Is my payment safe?
Absolutely. Your privacy is important to us and we only use secure online payment processing methods. You can pay via Bancontact, Visa, Mastercard or American Express.
As part of your booking, you also need to enter your billing information, after which the amount due for the booking will be put on hold (also known as a 'hold authorisation' on your credit card for the total of your booking). This is very similar to a booking you make for a room at a hotel: here, too, a hold authorisation will be put on your credit card for the amount of the booking.
A pet sitter can then do one of these three things following your booking request:
- Confirm your booking: once this happens, your credit card will be charged. This means that the money provided for the booked pet sitting service will be held in escrow by Pawshake until the service has been completed. We do this for the security of both parties involved.
- Decline your booking: if this happens, no amount will be charged. The authorization for the hold on your credit card will be released immediately. After a few business days (10 at most), you will no longer see the pending amount on your statement. Please contact our Customer Support if the booking still appears on your statement.
- No response: similarly, if a pet sitter doesn't respond, no amount will be charged and the hold on your credit card will automatically expire after 30 days. Please contact our Customer Support if the booking still appears on your statement, or, if you’d like to have it released sooner.
A pet sitter responds, on average, within 4 hours after receiving a booking request. Pet sitters have up to 24 hours to respond. If a pet sitter takes longer than 24 hours to respond, their account will be flagged as unresponsive and will be reviewed by our Trust and Safety team.