extra pets usually +30-50%, not double
Advanced options
Cats overwhelmingly do better at home with drop-ins (territory beats company for most cats: a cattery is the stressful option, not the safe one): dogs split by temperament (social dogs enjoy good home-boarding: anxious ones want their own sofa and a sitter). The house-sitter's hidden dividend: your home is occupied: post cleared, plants watered, insurance-friendly presence during the exact weeks burglars prefer. Home-boarders need a LICENCE in England (boarding in their home is licensable): ask for the number: it's the fastest quality filter in the market.
What The Pet Sitter Calculator Works Out
- Estimated cost: the daily rate x nights x a multi-pet factor. Drop-in visits run about GBP 12 a time (GBP 24 a day at the standard twice daily), overnight house-sitting GBP 30 to GBP 45 a night, and boarding at the sitter's own home GBP 25 to GBP 35, so a week away costs GBP 170 to GBP 300.
- Multi-pet factor: each extra pet adds 40% of the rate rather than doubling it, in line with the 30% to 50% surcharges the market charges. Visits in particular price per call, not per head.
- Sitter vs kennels/cattery: what kennels (GBP 22 a night per dog) and a cattery (GBP 14 a night per cat) would cost for the same nights. The sitter premium buys no drop-off runs, no kennel-cough vaccination deadline with its two-week lead time, and far less stress for cats, who do better in their own territory.
- Vetting the sitter: the licence number (home-boarding in England is licensable and the number is the market's fastest quality filter), public liability and care-custody-control insurance, a meet-and-greet, a lodged vet-release form, agreed daily photos and a coded key tag. Repeat-customer references beat star ratings.
- Your sitter's quoted rate (advanced): overrides the dropdown with the real quote, per visit for drop-ins or per night for the other two formats.
- Drop-in visits per day and surcharge per extra pet (advanced): kittens, medicated pets and dogs usually need two or more visits a day, and you can replace the 40% multi-pet assumption with the sitter's own surcharge.
- Peak surcharge and platform fee (advanced): Christmas, bank holidays and school holidays commonly carry 20% to 50% uplifts, and the app marketplaces add a service fee of roughly 7% to 15% on top of the sitter's rate. Both are itemised in the surcharges card.
- Kennels and cattery rates (advanced): edit the comparison prices, and the card shows what boarding every pet would cost before any multi-pet discount, with the difference against the sitter.
- Per year and the comparison table (advanced): the trip cost x trips a year, plus a table of all five options per night, per trip and per year at your surcharges. A regular sitter who knows the animal is the market's real currency; book school holidays months ahead and take a trial night before the fortnight.
- The occupied-house dividend: a house sitter clears post, waters plants and provides presence during exactly the weeks burglary statistics prefer, which partly offsets the format's premium and can satisfy the unoccupancy clauses that long trips trigger on home insurance.