Pay for something online and the platform usually sits in the middle: it holds the money, processes refunds, steps in when a transaction goes wrong. That is where the expectation comes from. House sitting does not work that way. No Australian pet-sitting or house-sitting platform is a party to the arrangement you make with the other person, and none of them will adjudicate a damage claim, order compensation or compel anyone to do anything. That is not a flaw in one company's policy. It is how online marketplaces are built, and knowing it in advance changes how you set a sit up.
This article covers what a marketplace can genuinely do when a sit goes wrong, where Australian Consumer Law reaches and where it stops, who you escalate to for each kind of problem, and the small number of things you do before a sit that matter far more than any platform feature.
- A marketplace introduces people. It is not a party to your agreement, an insurer, an investigator or an arbitrator.
- Australian Consumer Law is built around businesses supplying goods and services. It does much less work in a one-off private arrangement between two individuals, particularly where no money changes hands.
- A Report function can lead to moderation, a warning, suspension, permanent removal and referral to authorities. It cannot recover money or force anyone to act.
- The correct escalation depends entirely on the problem: a vet, the police, your insurer, AFCA, Scamwatch, your state consumer agency, or a small claims tribunal.
- Nearly all of the practical protection available to you is created before the sit starts, in a written agreement, a documented handover and your own checks.
What a marketplace actually is, and what it is not
An online marketplace provides a place for two parties to find each other, communicate and agree terms. The agreement that results is between those two people. The platform sets rules for using the site, moderates behaviour on the site, and removes accounts that break the rules. That is the whole of its role.
The ACCC explains the same structure in its guidance on selling online: when you buy through a marketplace, your rights sit with the seller you dealt with, not with the platform that hosted the listing. The point generalises. The platform is the noticeboard, not the counterparty.
This is not a criticism of any particular company. Virtually every marketplace in Australia, in pet care and well beyond it, is structured this way, and there is nothing dishonest about the structure itself. The friction people describe is narrower than that: the terms of service and the marketing sometimes tell different stories, and users only read the terms after something has already happened. The fix is to read them first.
Sitterly's position is published on our about page and it is deliberately plain. Sitterly supports the connection. Homeowners and sitters remain responsible for getting to know each other, discussing expectations and deciding whether to proceed. We are not a party to your arrangement, we do not supervise sits, and we do not provide insurance.
Read the terms before you need them
Whichever platform you use, spend ten minutes on its terms of service and its safety page before your first sit. Look specifically for the sentence describing whether the platform is a party to arrangements between users, and for what it says about disputes, insurance and liability. Almost everything else follows from those two answers.
Where Australian Consumer Law reaches, and where it stops
Consumer guarantees under the Australian Consumer Law apply to products and services normally bought for personal or household use from a business. If you pay a pet-sitting business, guarantees such as due care and skill apply to that business, and they cannot be signed away in a contract. The ACCC sets out the scope on its page covering consumer rights and guarantees.
The same page is equally clear about the limit: most consumer guarantees do not apply to a one-off transaction between two individuals where the seller is not running a business. A few still do, such as clear title to a product, but the due care and skill guarantee that people usually have in mind is not among them.
That matters a great deal for non-monetary house sitting. On Sitterly, no money changes hands between homeowner and sitter for the sit itself. There is no supply of a service for payment between the two of you, so the consumer guarantee framework is doing very little inside that relationship. What you have instead is whatever the two of you actually agreed, plus general law. This is precisely why a written agreement carries so much weight in an exchange arrangement.
Consumer Protection WA makes a related point in its guidance on house sitting: using a registered business brings Australian Consumer Law protections with it, and consumers should read the terms of any intermediary carefully. It also flags something homeowners frequently miss, which is that many insurance policies exclude deliberate damage and theft by people lawfully invited onto the property.
Australian Consumer Law still binds the platform itself as a business. It cannot make false or misleading claims about what it provides. That is a real protection and it is the reason the wording on a safety page matters. What the ACL will not do is turn a regulator into your representative. The ACCC states on its page about where to go for consumer help that it does not resolve individual complaints, and it directs people to state and territory consumer agencies and to small claims courts and tribunals instead.
What a Report function can and cannot do
Reporting is a moderation tool. It is genuinely useful, and it is not a dispute-resolution service. Being precise about the difference is more helpful than implying more.
What reporting can achieve
- A human review of the account, the listing and the on-platform message history
- A formal warning issued to the account
- Temporary suspension of the account
- Permanent removal from the platform
- Removal or amendment of a listing or profile that breaches the rules
- Referral to the relevant authorities where illegal conduct appears to be involved
- A durable, timestamped record of what was said, which is useful to you later
What reporting cannot do
- Recover money, property or a bond
- Order or arrange compensation for damage
- Mediate between you and the other person, or decide who is right
- Compel a repair, a refund, an apology or an explanation
- Remove or rewrite a review because you disagree with it
- Investigate off-platform events, take statements or gather evidence for you
- Replace the police, your insurer, a regulator or a court
Sitterly's own limits are the ones listed above. Our community guidelines set out the consequences we can apply: a warning, temporary suspension, permanent removal, and referral to authorities where illegal conduct is involved. We can act on accounts. We cannot act on money.
Report and escalate at the same time
Do not wait for a platform review to finish before contacting a vet, the police or your insurer. Moderation runs on its own timeline and has no bearing on a claim, a police report or an animal's health. Lodge the report so the conduct is on record, then deal with the actual problem through the right channel immediately.
Who to escalate to, problem by problem
Much of the frustration people describe comes from taking a problem to the wrong place. Here is the right place for each of the common ones.
- Pet emergency. The pet's usual vet first, or the nearest 24-hour emergency clinic if the practice is closed. Animal Emergency Service lists the signs that warrant an immediate visit, including breathing difficulty, collapse, a distended abdomen, seizures lasting more than a couple of minutes, suspected poisoning, snake bite, tick paralysis and heat stroke. Notify the owner as soon as the animal is safe.
- Pet missing. Search locally, then check the microchip details are current. PetAddress lets you search a microchip number to find which Australian registry holds it. Contact the local council, nearby vets and the nearest pound or shelter.
- Property damage. Photograph everything before anything is moved or repaired, put a written account into the on-platform message thread while it is fresh, then contact the home and contents insurer. Moneysmart sets out the steps for making a home insurance claim.
- Theft, or a crime in progress. Call 000 if a crime is happening or anyone is at risk. Otherwise report it to police. Victoria Police, for example, directs non-urgent reports to online reporting or the Police Assistance Line on 131 444, and most states and territories use the same number. Check your own state police website.
- Personal safety. Call 000. Leave the property if you can do so safely. Report the account to the platform afterwards, not instead.
- An insurer declines or delays. Ask for the decision in writing and lodge an internal complaint with the insurer first. If that fails, the Australian Financial Complaints Authority hears complaints for free on 1800 931 678. The Financial Rights Legal Centre also runs a free Insurance Law Service on 1300 663 464.
- A scam, or a request to send money. Contact your bank immediately, then report it through Scamwatch. If identity details were exposed, IDCARE is on 1800 595 160. On a non-monetary platform there is nothing to pay for a sit, so any payment request should stop the conversation.
- A civil claim for money. Your state or territory consumer agency can explain your options and may help negotiate. Beyond that, every state and territory has a small claims court or tribunal that hears consumer matters, and the ACCC links to each of them. Thresholds, fees and rules differ by jurisdiction, so get advice before lodging.
Two practical notes. First, 000 is for human emergencies. Ambulance services do not attend animals, so a pet emergency means a vet, not Triple Zero. Second, ask police for the event or report number when you make a report, because insurers commonly ask for it and it is much harder to obtain weeks later.
It is also worth knowing that a sitter carries animal welfare obligations in their own right. Business Queensland explains that a person is in charge of an animal if they have custody, care or control of it, which includes temporary carers, and that a duty of care follows. Each state and territory has its own animal welfare legislation with similar concepts, so check the rules where the sit takes place.
The work that actually protects you happens before the sit
Once you accept that no platform will adjudicate anything, the sensible response is to build the arrangement so you never need one to. Five things do most of the work. The most common failure is not damage or dishonesty but a sitter pulling out close to your departure, which we have covered separately in what to do when your pet sitter cancels.
Put the terms in writing
Dates and times, who feeds and walks what and when, guests, use of the car, bills and utilities, the state the house is left in, and what happens if either side needs to cancel. A short document that both people have read beats a long conversation nobody wrote down. Our guide to a house sitting agreement walks through what to include.
Document the handover
Take dated photos of each room, the exterior, the car if it is included, and any existing marks, chips or stains. Photograph meter readings. Both parties should keep a copy. This is not distrust, it is the same reason rental condition reports exist, and it settles the large majority of end-of-sit disagreements before they start. Our guide to preparing your home and pets covers the rest of the handover.
Do the verification checks yourself
Verification badges tell you a specific, limited thing. They are worth using as a filter, and they are not a character reference. Read what each badge actually means in our explainer on what pet sitter verification means, then do your own work on top: a video call, a meet and greet where practical, and references you contact yourself.
Agree the emergency plan
Name the vet and the after-hours clinic, agree a spending limit above which the sitter must call, and write down how the bill gets paid. Settle our guidance on emergency vet consent in advance rather than at 2am. The RSPCA also recommends nominating at least one emergency contact who can help if you cannot get to your home, and keeping microchip registry details current.
Keep the conversation on the platform
Swapping to text messages is convenient and it scatters the record. On-platform messaging keeps everything timestamped in one thread, which is what you will want if you ever need to show what was agreed. Confirm the insurance position early too, since our guide to house sitter insurance explains that the homeowner is the one who needs to check whether their policy permits third-party stays.
The assumptions that leave people exposed
- Treating a badge, a rating or a review count as a guarantee rather than one input among several
- Reading the terms of service after the problem instead of before the sit
- Waiting for a platform to investigate before calling a vet, an insurer or the police
- Having no photos of the property at handover, which turns every later disagreement into one person's word against another's
- Agreeing everything verbally at a rushed handover on the morning of departure
- Treating a report as a claim, then feeling let down when moderation does not produce compensation
- Sending or accepting money for the sit itself on a non-monetary platform, which is both outside the model and a common scam pattern
The record you want to already have
- A signed or mutually confirmed written agreement covering dates, duties and cancellation
- Dated photos of every room, the exterior and any pre-existing damage
- Vet name, address, after-hours clinic, and the agreed spending limit in writing
- Microchip numbers, and confirmation that registry details are current
- Insurer name and policy number for home and contents, and for pet insurance if held
- Two emergency contacts who are not the person travelling
- The full message history retained on the platform rather than deleted
Where Sitterly stands
Sitterly is a non-monetary exchange. Homeowners list at no cost, sitters stay in the home and care for the pets and property, and no money changes hands for the sit. We provide free listings, sitter profiles, optional email, government ID and police check verification that users initiate and we review, on-platform messaging, a reply rating, reviews after a completed booking, and a Report function with admin moderation.
We do not vet every user, require police checks, guarantee bookings or outcomes, provide insurance of any kind, supervise sits, or mediate disputes between users. Reviews only exist once a booking is completed, and on a platform at our stage the volume is necessarily low, so treat review counts as one weak signal rather than a substitute for your own checks. We would rather publish those limits than have you discover them at the worst possible moment.
Frequently asked questions
Can a platform make a sitter or homeowner pay for damage?
No. A platform can suspend or remove an account, and it can pass information to authorities where illegal conduct appears to be involved, but it has no power to order payment or enforce one. Recovery of money runs through your insurer, direct negotiation, your state or territory consumer agency, or a small claims tribunal, depending on the circumstances.
Does Australian Consumer Law cover a free house sit?
Largely not, in the relationship between the two individuals. The ACCC explains that most consumer guarantees do not apply to one-off transactions between people who are not running a business, and in a non-monetary exchange there is no payment for the service at all. The ACL does still apply to the platform as a business, which means it cannot mislead you about what it provides.
Is it still worth reporting if the platform cannot fix my problem?
Yes. Reporting is how patterns become visible and how accounts that behave badly get suspended or removed, which protects the next person. It also creates a dated internal record. Just lodge it alongside the real escalation rather than in place of it.
The other person has stopped replying since the sit ended. What now?
Put your position in one clear written message on the platform, including what you are asking for and by when, so the request is on record. Report the conduct if it breaches the guidelines. If money is genuinely in dispute, your state or territory consumer agency can outline your options, and a small claims tribunal is the usual civil path. Weigh whether the amount justifies the time and fees involved.
Where that leaves you
A platform is a place to meet, a set of rules, and a moderation team. That is a useful thing to have and it is not protection. The protection comes from a written agreement, a documented handover, checks you carry out yourself, and knowing in advance which number to call for which problem. None of that takes long, and all of it works whether or not anyone answers a support ticket.
If something on Sitterly concerns you, our community guidelines explain what we expect and how to use the Report function. To be precise about what that achieves: a report can lead to a warning, temporary suspension, permanent removal from the platform, or referral to authorities where illegal conduct is involved. It is not a dispute-resolution service, it will not recover money or property, and it does not replace the police, your insurer or a tribunal. Report the conduct, and escalate the problem to the right place at the same time.
This article is general information only and is not legal, insurance, veterinary or financial advice. Consumer law, animal welfare legislation, tribunal thresholds and police reporting processes differ between states and territories. For advice on your own situation, contact your state or territory consumer agency, your insurer, a qualified lawyer or your vet.
