Effective November 6, 2026. These terms are an agreement between you and Paw and Collar LLC, a Washington limited liability company ("Paw & Collar," "we"), about using the Paw & Collar app and website. You accept them by checking the agreement box when you create your account, and again whenever we change them. We keep a record of each agreement: the date, the version and the device it came from.
1. What Paw & Collar is
Paw & Collar is a marketplace that connects pet owners with independent pet sitters. Sitters are not our employees or agents. They choose their services, set their prices and decide which bookings to accept. Each booking is an agreement between the owner and the sitter, and Paw & Collar doesn't supervise, direct or control how sitters provide care. Paw & Collar does not provide pet care. Except for handling payments as described below, we are not a party to the care arrangement between an owner and a sitter.
Paw & Collar doesn't employ, supervise or insure sitters. Each sitter is an independent business and is responsible for the care they provide and for any harm or damage they cause. Badges and checks help you choose, but they aren't a guarantee of anyone's conduct (see section 5).
2. Who can use it
You must be 18 or older and able to enter a binding contract. Each person may have one account. Keep your password private, because you're responsible for activity on your account. The information you give us must be true and current. Before you book or accept bookings, you confirm your email address, and your mobile number when we ask.
People on an owner's account: an owner can add up to 3 more people, such as a spouse, partner or roommate. Each has their own login and shares the account's pets, bookings and saved cards. The main account holder is responsible for what they do on the account. Only the main account holder can add or remove people, change the account name or delete the account.
3. Booking and paying
- An owner sends a request and the sitter accepts or declines it. A request becomes a booking once it's accepted and paid.
- The price is the sitter's rates for the service, dates and pets shown in the app, itemized before you pay. It can include the sitter's 60-minute, extra pet, puppy, holiday or cat rates, add-ons such as a bath or medication, a discount for 7+ days, or a sitter's discount code. A Paw & Collar service fee of 10% is added. Every price we show you includes that fee, and you see the total before you pay.
- You pay by card, Apple Pay or Google Pay through our payment processor, Stripe. Paw & Collar collects the payment as the sitter's limited payment collection agent. Once you've paid us, you owe the sitter nothing more for that booking.
- Visit times: for walks, drop-ins and training sessions you pick morning, midday, evening, any time, or an exact time. A sitter's weekly hours, days off, busy hours and daily pet limit decide what can be requested.
- Paying when the sitter accepts: when you send a request, you can choose a saved card. It's charged only when the sitter accepts, and the booking is confirmed right then. Nothing is charged if they decline or the request expires. If the charge doesn't go through, the booking shows Payment needed and isn't confirmed until you pay. You can change the card until the booking is paid, or choose to pay after the sitter accepts. Cards are saved with Stripe; remove them anytime in Account.
- Price changes before a booking is confirmed: a sitter can lower a request's price, or ask for a higher one with a reason. A higher price applies only if you approve it.
- Changing a confirmed booking: either side can ask to change the dates, pets, visits per day or visit times, and the other side approves or declines. When a change that costs more is approved, you authorize Paw & Collar to charge your saved card the difference. When it costs less, the difference is refunded to you automatically.
- Weekly bookings: when you set up a weekly booking, you authorize Paw & Collar to charge your saved card for each week, about two days before that week starts, until you or the sitter stops it. Stop it anytime in the app. Weeks already paid still happen.
- Walk now: an on-demand walk request goes to nearby walkers. The first to accept becomes your sitter at their own price, which is never more than the maximum you set. You pay to confirm.
- Tips are optional. You can tip during a paid booking that lasts several days, from its second day, and for 30 days after a booking ends. 100% of a tip goes to the sitter.
- A request that isn't accepted and paid before its start date expires, and you aren't charged.
- A free meet & greet is confirmed when the sitter accepts it.
- Keep it on Paw & Collar: book and pay through the app for anyone you met here for 12 months after you first connect. Until a booking is paid, the app blocks phone numbers, emails and links in messages, and payment apps are always blocked. If you ask for or take payment outside the app, we'll warn you the first time; after that we may pause or close your account. You can appeal (section 10).
4. Cancellations and refunds
- Before payment: either side can cancel at no charge.
- Sitter cancels after payment: you get a full refund automatically. When a sitter cancels or declines a booking that hasn't started, the app shows other sitters who are free on the same dates, and you can send them the same request in one tap.
- Owner cancels after payment: what you get back depends on how far ahead you cancel, and it's the same for every sitter.
- Stays (boarding and house sitting) and other bookings that span several days: a full refund if you cancel 30 or more days before the first day, 80% back 15 to 29 days before, 65% back 7 to 14 days before, and 50% back after that.
- Walks, drop-ins, day care and training on a single day, on-demand walks, and each week of a weekly booking: a full refund if you cancel by the day before, and 50% back on the day.
- The sitter is paid for the part that isn't refunded, for holding the dates. The app shows the exact amount before you confirm, and the refund happens automatically.
- Weekly bookings: after each week, any walk, visit or day of care without a report card from the sitter is refunded to you automatically.
- Report a problem: from the start of a paid booking until 2 days after it ends, you can report a problem in the app and say how much you'd like back. The sitter can agree, which refunds you right away, or explain their side within 2 days, and then Paw & Collar decides. The sitter isn't paid for that booking until it's settled. Paw & Collar may refund more than the cancellation policy when that's fair.
- Card disputes: please report a problem in the app before disputing a charge with your bank. While a dispute is open, the sitter's payout for that booking is held. If your bank reverses a payment for care you received, you still owe it: you can't book, request a walk or pay for a booking until you pay it back in the app, and Paw & Collar may collect it from you.
- Refunds go back to the original payment method. Your bank may take 5 to 10 business days to show them.
5. Background checks, ID checks and badges
Every sitter completes a background check through Checkr, a photo ID check through Stripe (a photo of a government ID and a live selfie matched to it) and Paw & Collar's safety course before they can accept bookings. A background check covers certain records only. Records can be incomplete, and no check predicts how a person will behave. Owners confirm their email but don't get a background check. Paw & Collar does not guarantee any sitter's or owner's conduct or the quality of care. Use the meet & greet, read reviews, and decide for yourself.
What badges mean. Insured: the sitter showed us their own insurance policy and we confirmed it with the insurer. It's the sitter's policy, not Paw & Collar's, and its own terms decide what it covers. Veterinarian and Vet Tech: we confirmed the license in the state's license lookup. Vet Assistant: we confirmed the experience by calling the clinic. Certified Trainer: we found the sitter's certification in the certifying group's public directory. Only certified trainers can offer dog training. Golden Paw, Fast Responder and Background Checked come from reviews, response times and checks in the app. References marked as from before Paw & Collar were written by people the sitter invited, and we don't confirm them. No badge means Paw & Collar insures or guarantees a booking.
6. Owner responsibilities
- Tell the sitter the truth about your pet's health, behavior, medications and special needs, and answer the bite-history question honestly, including small nips. Keep it current.
- Keep your pet vaccinated as the law requires, including rabies. Sitters who board or do day care can require current records, which you add in your pet's profile.
- Provide food, supplies and home access, and fill in your emergency info in the app: a backup contact, an emergency vet and how much vet care the sitter may approve. Sitters are strongly encouraged to ask for anything missing.
- Home access: if you save lockbox, door, alarm or Wi-Fi details in the app, the sitter on a confirmed booking at your home can see them from the day before it starts until it ends. We keep a record of each day they were shown. Change your codes after a booking if you want to.
- Emergency care: if your pet needs urgent care and the sitter can't reach you or your emergency contact, you authorize the sitter to take your pet to a veterinarian. You are responsible for the vet's bill.
- You are responsible for injury or damage your pet causes, including to the sitter, other people, other animals and property.
7. Sitter responsibilities
Sitters agree to the Sitter Agreement in addition to these terms. Sitters decide how to do the work. They agree to provide the care they accepted, follow the owner's written instructions and the law, and keep pets safe.
8. Messages, photos, reviews and visits
- Keep booking conversations in the app. We may review messages to keep people and pets safe, prevent fraud and resolve disputes.
- You own what you post. You give Paw & Collar permission to store, display and use it to run and promote the service.
- Reviews go both ways, under the same rules. Owners review sitters and sitters review owners, within 30 days after a booking ends. Each review posts right away, so nobody waits for the other side, and it's final once posted. The person reviewed can reply once and can report a review. We remove a review only if it's written to retaliate, says things that didn't happen, shares personal information, is abusive or discriminatory, or isn't about the booking. We never remove a review just for being negative, and we never pay for or reward positive reviews.
- Report cards: sitters send a report card after each walk or visit, and each day of an overnight stay. Each one has at least one photo and safety checks for the pets on the booking, along with times, potty and meal notes, and for walks a map recorded on the sitter's phone. The map is shared only after the walk ends, never live.
- Check-in at the home: if you save your home's location in the app, it's compared with the sitter's location when a walk, drop-in or house sit starts, and the booking shows whether they checked in at the home. Sitters never see your saved location.
- Missed visits: if a walk or drop-in hasn't started 30 minutes after its time, the sitter, the owner and Paw & Collar are told.
- Incidents and lost pets: either side can report an incident, such as an injury, illness, bite, fight, escape or damage, during a booking and for 2 days after. The other side and Paw & Collar are told right away. If a pet goes missing, the owner or sitter can send a lost-pet alert to sitters and owners within 5 miles, who can report sightings in the app.
9. What you can't do
Don't harass or discriminate against anyone, break the law, create fake accounts, reviews or references, pay or ask for payment outside the app, collect other users' information, or use Paw & Collar for anything but pet care. You can report or block anyone in the app. People who are blocked can't see each other in search, message each other or book each other.
10. Pausing and deleting accounts
We may pause or close an account that breaks these terms or puts people or pets at risk. Except where safety requires acting at once, we'll warn you first and tell you why. You can appeal any decision by replying to our email within 14 days, and a person at Paw & Collar will review it. Sitters who have been approved get a written notice in the app and 7 days to appeal there instead, as the Sitter Agreement describes. You can delete your account anytime in Account → Delete account once you have no open bookings.
11. Release of claims and assumption of risk
PLEASE READ THIS SECTION CAREFULLY. IT LIMITS YOUR RIGHT TO SUE PAW & COLLAR.
Pet care has risks no one fully controls, including a pet's injury, illness, escape or death, bites, and damage to a home or belongings. You accept those risks when you book or provide care through Paw & Collar.
To the fullest extent Washington law allows, you release Paw & Collar, its owners and its employees from claims arising from pet care arranged through the app, including claims based on Paw & Collar's ordinary negligence. Claims about the care itself are between the owner and the sitter who provided it. This release doesn't cover gross negligence or intentional misconduct, which the law doesn't allow anyone to release.
12. Disclaimers and limits on liability
Paw & Collar is provided "as is." To the extent the law allows, Paw & Collar is not liable for the acts of owners, sitters or pets. Our total liability for any claim is limited to the fees you paid Paw & Collar in the 12 months before the claim, or $100, whichever is greater.
13. Disputes
Washington law governs these terms. Contact us first and we'll try to resolve the problem within 30 days. If we can't, it goes to the courts of Cowlitz County, Washington, and either side can use small claims court.
14. Changes
We may update these terms. If a change is significant, we'll tell you in the app before it takes effect. Using Paw & Collar after that means you accept the new terms.