Poor customer service and client relations
I was a sitter for Rover with over 20 five star reviews and none of them negative. Every review reflected fantastic customer service and compassion towards what I do. The first time I needed their customer support it was a nightmare. I was left a 1 star review by someone who was disgruntled most likely because I suggested their dog could benefit from training because it was bullying one of my younger dogs. After they picked up their dog with all smiles, they then decided to leave me a nasty review making completely false claims unrelated to their stay. Rover only sent a few automated messages saying they wouldn’t remove the review, and never answered how it does not violate their terms when it clearly did. As a professional dog trainer and small business owner, I just don’t think I want to continue making money for a corporation who doesn’t value the people who are actually doing the work. I honestly don’t even think they read the context of my emails or the customer reviews. As a dog owner, I’ll never use Rover or again or recommend it to anyone. It would be best for anyone to find a professional boarding service or simply save money and hire a local boarder without giving rover a giant cut for no need. If the customer service is trash then what’s the point?
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No protection for the dog sitters
I like overall design and functionality of the app. But one thing I do like to point out: Rover doesn’t seem to care about dog sitters’ safety or interests. For example, they only do background checks for dog sitters but there is no check on dog owners. Although most dog owners are very nice and polite, sometimes there’re rude or skeptical people. Another thing is that Rover only allows dog owners to review dog sitters but not the other way around. Despite most dogs I have sat are well trained, some dogs are not. Meet and greet normally is not enough to tell if the owner is telling the truth. If the dog peed and pooped all over your house or did something aggressive or dangerous, except for leaving a note for yourself and Rover, there’s no way you can share it with other fellow dog sitters. So dog owners don’t have any consequences if they lie or their dogs create damages. Other dog sitters just have to go through it again. Rover should allow dog sitters to see reviews from other dog sitters so that dog owners will have consequences if they lie. If a dog is badly trained, dog sitters can make informed decisions to either reject it or charge extra. I complained about these issues but every time Rover just said they will record the suggestions and nothing happens afterwards. I guess they just don’t want to hurt the business
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Response from developer
Thanks for your review. Safety remains Rover's top priority. To cultivate safe experiences for all users on our platform, sitters and owners alike, Rover offers resources on how to vet clients and set stays up for success. We highly recommend taking a look at our sitter community and articles on things like how to conduct successful Meet & Greets. All users have the ability to report suspicious or dangerous behavior.
Not going to waste my time
I just download this app. Found a local sitter and sent message. Rover suggested I message more sitters to find the “perfect match” so I regretfully messaged 3 total potentials all that showed available for my dates selected. I received a reply from one of them saying they were not available but rover doesn’t tell me which one it is which is already proving to be a pain. after scrolling through the many negative app reviews I now regret providing my card info prior to booking anything. Y’all sound too messy and I don’t want to come back with a horror story. Great concept but the communications process needs improvement but that’s as far as I’m willing to risk. I will not be booking with rover after reading the reviews and receiving confusing response from one of the 3 that I messaged. Would be nice to know which one turned down the job even though it indicated they were available. I live in a very small town with few options anyway. If I’m going to pay over $100 for 3 drop in visits from a stranger then I might as well spend a little more and just pay a facility to actually board my dog. I understand they set their own prices and I found the cheapest one in my area. Thanks but no thank you.
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I get paid to hang out with pets!
My friend told me about this app and I decided to give it a try as a side job. I was a little skeptical when I had to pay for a background check. However after being a pet sitter for over a year and starting my little enterprise, this has really turned out to be a worthwhile investment. I love how I can modify my rates, create a profile with my own pictures, and write my own bio. Plus, everyone I have sat for have been extremely friendly and grateful that their fur babies were taken care of. If you love pets and don’t mind waking up early when the dog wants a walk, this is for you! And if you are a pet owner looking for a trustworthy app, this is the app for you! Plus the app is constantly updated to be even more detailed and convenient, such as video calls in place of meet and greets during the pandemic, and modifying a booking after it’s been confirmed.
My only issue was that one time a false account contacted me about sitting their puppy. The person with the same name contacted me twice with different dog pictures on both profiles. Thankfully I did not meet up with this person and reported it. But I wish Rover would require a picture of the owner, or at least a picture of their pet, because now when I receive requests with photoshopped photos, or requests without photos, I sometimes feel skeptical about sitters’ safety.
My only issue was that one time a false account contacted me about sitting their puppy. The person with the same name contacted me twice with different dog pictures on both profiles. Thankfully I did not meet up with this person and reported it. But I wish Rover would require a picture of the owner, or at least a picture of their pet, because now when I receive requests with photoshopped photos, or requests without photos, I sometimes feel skeptical about sitters’ safety.
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Good service, but it could be more user friendly
I have been a dog walker and pet sitter on Rover for a couple of months now. I’ve gotten connected with many people in my neighborhood and make good money doing it. My only issue with the app is that it’s not the most user friendly for those trying to book services.
For example, I had a woman asking me to check in on her pets over 4th of July weekend. She has 3 dogs and a cat and wanted me to check on them once on the 3rd, three times on the 4th, and once on the 5th. The first issue with that is that is that she would have had to create at least 2 separate bookings because the app doesn’t allow users to choose a different amount of visits for different days. My second issue was that the app should have charged her my holiday rate (x3 days), the additional dog rate (x2, because she had two additional dogs) (x3 days), and then one additional cat rate (which is $0 in my case, cats are easy). Instead the app tried to charge her for 9 total visits and the holiday rate for each of her pets which brought her total to over $700 which is wayyyyyy over what her actual total should have been. Luckily we caught this before going through with our booking. I’ve had several other instances similar to this, but this was the most extreme. The app needs to update its UI so this issue doesn’t occur.
For example, I had a woman asking me to check in on her pets over 4th of July weekend. She has 3 dogs and a cat and wanted me to check on them once on the 3rd, three times on the 4th, and once on the 5th. The first issue with that is that is that she would have had to create at least 2 separate bookings because the app doesn’t allow users to choose a different amount of visits for different days. My second issue was that the app should have charged her my holiday rate (x3 days), the additional dog rate (x2, because she had two additional dogs) (x3 days), and then one additional cat rate (which is $0 in my case, cats are easy). Instead the app tried to charge her for 9 total visits and the holiday rate for each of her pets which brought her total to over $700 which is wayyyyyy over what her actual total should have been. Luckily we caught this before going through with our booking. I’ve had several other instances similar to this, but this was the most extreme. The app needs to update its UI so this issue doesn’t occur.
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Ridiculous
This app is ridiculous. In this day and age, to not offer the option to enter your pet’s details in KG? It’s 2020, the metric system has been around for long enough. Sure, give imperial as an option, too, but get with the progress we have made.
Secondly, you cannot add sitters to a favourite list to return to later, so I feel left no other option than to contact someone just so that I can find them in the future when I actually need them. Some pet owners would perhaps like to do some research and take their time to go through sitters before deciding between a few pre-selected ones. But without the option to select/favour them, you are left with having to take screenshots and hope to find them again later.
This is ridiculous.
It was so much better when it was DogBuddy, and so much more personal.
I don’t like the impersonal, greed-driven feeling Rover, and have resorted to using Pawshake instead.
Secondly, you cannot add sitters to a favourite list to return to later, so I feel left no other option than to contact someone just so that I can find them in the future when I actually need them. Some pet owners would perhaps like to do some research and take their time to go through sitters before deciding between a few pre-selected ones. But without the option to select/favour them, you are left with having to take screenshots and hope to find them again later.
This is ridiculous.
It was so much better when it was DogBuddy, and so much more personal.
I don’t like the impersonal, greed-driven feeling Rover, and have resorted to using Pawshake instead.
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Response from developer
Hi, thank you for your feedback. We are sorry to hear about your experience. Please know that our Support Team is available to answer any question and to assist you in the process of finding the ideal sitter for your dog at +44 8082 812524 or by email at support-uk@rover.com. Best regards, Laysa K.
Pretty good. Would like small improvements
I have been using rover for over a year now. I’ve used about 10-15 different dog sitters and I’ve had a 95% success rate. I have had mostly awesome experiences and 2 bad ones (sitter wasn’t home when I dropped off or picked up and didn’t answer calls) :( but if that’s the worse thing, not too bad. My one suggestion to this app would be to develop a block function. A way for me to block certain sitters from coming up in my future searches. Sometimes a sitter tells you they won’t watch your dog, or if you have a bad experience (like them no showing up) ... it would be nice if they didn’t keep showing up in your searches. If they added this feature the app would be nearly perfect in my opinion.
It is a bit annoying for me to try and remember which sitters had already told me no in the past or had some other reason for not being able to watch my dog. Then I end up having a weird conversation with them all over again. That being said - I can’t speak for all areas and sitters (because I’ve heard horror stories) ... but I’ve tried many sitters in So. Cal. (SGV) and I keep coming back for more because the good far outweighs the couple unreliable people out there.
It is a bit annoying for me to try and remember which sitters had already told me no in the past or had some other reason for not being able to watch my dog. Then I end up having a weird conversation with them all over again. That being said - I can’t speak for all areas and sitters (because I’ve heard horror stories) ... but I’ve tried many sitters in So. Cal. (SGV) and I keep coming back for more because the good far outweighs the couple unreliable people out there.
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Good app but the company needs work
I love the concept of the app! It’s a great way to connect owners to qualified sitters in the area. However I believe River needs to do more to ensure the safety of the sitters. They have a rover guarantee that will cover vet care and expenses if a dog is injured during a stay but offer no such protections for sitters. I understand that watching dogs is a risk but the fact that owners and dogs aren’t subject to background checks or vaccination requirements is a bit annoying. I got bit in the face while playing with a dog and ended up having to get stitches and have permanent scaring. Rover covered absolutely nothing and the only way to get the owner to pay was to take them to civil court and sue, which I decided against out of fear of lowering my Rover reputation due to a bad review from them in retribution. After the fact I found out that this wasn’t the first time the dog had expressed aggressive behavior during play and had bit his owner a few time prior to this incident. This was not relayed to me during the meet and greet when I asked if the dog had any aggressive tendencies or toy possessiveness. I followed all steps of the Rover policy prior to and during the booking and feel that I should have had some protections against this incident. It’s crazy that the dogs expenses can be covered but not the sitters.
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Makes my job harder than it needs to be
As a sitter, the app is not user friendly. I am constantly having to restart the app or my entire phone just to get my home tab to properly display the list of pets I’m watching that day. Otherwise it’ll just show the list from the previous day. If I’m not connected to WiFi, then it’ll usually take all day to send a rover card, even if I go back onto WiFi.
The app takes a really long time to load sometimes, even on WiFi.
And sometimes when I end a drop in, a duplicate visit will start, and I can’t stop it obviously without adding a picture, so the owner is essentially getting two rover cards for the same visit.
I am at least receiving my payments in a timely manner, although I do know that some sitters have issues with getting paid.
Rover is constantly adding new features to their site/app, which I like, but it seems to just add more bugs to the speedy never ending list of bugs this app causes. I feel like we should have a much more streamlined app if they’re going to take 20% of our earnings.
The app takes a really long time to load sometimes, even on WiFi.
And sometimes when I end a drop in, a duplicate visit will start, and I can’t stop it obviously without adding a picture, so the owner is essentially getting two rover cards for the same visit.
I am at least receiving my payments in a timely manner, although I do know that some sitters have issues with getting paid.
Rover is constantly adding new features to their site/app, which I like, but it seems to just add more bugs to the speedy never ending list of bugs this app causes. I feel like we should have a much more streamlined app if they’re going to take 20% of our earnings.
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Rover needs to step it up for 20%
For 20% of our earnings Rover needs to step it up. First, I would say Rover needs to fix the app, it sends messages about new features and has a clicker ”try now” that doesn't work. The other complaint is the daycare or sitting feature, the client's and I are texting and not even using the app, but you're supposed to do everything through the app, like the start of the visit, walks, pees and poops. I'm walking three dogs and im supposed to check in on an app, take picture enter how many times the went. It's a little cumbersome because I am sending pics throughout the day through rovers text in my messages. The app is not easy to use! I care for many dogs for friends and through rover, I don't need to keep track of trying to use a difficult application that should be easy for the price. Second is Rover's support sucked! Period, after it took me hours to speak with someone, not an emergency, they were no help and had a typical corporate response. I will say I have met some fun and great dogs. I'm just not sure why Rover feels they need 20% seems a bit much for the service they provide.
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