I'd ensure the person recommending and sharing clients with her knows about it too.

Taking a kid in and allowing them to terrify a cat taking heart meds, such that the cat then won't take the meds/won't be caught to be given the meds and misses day after day of those daily meds... absolutely unacceptable.

Are you able to post a review online about her "service" provision OP? 🌹

She’s not even apologetic! No shame.

Poor cat and poor neighbour, you’d have been better off paying them.

This is appalling. I'd be furious. You'd probably have got 100% more professionalism from a local teenager earning a few quid.

Whatever, can't be arsed arguing. Not worth the hassle!!

She's a real charmer, isn't she...

I'm West Yorkshire and know a few cat sitters

If you don't mind pm'ing me with them that would be great!

Wow from her latest response she sounds absolutely horrible and unprofessional.

I sympathize OP, I only ever had one amazing catsitter and ever since she moved away, it’s been a stream of mediocre ones. I think my favorite was one that informed me that their rate is going up from 20 to 30 per visit, the night before we left for our trip! And then I got home to find all food bowls completely empty (which rarely happens if refilled daily) so even at a much higher rate they didn’t do the job properly.

She's not a professional pet sitter then. That response says it all.

@Mseddy just read all of this and omfg.

What a CF.

I would be going crazy if someone I was paying to feed my cat allowed their child to play with my dc's toys.
Yes I may be precious but those are my child's personal belongings.
Not the kids fault but the cf obviously saw all the toys on the visit and thought bingo!

I'd be looking for her on sites/ Google etc to leave a review.

I've spent a large chuck of this evening doing just that! Can't find her on any pet sitting sites, social media groups etc. She was older, so I'm assuming works on word of mouth and referrals.

I think it's the same as you've said, the personal belongings thing that gets me. Just because she's a child it doesn't mean she doesn't have a say on what happens with her stuff. Imagine the woman had gone upstairs and started testing out my perfumes and playing with my make up? It would be diabolically rude. Why should I be more lax with boundaries for my DD? That's why I drew a line, ended things and told her how many boundaries she had crossed. I obviously want to teach DD to share with others, and she does with her friends. Would I expect her to share with a complete stranger a good few years older than her who didn't have consent to be there in the first place? Absolutely not! So it shouldn't happen in her absence. I've gone from being astounded at her CF'ery to just absolutely furious tonight.

On the cat front lone wolf cat (I'm only not saying his name because the two paired together is as outing at writing my address, although I'm sure anyone who vaguely knows me in real life 100% knows it's me now anyway) has spent an hour at home having a week's worth of cuddles and drooling over us. Happily accepting all the treats DD wants to give him because she's missed him. Then gone back out to enjoy the warm evening.
Gary has finally forgiven us and has resumed his spot on the windowsill "watching the people" as we call it. Just taken his tablet for DH with zero bother and purred away the whole time.

I know this is not the point of the thread but I love the fact your cat is called Gary.

I can take no credit, it was 100% DH. He didn't want a cat, I did. Said if we get one you can name it and I can't veto at all. He agreed and along came Gary....and his brother, because I said nothing about me not having one to name too 😁

My friend had a cat called Steve

Glad they're ok, I'd be the same re Wendy House and toys.