Yes!  We are licensed by the City of Alexandria, Arlington County, and the Commonwealth of Virginia.  We have many caregivers who live and work in both Arlington and Alexandria, and who may even be your neighbor!  Our insurance policy and bond are secured through the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters and the Business Insurers of the Carolinas.  We carry a commercial general liability policy that includes animal bailee coverage to cover all the pets in our care, custody, or control.

Despite our name, we love all kinds of animals!  DoggyWalker.com will care for dogs, cats, birds, rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters, chinchillas, and turtles (fish too!).  If you have another type of pet, feel free to ask!  Sorry, no snakes or other exotic pets.

DoggyWalker.com serves clients in the City of Alexandria, most of the Alexandria portion of Fairfax County, Arlington County, and select areas of the City of Falls Church and McLean.   Please check out our map to see our service areas in greater detail and feel free to contact us if you’re unsure if we serve your area.  You can also visit our team pages for specific neighborhoods served by our three service areas in Alexandria, Arlington, and Annandale.

Thank you for your interest in DoggyWalker.com services!  To get started, please complete our New Client Form and a manager will contact you within one business day to set up a new client consultation and/or answer any additional questions you may have.  Please explore our website for additional information about our services, rates, and company history.

DoggyWalker.com requires two sets of keys for a few reasons, but normally it is because it is necessary for both sets of keys to be with two caregivers in cases of multiple visits in a day, substitutions, and emergencies.  Occasionally, the second copy comes in handy when you have locked yourself out and need a copy of your key!  If  not assigned to more than one caregiver, the backup copy of your key is always safely stored in a secure location and labeled in a way which does not give away the name or address of your home. For clients who live in apartment buildings that require a FOB, we only need one copy of the FOB (although we’re happy to have two copies if allowed!).  Having the FOB allows us tto maximize the time spent with your pet(s) as opposed to waiting for the front desk or concierge to check the key out to us.

We manage a profile on every home and pet that we visit, allowing us to follow your routine and handling preferences.  The profile includes important information including your visit schedule, feeding schedule, your contact information, vet information, general routines, and any quirks about your home or pet (we all have quirks!).  That profile is accessible to any caregiver that is scheduled to visit your home to ensure they know what to expect. If you need any changes to your profile information, you can inform your service area office so we can be sure the profile reflects those changes.  Our clients also have the ability to update their profiles on their own by using the LeashTime client system.

Within reason, a DoggyWalker.com caregiver will complete additional tasks such as watering plants, bringing in mail and newspapers, turning lights and TVs on and off, etc. as part of a midday or pet sit visit.  Our caregivers are not expected to and will not pick up excessive, pre-existing animal waste, perform house cleaning, maintenance, or be on call for delivery or repair people.  However, they are expected to manage any illness, accidents, or damage in a way that secures your pet(s) before you return home. 

We refer to regular, weekday dog walks ( between 9 a.m. -5 p.m.) as midday visits, and after hour visits as pet sitting (weekday visits before 9 a.m. and after 5 p.m., as well as any visit taking place on weekend days).  You can think of it as a midday visit happening while you’re away at work for exercise and a bathroom break, and pet sitting is for when you’re working late or are out of town, for exercise, bathroom break, feeding, medication management, etc.  Please also note that any visit occurring on a weekend day (Saturday and Sunday) must be at least a 30-minute visit;  midday visits Monday through Friday are a minimum of 20-minutes.

When dogs are young, they have smaller bladders and need to go outside frequently to help with their house training.  Our puppy package provide two, 20-minute visits per day (either 3, 4, or 5 days, Monday through Friday) that fall within two, 1-hour time windows (that you can choose based on your schedule) to help with this training.  This option also works well for senior dogs or those with medical issues that require more frequent trips to the bathroom.  Although most of our caregivers aren’t officially trained as dog trainers, they do have enough experience that be of help to get your puppy off on the right paw.  Plus, we love to help our clients with raising their furbabies, both young and old alike!

DoggyWalker.com no longer provides overnight visit options for new clients.  However, we do have an “Almost Overnight” visit that similar to having someone stay in your home, but it does not include our employee sleeping there.  The caregiver would care for your pet(s) for a 2-hour visit in the evening, and then return for a 1-hour visit the next morning. Both visits can include walks, feeding, medication administration, basic home care, and of course; giving lots of love and attention to your pet(s)!  Please visit our Rates Page for more details on the Almost Overnight and other visit options.

As a professional pet-sitting company offering individual leashed walks, we cannot take your dog to a public dog park.  Although your dog may be well-behaved, we cannot predict how other dogs may react to your dog and therefore cannot guarantee your dog’s safety.  Your dog’s well-being and health is our primary concern and for this reason we do not put them at risk by taking them to a public dog park.  If your dog enjoys off-leash exercise, we will happily play ball in a fully-fenced yard.  Based on this same concern,  we do not interact with people or other dogs while outside your home.

Our goal is to keep the same caregiver scheduled for all midday visits, but having the same caregiver often depends on how often you schedule visits if you are not using the monthly contract option.  For clients with regular weekly visits, a priority is to have the same caregiver with your pet(s) and doing so is easily done!  For clients with less regular schedules, the assignment of your caregiver depends on the flexibility of the schedule on that day and availability of the caregiver.  When situations with our caregivers arise such as vacations, appointments, and illness; we utilize the second key that we keep secured at the office and assign a substitute caregiver to ensure your pet(s) receive the daily care that they need.  We maintain your profile in our LeashTime client system so that the substitute caregiver can access the most up-to-date information, providing the same quality of service you’ve come to expect from your “regular” caregiver. For pet sitting visits, our priority is to have no more than two caregivers conduct the entire series, though we cannot guarantee this.  Many factors are involved with scheduling visits such as the number of visits per day you require and where you live in relation to the caregiver.  Since most pet sits occur outside of our standard operating hours and on weekends, there may be variability in who is assigned pet sit visits.  Our goal is to maintain as much consistency as possible – especially for your pet(s) while you are away – while respecting the caregiver’s time, transportation costs, other employment, and personal concerns.

DoggyWalker.com utilizes a pet sitting software called Time to Pet that manages our daily schedule (among other things) and is our database of record.  Our caregivers interact with Time to Pet to mark when they arrive to your home and complete a visit.  Though our caregivers have traditionally left hand-written notes at the end of each visit, they also have the capability to submit a visit report through Time to Pet that will be sent to you through the messaging platform (with additional notification delivered to your email inbox).  The electronic visit report became a required practice in June 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.   Time to Pet can be accessed in a browser session as well as in an app!  The app is available in Google Play and the App Store.