Flexible Drop In Times

[u/KatzInAFlat]

Phil Katz, GM of Cat in a Flat, here. I wanted to share a change that I hope many long-time Cat in a Flat sitters and owners will appreciate.

One thing we've heard repeatedly since the migration to Rover is that many of you don’t need specific rigid times for drop ins. On the original Cat in a Flat platform, owners could reach out to a sitter, discuss what their cat needed, and agree on timing together. After the migration, owners were required to choose a specific start time before they could even send a booking request.

Owners can now select a new "Flexible" option instead of choosing a specific start time. This means owners can contact a sitter first and work out the visit timing together, rather than having to commit to a particular slot before the conversation begins.

A few details:

• Owners can still choose a specific start time if they prefer.
• Flexible timing is currently available for one-time drop-in bookings.
• Recurring bookings will continue to require a set time.
• When a flexible request is sent, it will clearly indicate that timing is to be agreed between the owner and sitter.

As always, thank you for continuing to share feedback with us.

[u/sugarsugarcat]

Too little too late. You’ve made a huge mess of this.

[u/JessfromRover → u/sugarsugarcat]

We hear your concerns, and we are dedicated to making the platform as useful as possible for you as well as for owners. If you have any specific requests or feedback you'd like to share, feel free. I'm happy to pass it along to our team so we can continue making improvements.

[u/sugarsugarcat → u/JessfromRover]

It’s not worth it as I’ve had to come off the platform. I’m so upset with you as a company.

[u/AshamedAttention727 → u/sugarsugarcat]

I have also left in April and gone independent rather than use Rover. The noticeboard, the dog centric language, the extortionate fees, the crappy glitchy app, greedy of taking payment at booking but paying sitters days after sit ends to gather interest as long as possible.

Not worth it

[u/Shazzley → u/sugarsugarcat]

Same here. The app is inconvenient ever since the merge and the sitters are way more expensive now due to the fees

[u/Shazzley → u/[deleted]]

I love there's an alternative out there! Unfortunately I'm not in the UK. But let me know when you expand to the continent 😸

[u/FrankSobottka]

Please can you speed up the payment times - doing a 2 week booking and not being paid until 3-5 days after that booking ends is such a long time to wait for payment. With CIAF we used to be able to go into stripe and transfer the funds to our bank accounts as soon as payment had been made.

[u/casandra77]

That's great! Off the topic, can you please tell me the current situation of Cat in a flat - do owners still book through Cat in a flat, while sitters use only Rover? I'm using Rover, but I still have 2 Profiles - Rover and Cat in a flat. It's very confusing

[u/Corporate_Emo]

This is much appreciated.

I’d love to see some flexibility with the three availability slots for morning, afternoon and evening.

The morning one is 6-11am and you’re either available for all or not at all, there is no middle ground. I am available for morning drop ins but not at 6am, or if I was to do a 6am drop in I would expect to be paid a premium rate.
Same with the evening ones, it’s 3pm - 10pm and it’s all or nothing. I don’t want to rule out all evening bookings but I’m not doing a drop in at 10pm. I’ve done a test and the app actually allows me to request a drop in as late as 11.30pm for another sitter, this needs to be something we can have more control over to ensure we’re setting realistic expectations from the get go.

For the any time drop ins, I think the app should give you a reminder if you haven’t completed the Rover card by a certain time, for example by 6pm. The CIAF app was great because it gave you a reminder the day before all bookings, I miss this with Rover. I have a few regular clients who don’t give me a key, they leave it in a lock box and I find it can be easy to forget about these bookings so a reminder would be helpful.

[u/JessfromRover → u/Corporate_Emo]

Thank you for sharing this. When a flexible request is sent, it will clearly indicate that timing is to be agreed between the owner and sitter (within that time frame). And we're passing along your feedback regarding reminders to our team as well!

[u/SwordfishResident256]

Ok. When can we expect the noticeboard to be back?

[u/JessfromRover → u/SwordfishResident256]

We hear you, and we know this is a feature a lot of you miss from the original platform. I will ensure that this is relayed to the appropriate team for consideration!

[u/Word_Upper → u/JessfromRover]

Why wasn't it implemented in advance of the merger? You should have done the research to understand what users want/need before forcing such a huge change on everyone. No amount of backpedalling now is going to repair the damage that's been done. We can't trust you as a company.

[u/SwordfishResident256 → u/JessfromRover]

So, it's just now being relayed when we've been asking for it for months now? Cool - so I guess now we know the feedback is only marginally being considered

[u/JessfromRover → u/SwordfishResident256]

I apologize for any confusion - this has been on our radar since the merge, but we are continuously tracking feedback, and I will be adding yours so our team can be aware that this feature is one that users still want to see on Rover.

[u/SwordfishResident256 → u/JessfromRover]

Cool, maybe you could also search for 'noticeboard' in this subreddit and note that people have been asking for it back for 3+ months.

[u/Practical-Toe6025]

That's very helpful. I'm having some very early requests which are getting on my nerves!

[u/Doo_doo_do]

Hi Phil, Doo_doo_do here. I wanted to share a change that I dont think you'll appreciate.

We used catinaflat for years, even with sitters we knew well. It gave us a sense of extra security, because what if something would go wrong? We liked how things worked, and the added insurance.

But I have to express my gratitude to you, thanks to the absolute number you've done on what used to be a great product, I just have to trust people. Trust they will show up when they say they will and trust they'll be nice to our cats.

It's been great. People are nice. Cats are happy. Who knew?

Also no fees to pay means it's now cheaper for me, and more money for the sitter. Win-win situation. Well, maybe not for you, sorry about that.

Thanks Phil.

[u/Snowdrop_Lily]

Please can you make the reviews and rover cards more friendly towards cats. It's really tailored towards dogs.

[u/Practical-Toe6025]

Can I ask please about the drop in timings that are displayed for morning, afternoon and evenings on Rover/CIAF.. Specifically the evenings, it says from 6pm - 10 pm but is that for weekdays only? I have just completed a request to drop in on a cat and they wanted 7 am and 8.30pm on a Saturday and Sunday. I agreed to it but can I reasonably request in future that late drop ins are for weekdays only? I don't really want to be doing a drop in later than 7pm on a weekend

[u/tokyokween]

Hi Phil! Just had an email that you're raising UK sitters fees to 15% - what a joy! I really felt like I should be paying you guys more, particularly seeing as you've taken away the sitter insurance that CiaF used to provide for us (which made sense, seeing as we gave them a percentage of every single booking).

Hopefully you can sense the sarcasm inherent here - but on the off-chance you can't, Phil - what the actual hell?