“Terms and Conditions Apply”: The Gig Economy’s Modern Domestic Servitude
I used to be a full-time pet sitter, but I ran away from domestic servitude. Actually, I got banned from the platform. I’m not sure which came first.
Tragic modern fact: pet sitters have second-class status. So do professional drivers, dog walkers, cleaning professionals, farmhands, nannies, and anyone hired for odd jobs for paltry pay or barter through any gig economy online platforms and apps. These professionals don’t have the same protections as the “boss,” because the system was built that way.
These domestic servants — a term especially accurate for those who make no money beyond a place to stay “for free” — create the backbone of our convenient lifestyle. What was once a dance of blue bloods and people who used the side doors is now all just a click away.
It’s not so hard to find good help these days. People are desperate for ways to make money without killing themselves at a corporate nine-to-five working for and around a group of soul-sucking robots who chirp TERMS AND CONDITIONS TERMS AND CONDITIONS TERMS AND CONDITIONS.
But if you find yourself on the wrong end of a dispute with any company that positions itself as an easy and enjoyable alternative to a corporate lifestyle, you’ll know whether or not you’re in the privileged class. You’ll know if those terms and conditions are written to protect you.
Try to slip away from the corporate life, and it will try to ensnare you. Don’t let it.
Pet Sitting Is a Bad Travel Hack
For years, I preached the opposite — before I understood the dynamic of the gig economy’s hierarchical class structure. I used to tell everyone about how pet sitting was the ultimate travel hack. I could travel around the world, barely paying any rent, and having furry friends everywhere I went.
What could be better? Turns out, freedom is better. The ultimate travel hack is being intentional with your environment, time, and energy while avoiding being beholden to someone with control over you.
The reality of the “terms and conditions,” I have recently learned during my final, disastrous pet sit, is that the homeowner can cancel a sit at any time. They can lie about the number and species of animals you will be responsible for. They can conveniently omit crucial facts, like how, for example, you must sleep in the same bed as the dog that is dirty, anxious, and licking infected wounds without medicine (unless the pet sitter contacts a vet, which I did, of course). They can even put you in physical danger, such as getting you on the wrong side of the Bulgarian mafia.
“You have to have a plan B,” the unhelpful representative with TrustedHousesitters told me when I first called to report the pet owner announcing a cancelation of a six-month sit simply because she didn’t “like my approach.”
Sure, you can purchase their insurance as an upsell to the basic membership. But that’s no guarantee that the homeowner won’t accuse you of violating the “terms and conditions.”
See, the homeowner doesn’t have to have a plan B. The upper class is protected by these corporations.
They explained to me that pet sitters are not allowed to leave, even if they feel in physical danger. They cannot leave even if the homeowner changes the terms of the agreement … unless they are released officially from their domestic servitude by the homeowner.
So, even though the homeowner changed the agreed-upon dates of the arrangement, lied, and endangered me, I still was required to remain in the home for “48 to 72 hours, or any reasonable time that the homeowner agrees to.”
Because I left three days after the homeowner told me that she was getting a new sitter and that we needed to set an end day, I “abandoned the sit” and got kicked out.
No, yet another TrustedHousesitters representative told me, I won’t get my money back for the membership fees I paid.
“According to our terms and conditions,” she parroted, “You violated our terms and conditions.”
Like me, you may mistake pet sitting and other means of living outside the system of rent and mortgages as freedom. It is, I’m sorry to say, the exact opposite.
Nightmare Petsit Filled with Red Flags
In the spring of 2024, I was living in the Canary Islands of Spain and planning my summer. As I normally did, I started by scanning pet sit ads.
I tended to pick the longest pet-sitting assignments I could find to offset the cost of travel. My mental math involved dividing the length of the stay by the travel costs to determine my monthly rent. I tried to keep this part of the living costs under $400.
When I first started, I joined HouseCarers, but that website went under. I suspected it was due to how challenging it was to say the name. I then joined TrustedHousesitters, which cost about $120 a year for membership. I also sought out opportunities through Facebook groups for housesitting or travel.
For years, like I said, I was lucky. The homeowners mostly gave me five-star reviews, one taking a star off for “self-sufficiency” after their guard grabbed my breast and I needed help to hold him accountable for the sexual assault. Mostly, however, they have been grateful for my efforts in keeping their household running smoothly.
I’ve nursed a 22-year-old cat back to health after it fell in an indoor pond. I’ve rescued another scrappy cat from a fight with a stray. I’ve walked countless miles through pastures and streets with dogs of varying temperaments. I’ve enjoyed purring friends and those who hissed and howled at me from across the room, convinced I was responsible for sending their favorite person away.
I wrote all about this in my book, “One-Way Ticket.” I sang the praises of this corporation in the key of Stockholm Syndrome.
By the time I was kicked off the TrustedHousesitters platform, I had 17 five-star reviews and a federal background check under my belt. I was so comfortable with the process that I overlooked major red flags with the woman in Bansko, Bulgaria.
First, her small studio was a mess when we had a video call. She promised she would tidy up before I arrived. Then, the sit itself was originally seven months. That’s an awfully long time to leave a pet and a home. Then there was Roska, the dog. Neither the dog nor the cat was there when the call took place.
“You won’t have to worry about the dog. It’s really owned by a neighbor, whose in the hospital. My daughter is caring for her in her own apartment, but she’s traveling with me to Mexico. He should be out of the hospital by the time you arrive,” said Emmy the Dutch woman two months before my arrival. “Roska and my cat, Ash, haven’t lived together, but I think it will be okay, just in case.”
Well, by the time I arrived, not only was the dog still there, but it was traumatized. And the owner wasn’t in the hospital for a heart attack or anything. This guy, I later found out, had been beaten close to death by some Bulgarian mafia members. Both of the dog owner’s legs and arms were broken in the fight. Whatever that guy did, I didn’t want any part of it.
Roska was jumpy. The dog had been abandoned now three times — the owner, the daughter, and then the pet sitter before me, a 22-year-old Ukrainian girl on her first pet-sitting experience who was just happy to not have bombs dropping nearby. It didn’t trust humans. There was no sign of the dog’s actual owner.
The cat, Ash, howled whenever inside — especially throughout the evening hours. Ash, it seems, did not like Roska. The previous sitter told me she got up at 3 a.m. when the cat howled to walk it three flights downstairs to let it out. That wasn’t something I was willing to do for the next six months.
Roska refused to get off the bed, even though it was a studio apartment with no other place. There were no treats, no dog bed, and no toys. The dog had an infected wound and painfully long nails.
“I didn’t even know you had to cut dog nails,” Emmy finally replied, days after my increasingly desperate messages. “Just give it time. The last pet sitter didn’t have a problem.”
I suggested the dog needed a forever home.
“Yes, I agree the dog needs to be rehomed,” she wrote. “If you know anyone who wants the dog, that would be great.”
After two weeks with barely any sleep, a deep cleaning of the filthy room, and a dog staring anxiously at me whenever I was in the small space, I finally confronted Emmy. I told her we needed to agree upon a deadline to rehome the dog so the sit could move forward as originally planned.
“I do not agree with your approach. I think it is best for my family that I find another sitter,” she replied.
Forced To Scramble for a New Home
After being instructed by TrustedHousesitters that I needed to find a “plan B,” I started scrambling to find a new place to live. Luckily, this happened in Bansko, Bulgaria and not, say, Tokyo. In a few days, I found a place that was twice as large, quiet, and with a beautiful view of the mountains for just 280 euros a month.
That meant I had been bartering around 50 euros a month for living in a cramped studio apartment in exchange for an overwhelming amount of pet care and disrupted sleep.
Interestingly, on that same day, the apartment manager alerted me that the dog’s owner was finally returning from the hospital. She gave me his apartment key and asked me to please return the dog there. He was expecting her when he arrived home.
I texted Emmy, offering to move forward as agreed now that the dog was returned to the owner.
“No. We need to come to an agreement for an end date,” Emmy texted me.
Two days later, upon signing my new lease, I replied: “End effective immediately.”
I filled the cat’s bowls with food and water, cleaned the entire apartment once more, and returned the key to the apartment manager.
Then, I received a note from TrustedHousesitters alerting me that they had suspended my account based on a report from Emmy.
No, it didn’t matter that I had a long track record of integrity. No, it didn’t matter that I used my referral code to sign up more than a half-dozen friends to what I thought was the best housesitting website. No, it didn’t matter that I was uncomfortable with this forced connection with this dog owner with dangerous enemies.
No, it didn’t matter that Emmy canceled the sit — she was able to change the end date from six months in the future to 1.5 weeks. The fact that I left before she granted me leave was enough to kick me out, no money back.
“Terms and conditions,” Rachel from TrustedHousesitters said. “Terms and conditions … terms and conditions.”
The gig economy creates a hierarchical class structure, which supports a quiet reconstruction and distribution of the world’s wealth and respect. One group of people can’t enslave another anymore — and yet, that’s exactly what happens to people who try to circumnavigate corporate life.
Do Not Agree To Unequal Terms and Conditions
Yes, we have to agree to terms and conditions. That’s the thing about working within a private online business designed to connect one group with another. Yes, the people who own homes and pets, who can afford the vacation rentals, or pay someone to chauffeur them across town have to agree to the terms and conditions, too.
But these rules aren’t level. Life isn’t fair.
Homeowners on the platform don’t have to complete the same background check that I did. I had nearly a decade of nice experiences with sane people throughout North and South Americas, Asia, Oceania, and Europe, so I presumed that was how it was. I was wrong.
Anyone on the wrong end of a dispute with rideshare companies, short-term rental sites, or housesitting agencies knows where they stand in terms of value by the definition of the corporate business model. Terms and conditions not only apply, but rule with an iron fist for those who yearn for freedom from the tarnished fake gold handcuffs of capitalism.
As I’ve read over and over now on Facebook groups for pet sitters, I’m not the only one who has had to defend themselves against what felt like a character assassination from these companies.
“The safety of the pets comes first,” Rachel said, ignoring the fact that both the dog and the cat were safe and cared for.
No, she wouldn’t talk with the apartment manager, who agreed to check on the cat if necessary. No, she wouldn’t talk to the family whose young daughter donated a comfort toy to the dog at my request. No, she wouldn’t talk with the kind Russian lady I found to try and walk Roska so I could have an hour of not being stared at. (I do work, after all.)
With platforms like these, there’s no need to go to the town square to the slave market. Bosses don’t have to drive by a hardware store with immigrants gathering in search of day labor. They can just log on to the app of their choice to find someone willing to do their dirty work.
Corporate “terms and conditions” will always support them. If you want freedom, grab it and get out while you can.
