You don’t always get to go on vacations with your dog. If you’re planning to leave it behind, you have a couple of options. If you have a friend that’s on good terms with your dog, you can ask them to help you look after it, but should you compensate them in cash?
You can ask your friends to help look after your dog while you’re away as long as they’re willing to do that. Afterward, you should offer to pay as compensation for the service, even if they appear not to want it.
This article will dive into all the unwritten rules of asking your friend to petsit your dog. You’ll learn how much you’re expected to offer as payment and when you should offer to pay.
Is It Okay to Ask Your Friends to Take Care of Your Pet While You’re Away?
While you can always hire a pet sitter to help you look after your dog during a vacation, asking a friend to help out doesn’t hurt. As long as your friend is also on good terms with the dog, it should work out.
However, that is assuming your friendship is perfect and you do help each other out frequently. Also, you must consider how well they treat animals before leaving your puppy in their care for weeks.
If they have a dog themselves, things should work out perfectly. Even if they don’t have a dog, try to recall how your dog has acted towards them in recent times. If they generally keep a friendly relationship with your dog, you certainly don’t need a petsitter.
If you’re not going to be away for so long, you can let the dog stay alone at home while they come occasionally to check on her. Dogs are generally good at coping alone, so you don’t have to worry.
If you’ll be away for more than a week, you should let them know they’ll be pet sitting full time. Since you’ll be paying a professional petsitter for essentially the same service, you should offer to pay them too.
If you’re inexperienced in managing payments between friends, especially when a pet is involved, the next few sections will help you out.
Should You Pay Your Friends for Dog Sitting
There’s a certain urge to not pay your friend in cash for a professional service. After all, what are friends for, right?
If you’re hiring your friend to help petsit your dog, it’s mostly because you’re trying to save some money. However, if your friend is unhappy to help sit your dog, you should avoid forcing it.
There are just so many wanted disadvantages that may pop up from that. Your friend isn’t obligated to help you out in any situation, and you should always respect that.
When they do, however, it always helps to compensate them in cash. Since you’ll typically pay for the same service rendered by someone else, there’s no reason why you should let your friend offer it for free.
It’s important to note that payment to friends shouldn’t necessarily be in cash. Most friends will refuse to take the payment after rendering excellent service. In that case, you can pay by buying them a gift that they may have bought if they accepted the money.
If you respect your friend’s decision and pay them for s job well done, you’ll maintain a healthy friendship without any hard feelings.
Most importantly, both of you will end up feeling accomplished as you’ll save some money, and your friend won’t think you took advantage of them.
How Much Should I Pay a Friend for Dog Sitting?
At this point, you already know it’s okay to ask your friends to petsit your dog while you’re away. Also, you understand that you’re supposed to compensate them, most preferably in cash. Another roadblock that most people face is how much they should pay their friends for petsitting a dog.
This question is just as vague as asking how much you should pay a professional for sitting your pet. Since you’ve most probably read something related to that, the answer here is essentially the same: it depends.
However, the amount you pay a friend depends on entirely different factors than what you pay to a professional pet sitter. Generally, you’ll end up saving about 30% to 50% of what you’ll pay to a professional sitter.
Before deciding on how much to pay your friend, you should estimate how long the contract will last. If it’s only for a couple of hours at most, the charge can range from free to a few bucks.
You should never assume that your friend can sit your dog for as long as you want, even if they agreed to help pet sit the dog. Always try to make the terms of the agreement clear, especially the part relating to the length of time involved.
Before deciding on the final payment, it’s recommended to check out the pricing of some professional pet sitters. You can undercut that price by around 30% to 50%, depending on what you can afford.
When Should You Pay Your Friend for Dog Sitting?
Most professional petsitters will receive payment before you go on your vacation. Because of this, it sounds morally right to pay your friend before the beginning of the petsitting contract.
However, that setup never works out. It’s very unlikely that your friend will accept the payment at all, and the probabilities get even lower when you try to pay before the fact.
Instead, you should let them sit the dog first, then pay them when you get back. If they’re not willing to receive cash for the service, you can buy them different gifts to show your appreciation of the service.
What to Do If Your Friend Refuses Payment After Sitting Your Dog
Another very common scenario that may pop up after your friend helps to pet sit your dog is refusing payment. Some friends will gladly refund the money once you send it to them.
If your friend insists they don’t want payment after the service, you should ignore it. Even if they don’t want a cash reward, you can repay them in kind by buying them several gifts to make up for the service. It also doesn’t hurt to send a thank you card to show appreciation.
