Scheduling
- Late Request Fee:
For weekday, midday visits, a $15 late request fee applies to any visits added the same day, requested after 9 a.m. For pet sitting visits, a $15 late request fee is added to any visit requested after 2 p.m. for the same evening through the next morning before 9 a.m. (Monday through Friday), and/or after 2 p.m. on a Friday for any visit over the same weekend, through Monday before 9 a.m.
- Cancellation Policy:
Midday visits must be cancelled by 9 a.m. on the day of the visit or they will be charged in full. Pet sitting visits must be cancelled by 2 p.m. for any visit that evening through 9 a.m. the next day or they will be charged in full. Weekend pet sitting visits must be cancelled by 2 p.m. on Friday or they will be charged in full.
- Rescheduling Policy:
Multipack visits (either 30- or 20-minutes) can be rescheduled as long as they are canceled before the cancellation deadlines listed above. Monthly package visits for 3 or 4 days per week can be rescheduled on any following weekday of the same month (one visit per day, no doubling up) as long as they are canceled before the cancellation deadline.
We have a couple different ways to schedule a visit:
- Login to your Time to Pet account (Alexandria or Arlington) and request the visit yourself (don’t worry if you’re not sure what kind of visit you normally have, we’ll make sure it’s correct!). For monthly package visits, you can cancel or request a change to those visits, but you do not need to request them each month. The visits are automatically published to the schedule.
- Email us for Alexandria or Arlington customers.
- Call your DoggyWalker.com Office after 9 a.m. (the numbers are listed below in the page footer). Please feel free to leave a message if we do not answer, as we may be away from the phone on a dog walk!
DoggyWalker.com provides services 365 days per year. We observe the following days as holidays and close our offices, cancelling midday visits (9 a.m. – 5 p.m. Monday-Friday). Though our offices will be closed and midday walks canceled, our client system and email communications will be monitored. These days are not included in your monthly contract: if you require a midday visit on these days and if they occur between Monday through Friday, there is an additional $10 holiday fee per visit:
- New Year’s Day
- Memorial Day
- Independence Day
- Labor Day
- Thanksgiving Day
- Christmas Eve (after 5 p.m.)
- Christmas Day
- New Year’s Eve (after 5 p.m.)
We follow the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) guidance regarding inclement weather for the Northern Virginia area. If OPM has closed the Federal Government due to weather, we will cancel all midday walks. If OPM has issued a delay due to inclement weather, we will conduct walks but may have to widen your visit window to make sure our caregivers can get to your pet(s) safely.
There are some weather events, namely excessive heat, when DoggyWalker.com will advise clients of the possibility for less outdoor time in order to maintain the health and safety of pets and caregivers. The full visit time will still be fulfilled but the actual time outside walking may be restricted or modified, and all of your dogs’ potty needs fulfilled beforehand.
For any pet sit visit when you are out of town – regardless of office closure or inclement weather – we will make sure your pet(s) are cared for!
Deciding between a monthly contract or a flexible, multipack of visits usually depends on how many days you will cancel; some months it may be less expensive for you to keep the monthly contract, where in others it may make more sense to pay for visits in a pack or individually. However, many of our clients stay with the monthly contract even if they are going to occasionally be home, which gives them the freedom to work from home, run errands, or focus on other tasks during the day while knowing their pet(s) are still cared for! Since the COVID-19 pandemic, many of our clients work from home, DoggyWalker.com has maintained continuity of service for clients with both monthly contracts and multipack options, keeping their dogs on schedule with as little disruption as possible.
Our policy of “use it or lose it” does not provide for pro-rated fees for monthly contracts. Since the monthly contract is calculated at a discounted rate (on average of 20%) and you pay for the monthly contract at the beginning of the month, we do not credit back any payment for walks that are not used. In a situation where you know ahead of time that you will be not be needing all your walks in the coming month, we can check to see if it would be less expensive for you to pay for visits individually as opposed to the monthly contract, but you must notify the office before the 1st of the month about this arrangement.
You are not committed or tied to your monthly contract, so if it’s less expensive for you to switch to a flex pack of visits for the month you don’t need as many visits, we are happy to make that switch – as long as it’s been done before the 1st of the month.
