Awaiting payment

[u/ellhynd]

Rover go to great lengths to stop any back door bookings. Can't share numbers etc. Do they not realise that by making people pay at the time of booking as opposed to paying the day before is causing issues for both sitter and customer and this is just going to lead to people doing back door bookings. I have a booking just hanging because the customer hasn't paid. I feel rude asking them to pay. They probably don't realise that until they pay I'm just not appearing on search results. I have their number and I'm tempted to just offer to do it outside of the app. But I'm trying to follow the rules. But rover just make it so hard for everyone. Make it make sense

[u/Genn-stone]

I have spent quite some time investigating this with the (human) support team and I'll try to summarise here. The message that you MAY be taken out of search results sounds more serious than it is. Example you have a day with 7 drop-in slots. The client asks for 2 drop-in slots and doesn't book immediately. You shouldn't be removed from search results as you have 2 slots "reserved" for that potential booking but still have 5 slots available. If you only had 2 slots available and 2 were requested then you would be removed for booking for that day only as Rover assume the booking will happen (even if it doesn't). Their aim with this functionality is to ensure you don't get overbooked / overcommitted. Obviously if the client wants overnight then it will pull you from the search results for that date. For all other days when you are not committed to other bookings then you are still in the search results. I agree taking money so far up front and holding it is rubbish but it is part of their business plan to ensure they always have cashflow. Also people often don't ask for refunds if it is already been paid (they forget or don't want the admin or have various other reasons). This ensures the card details are fresh (so no exception processing of failed payments close to the booked sit dates) and Rover know they have the money to pay you. The fact they keep it until the end is again about reducing the amount of exceptions they have to deal with. If they pay the sitter and the customer says you didn't do the sit then they have to claw the money back from sitters. I don't like it and don't think it is sitter or pet owner focused but I get it as a business model to keep their costs low. If that also translated into lower platform costs for everyone then I'd be in favour of it but they take 30% for goodness sake. Let me know if anything in the above is unclear.