when dog boarding, does anyone use a cutoff/pick up time for the animal?

Rover's Help section states that each "night" of boarding is good for up to 24 hours of care. Unfortunately, the automated booking system has no way of knowing dropoff and pickup times and therefore charges by night. Therefore, it is up to you to ask the client before booking those important times so that you can manually adjust the booking before the client pays.

This is something that is easily explained to customers. You tell them you need to know those times to ensure the booking is accurate. If they say that they will drop off Fido at 8 am, then you tell them Fido needs to be picked up by 8 am on the last day. I do give customers a bit of leeway (2 hours) before I tell them there will be additional charges, but I don't tell them the exact limit because I am sure somebody will take advantage of it.

Not a single customer has balked. Just make it clear before you accept and finalize any booking. Get those times and manually adjust if you need to. Since you have a daycare rate, use that for those types of situations, especially as it is the same as your boarding rate.

You can always refer the customer here:

https://support.rover.com/hc/en-us/ar...

Also, there are sitters who have even shorter lengths of time for each "night of" boarding.

I usually just work it out with the dog owner for a mutually agreeable time. So far it's worked out OK for our family. The sitter we use for our dog through Rover has a "starting time" for the day, might be around 8:00 am. If I need an earlier drop off, then she charges a bit extra ($5 or $10 I think). She watches multiple dogs and this is her primary source of income, so it works for her. As a pet owner, it seems fair.

I have put on my profile that pick-ups after 1 p.m. incur a $25 day care charge. None of my clients have balked at it. If they will be later, they have either paid it or had someone else pick up their dog. I have grandfathered in some of my long-term regulars as a reward for their loyalty, but the newer clients all pay the extra day if they are late in picking up.

I definitely agree with Karen that it has to be worked out between you and the client. Essentially you create your own policy. I don't advertise a policy on my profile or even communicate one much. I tend to be more flexible because I've been very lucky in that most clients don't try to take advantage; a few have offered more upfront. I also have a lot of repeat clients that may pick up what would be considered "early" one time then a couple hours of what would be considered "late" another. But if I get a request and we talk about the pick up time and it would end up being more than 4 or so hours over the 24 hour period I will let the client know I generally charge a 1/2 day day care or full day, depending upon the number of hours. Usually they are very understanding. Good luck!