Good at
Showing free slots and letting someone claim one without messaging you.
Comparison
Messages, Spreadsheets or Booking Software: What Actually Works
Pet care bookings need dates, pet details, capacity and pricing that match the service. Messages, spreadsheets, general schedulers and marketplaces can all work for a while. This page shows where each approach starts to strain, and where dedicated pet care booking software fits.
- Where each approach starts to strain
- What a complete request needs to contain
- Commission versus a flat fee, with real numbers
- How to test any option in a week
- 4
- approaches compared
- 0%
- commission with SitPup
- 8
- languages for your booking page
- Free
- plan to start with
01
Start with what the request needs
A good pet care request should include the service, dates, animal details, care location and anything that affects price or availability. SitPup puts those pieces in the form by default, on a Free plan with zero commission. The other approaches below can work too; the question is how much you still have to finish by hand.
02
Messages, calls and a notebook
This is where almost everyone starts, and it works while the volume is low. It breaks when one detail goes missing, when two requests for the same dates are never compared, or when you need to reconstruct a booking from a chat, a call and a note. SitPup replaces all of it with one structured request.
03
Spreadsheets and a shared calendar
A step up, and fine for a while. Clients cannot see or send anything themselves, so every request still arrives as a message you retype, and a calendar that is only free or busy cannot express taking two dogs but not a third. SitPup gives clients a form and counts capacity for you.
04
General scheduling tools
Tools made for meetings solve availability well, and if you sell single short visits they can carry you. They start from fixed-length appointments, so multi-day stays, capacity per service and the pet's own details usually become custom questions and manual checks.
Strained by
Stays that run for days and block everything in between.
Missing by design
Pet details, care location and per-service capacity as first-class settings.
Best for
Single, short, repeatable appointments where the animal is not the deciding factor.
05
Marketplaces
Marketplaces can bring early demand, but the trade-off is real: a listing next to competitors, visibility controlled by the platform, and commission on bookings. SitPup is for direct bookings, so clients come through your page or website and no percentage is taken from the booking value.
Where SitPup sits on price
The Free plan includes the booking page, the widget, calendar and availability, 5 bookings per month and 3 gallery photos, which is enough to try it on real requests before deciding. Paid plans raise limits and add profile features, and no plan takes a percentage of a booking.
- Free plan, no card to start
- No commission on any booking
- Pet care defaults out of the box
- Booking page and website widget included
The four approaches side by side
Read this as a comparison of approaches, not of named products. Any individual tool may sit differently, and tools change over time, so verify the current details of anything you shortlist.
| What you are comparing | Spreadsheets or general schedulers | SitPup |
|---|---|---|
| Who does the typing | You retype what arrives in messages. | The client fills the form once and it arrives structured. |
| Multi-day stays | Modelled manually, or as a single long appointment. | A date range that blocks every day in between. |
| Taking more than one animal | A calendar is free or busy; you track the rest yourself. | A capacity per service, counted across the range. |
| Pet information | Custom questions you write and maintain. | Breed, age, weight and care notes as ready fields. |
| What you pay | Usually a flat fee, sometimes free. | A flat fee, with a Free plan and no commission per booking. |
| Who owns the client | You do. | You do, with no listing beside competitors. |
Marketplaces are left out of the table on purpose, because the trade-off there is commercial rather than functional: they supply demand in exchange for a share of each booking and a listing alongside competitors.
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FAQ
What is the best booking system for a pet sitting business?
It depends on what breaks first for you. If requests arrive incomplete, prioritise a structured booking form. If you double-book, prioritise capacity per service. If cost is the issue, compare a flat fee against a percentage of every booking using last year's real numbers.
Is a spreadsheet enough for taking pet care bookings?
It can be, while volume is low and you are the only person touching it. It stops being enough once clients need to send requests themselves, or once a date can be partly booked rather than simply free or busy.
Are marketplaces cheaper than paying for software?
Not usually, past a certain volume. A percentage per booking scales with your revenue while a flat fee does not, so run the arithmetic on a real season rather than comparing headline prices.
How is dedicated pet care software different?
The defaults match the work: service templates for walks, daycare and overnight stays, pet fields in the form, care location per service, capacity limits and pricing by night or per visit.
How do I test an option properly?
Set up your three most common services with real prices, send yourself a request from your phone, then deliberately try to double-book a date you already filled. Most weaknesses show up in those three steps.
Do I need a website for any of this?
No. SitPup gives you a hosted booking page at your own address, and the widget is only for adding the same form to a website you already have.
Does anyone actually use SitPup yet?
100+ pet care businesses already run live bookings through SitPup. The most common feedback: it's simple to configure and makes the day-to-day noticeably easier.
Test it against the bookings you already have
Recreate last month's bookings, overlaps included, and try to break the calendar. That tells you which approach you have outgrown faster than any comparison page.