These terms and conditions outline the rules and regulations for the use of House Sit America. House Sit America provides an introductory service/meeting place for home owners and house sitters who required each others services (collectively, the Services), and for no other purpose. The Services are available on the House Sit America Site at www.housesitamerica.com (Site).
The following terminology applies to these Terms and Conditions, Privacy Statement and Disclaimer Notice and all Agreements: “user”, “you”, “member” and “your” refers to you, the person using, logged on. “us”, “ourselves”, “we”, “our” and “House Sit America”, refers to us (House Sit America). Terminology is not case sensitive.
1. Acceptance of Terms of Use & changes to this Agreement
(a) By accessing or using this Site in any manner or otherwise engaging with House Sit America, you agree to be bound by the Agreement and represent that you have read and understood its Terms.
(b) Each time you use or cause access to this Site, you agree to be bound by these Terms and Conditions, as amended from time to time with or without notice to you.
(c) Do not continue to use our Site if you do not agree to take all of the Terms and Conditions stated on this page.
(d) Please read the Agreement carefully, as it contains information concerning your legal rights and limitations on these rights, as well as a section regarding applicable law and jurisdiction of disputes. You should also read our Privacy Policy, which also governs your use of the Site, and is incorporated by reference in this Agreement.
(e) You must be at least 18 years or older to use this Site and your use warrants that you are 18 and over.
(f) House Sit America makes no representation or guarantee that a house sitter will obtain house sitting positions by using this site or that a home owner will find a house sitter by using this site.
(g) In addition to the Terms and Conditions outlined, Users are also subject to/bound by:
– Google’s Terms of Service, as we use the Google Places API Web Service application on our Site;
– PayPal Terms of Service including, without limitation, the User Agreement, as we process payments via PayPal.
2. Our Service
(a) House Sit America is solely a meeting place/introductory platform for House Sitter and Home Owners only and.
– is in no way an acting agent for any third parties, nor do we act on behalf of members.
– does not directly or indirectly employ the house sitter;
– is not involved in the negotiations between members or for supervising the transactions that take place between its members.
– has no control of the contents posted by members and cannot ensure or guarantee the accuracy or legality of any such content; and
– is not involved in the transaction between members and is not a party to any transactions that take place between its members.
(c) House Sit America offers annual paid Memberships for House Sitters. Home Owners can join for free.
(d) House Sitters’ responsibilities are limited to facilitating the availability of the Site and the Services defined below:
Services for House Sitters:
the ability to create one Public House Sitter Profile
the ability to update their Availability Calendar and add notes
the ability to search for House Sits
the ability to shortlist House Sits
the ability to obtain a ID Verified Badge as a result of providing one form of Photo ID
the ability to communicate with Home Owners via the Platform’s messaging service;
the ability to accept/decline a House Sit Invite from a Home Owner
the ability to cancel a House Sit from a Home Owner
the ability receive Feedback (Review) from the Home Owner after completing a House Sit;
the ability leave Feedback (Review) for the Home Owner after completing a House Sit;
access to membership support
the ability to set up daily email alerts for house sitting positions in the region/s of interest
the ability to Renew their Membership up to 30 days prior to expiry
email notification that are account related
Services for Home Owners:
the ability to create multiple Public Home Owner Profile/House Sitting Assignment Listing
the ability to obtain a ID Verification Badge as a result of providing one form of Photo ID
the ability to search for House Sitters
the ability to shortlist House Sitters
the ability to send a House Sit Invite to a House Sitter
the ability to cancel a House Sit
the ability to communicate with House Sitters via the Platform’s messaging service;
the ability to leave Feedback (Review) for a House Sitter after they have completed a house sit;
the ability to receive Feedback (Review) from a House Sitter after they have completed a house sit;
access to membership support
email notification that are account related
(e) House Sit America makes no representation or guarantee that a House Sitter will obtain house sitting positions by using this site. Nor do we guarantee that a Home Owner will find a suitable House Sitter by using this Site.
(f) House Sit America, in its absolute and sole discretion and without notice, reserves the right to edit, remove or restrict any content posted on the site at any time and for any reason.
(g) House Sit America do not provide guarantees for any of the following and does not accept any responsibility in relation to these matters:
– the safety of an Owners home and/or pet(s);
– confirmation of arrangements including dates of Sit;
– whether the House Sit will go ahead as arranged;
– our verification of house sitter identity documents may in no way be construed as their authentication. There is no intention on our part to ascribe or to impute to them plausibility or to deny them plausibility. The verification that we perform on the identity documents House Sitters send to us, is completed by website moderators and in no way can be claimed to be be identified with certainty.
(h) We do not actively provide any of the following does not accept any responsibility in relation to these matters :
– house sitting and/or pet care services, House Sit America is available for Members to search, connect and communicate with each other;
– criminal background checks;
– employment of any House Sitters;
– checking the validity of House Sitters References;
– endorsement of the quality or performance of House Sitters;
– endorsement of the Home Owner’s Assignment details;
– endorsement of any Reviews or Feedback provided by Members;
3. Separate Agreement between Members
When you arrange a House Sit via the House Sit America Platform, you are entering into an agreement between yourself and an Owner or Sitter (as applicable). It is entirely your responsibility to ensure that the requirements are in line with your expectations and experience. For avoidance of doubt, we are not party to any agreement, contractual or otherwise, between an Home Owner and a House Sitter.
You should use your best judgement before arranging a House Sit/House Sitter, or otherwise interacting with Members. You are solely responsible for making decisions that are in your best interests.
House Sit America has no responsibility for the terms of the agreement entered nor for the collection of any monies due or payable. The Home Owner and House Sitter do not reply upon representations made by or on behalf of House Sit America and rely entirely upon their own enquiries as to suitability of the House Sitter and/or Home Owner.
4. Registration and accounts
(a) To be eligible for an individual account on our website, you must be at least 18 years of age.
(b) You may register for an account with our website by completing and submitting one of the appropriate account registration forms on our website.
(c) You must not allow any other person (other than a partner or member of your household) to use your account to access the website, nor may you share privileged information you acquire as a member of House Sit America.
(d) You may not share contact information relating to a current, potential or future hypothetical house-sitting assignment which you learn of through your membership.
(e) You must notify us in writing immediately if you become aware of any unauthorized use of your account.
(f) Any personal information, including names and email addresses provided to us by Users at the time of registration are solely used for the purpose of registration and the functionality of our site.
5. Memberships
5 a. House Sitter Membership
(a) By paying for an annual Membership fee, providing an email address, name, username and password you are registering for annual Membership with the site as a House Sitter. You must click on the activation email we send after submission of the registration form and payment, to be able to access all features of the membership account.
(b) At the time of registering you agree you are 18 years or older, agree to these Terms & Conditions and agree that House Sit America can collect, store, use and display your information as set out in the Privacy Policy.
(c) You will be responsible for all usage of your User Account and/or User name, whether authorized or not authorized by you.
(d) You agree to immediately notify House Sit America of any unauthorized use of your User Account, User name or password.
(e) Where members fail to renew their membership House Sit America will restrict access to the account functionalities and profiles will be hidden from search results until membership is paid.
(f) Memberships cannot be cancelled.
(g) There are limited grounds for a refund.
(h) House Sitter Members must agree and adhere to the Members Code of Conduct.
(i) House Sitter Members who wish to become a Home Owner or Affiliate Member will need to do this with a separate account.
(j) House Sitter Members can elect to have their ID verified.
(k) House Sitter Members will be notified before their Membership expires and have the option to renew.
(l) As a house sitter member, you must post your ‘sitter available’ listing to the site offering your Services as a house sitter. After that you can:
– update your listing to keep the information accurate and current.
– be contacted and contact unlimited Home Owners
– request, receive and manage reviews from confirmed House Sits
5 b. Home Owner Membership
(a) By providing an email address, name, username and password you are registering as a Home Owner member. You must click on the activation email we send after submission of the registration form, to be able to gain full membership features.
(b) At the time of registering you agree you are 18 years or older, agree to these Terms & Conditions and agree that House Sit America can collect, store, use and display your information as set out in the Privacy Policy.
(c) You will be responsible for all usage of your User Account and/or User name, whether authorized or not authorized by you.
(d) You agree to immediately notify House Sit America of any unauthorized use of your User Account, User name or password.
(e) Home Owner Members must agree and adhere to the Members Code of Conduct.
(e) Home Owner Members have a conversation limit for their Message box. Please read the FAQ’s for more information.
(f) Home Owner Members who wish to become a House Sitter or Affiliate Member, will need to do this with a separate account.
(f) As a Home Owner Member, you must post your ‘house sitting job’ listing to the site. After that you can:
– update your listing to keep the information accurate and current.
– be contacted and contact House Sitters
– review confirmed House Sitters
5 d. Affiliate Membership
(a) Please see the Affiliate Terms & Conditions
5 d. Down Graded Membership
(a) A down graded membership is applied to House Sitters who fail to renew their membership on time.
(b) A downgraded membership can be upgraded to a house sitter membership. This is automatically done when the user renews/repurchases a house sitter membership.
(c) A downgraded membership has limited features. House Sitters will not be able to (included but not limited to): contact new home owners, manager their profile, manage there dashboard settings.
6. User Content
(a) Users are permitted to post, upload, publish, submit or transmit relevant information and content (User Content). At the time of publishing such User Content (including profile/ads or Reviews & Ratings) the User grants to House Sit America a irrevocable, non-exclusive, royalty-free, perpetual, and fully assignable, transferable, and sublicensable world-wide right to use your User Content for any purpose. This includes but is not limited to:
– the right to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, reformat, translate, distribute, publish, create derivative works from, and publicly display your Content in any media, and allow business owners and our affiliates to do the same in connection with their own websites and media platforms.
– the right to use the display name you submit in connection with any reviews.
– the right to distribute user content on our social media channels and in marketing materials
– you grant all users of this Website, the right to access the reviews/comments, as they may be reproduced, modified, adapted, reformatted, translated, or otherwise distributed, in connection with their use of this Website or the services of any of our partners.
– you grant us the right to pursue at law any person or entity that violates your or our rights in the reviews/comments.
6 a. Content that we will not accept
(a)You expressly agree not to post, upload, transmit, distribute, store, create or otherwise publish through this Website any of the following, either directly or indirectly, by yourself or through others:
– Irrelevant, false or misleading content
– content which is is defamatory, obscene, pornographic, vulgar, offensive, promotes discrimination, bigotry, racist, violent, threatening, contains hatred or harassment or content which causes harm
– content which contains illegal or harmful activities or substances.
– content which relates to a personal attack
– content including swear words
6 b. Our rights
(a) We take no responsibility and assume no liability for any Submissions or other content posted, stored or uploaded by you or any third party, or for any loss or damage thereto, nor are we liable for any mistakes, defamation, slander, libel, omissions, falsehoods, obscenity, pornography or profanity you may encounter.
(b) We are not liable for any statements, representations, Submissions or other content provided by users.
(c) We reserve the right, and have absolute discretion, to remove, screen, translate or edit without notice any submissions or other content posted or stored on this Website at any time.
7. Refunds
(a) The Membership fee is non-refundable, unless:
– There is a major technical fault on our system; and
– we have tried to resolve this matter to our best extent, which sill didn’t resolve the matter within 30 days.
A house sitter, wishing to cancel their Membership for any reason other than above, is not entitled to a refund for any portion of their Membership.
(c) Under no circumstances will House Sitters be entitled to a refund of Membership or portion of a Membership payment because of changes to Services, features or Membership Fees.
(d) Under no circumstances will House Sitters be entitled to a refund of Membership or portion of a Membership payment because they cancelled their account. Cancelling an account has no grounds for a refund.
(e) House Sit America makes no representation or guarantee that a house sitter will obtain house sitting positions by using this site.
(f) Under no circumstances will House Sitters be entitled to a refund should they have been blocked/banned from using the site.
(g) If a House Sitter by accident does not apply the appropriate discount code at time of checkout, and then ultimately pays the non-discounted membership fee, House Sit America is happy to provide the House Sitter that discount code to use for the next Membership renewal period.
8. Invitations and Confirmed House Sits
House Sit America provide the opportunity for Home Owner to invite their chosen House Sitter to confirm a House Sit. The House Sitter can accept or decline any invitations they receive. Both parties can also delete a confirmed House Sit, this will trigger an email to the House Sitter/Home Owner. However, unreasonable House Sitters or Home Owners who cancel a House Sit without reasonable notice or good reason are not tolerated on our site. Any complaints in relation to a cancellation will be investigated and appropriate action will be taken.
This system is solely for record keeping and provides the opportunity for members to review each other, Using this system does in no way form any agreement or offer any guarantees between both parties.
9. Reviews
(a) House Sit America facilitates the opportunity for Home Owners to Review & Rate House Sitters and House Sitter to Review & Rate Home Owners.
(b) Members are notified via email once a new Review & Rating has been left for them for a confirmed house sit and are also prompted to leave a review and rating for the reviewing member.
(c) House Sit America reserves the right at all times to moderate Reviews.
(d) House Sit America reserves the right to delete Reviews which we believe are untrue, unfair, inaccurate, offensive, defamatory in nature or inappropriate and will act upon any claims that there are such reviews published on our site.
(f) Review are published instantly once submitted.
(g) Members should not leave complaints in the form of reviews, instead they must contact us and send us the complain directly.
(h) If a member has any concerns about a Review & Rating, they must contact House Sit America directly and provide sufficient detail.
(i) Members cannot modify or edit their review once submitted.
(j) House Sit America will not be held responsible for any reviews on this page.
(l) To the fullest extent permitted by law, House Sit America is not responsible for the content of any Reviews.
(l) Untrue, unfair, inaccurate, offensive, defamatory in nature or inappropriate Reviews & Ratings are not permitted on the Site.
(m) House Sit America does NOT allow members to post public defamatory, critical & uncomplimentary remarks about each other in Reviews. On rare occasions there are very unreasonable homeowners and house sitters who don’t fulfill their side of the agreement. If you are in an unfortunate situation where you find yourself in such a dilemma, we ask that you send a complaint to us directly along with true, clear factual and unemotional evidence.
We will listen to both sides of the story and will take appropriate action from there, which may include banning/blocking the offending member from our site.
We recommend both sides sign the a House sitting Agreement, to avoid any misunderstandings. You may find out sample House sitting Agreement on your dashboard.
10. References
We allow House Sitters to provide us a shareable link to the references and other relevant information they may want to share with home owners such as police clearances, photos e.g. The link can only be viewed by home owners. This ensures better privacy of the referees and that house sitters have control over who sees their documents. However, we stress that house sitters should have permission from referees to share their reference.
11. House Sitting Complaints
House Sit America strives to offer a meeting place for reliable Home Owners and reliable House Sitters. It is important to remember that we do not have any ties to any members on our site, nor we we vet any members. Please understand we have no control over what goes on outside of our website.
House Sit America does NOT allow members to post public critical & uncomplimentary comments about each other. On some occasions there are unreasonable Home Owners and House Sitters who don’t fulfill their side of the agreement.
House sitting complaints (from House Sitter or Home Owner) should be submitted via the Contact form and NOT via a Review.
House Sit America takes all complaints seriously. We receive responses from both sides. We may terminate the membership of Home Owner or House Sitter where it is evident either side is unreasonable, unfair or negligent. The complaint should be objective and have sufficient evidence to back the claim/s.
House Sit America cannot provide legal advise and will not arbitrate on complex cases. In these cases the parties should seek independent legal Advise.
We take all complaints seriously and members are required to take their agreed responsibilities seriously. We recommend both home owner and house sitter sign a House sitting Agreement (see our sample house sitting agreement via your Dashboard). This way everything is clear from the beginning and misunderstandings are avoided.
We reserve the right to immediately ban members from our site, should we feel it is in the best interests of our other members.
House Sit America cannot provide legal advice and will not arbitrate on complex cases. In these cases the parties should seek independent legal Advice.
For any serious complaints, we advise you to contact police or a relevant authorities.
Serious complaints include, but are not limited to the following:
– Physical Abuse
– Sexual Abuse
– Mental Abuse
– Theft of Property
– Mistreatment & Abuse of Animals
– Misuse of Property
12. Privacy policy
(a) Registration data and other personally identifiable information that the site may collect is subject to our Privacy Policy.
(b) Any personal information, including names and email addresses provided to us by Users at the time of registration are solely used for the purpose of registration and the functionality of our site.
(c) Members’ contact details will not be provided to other members.
(d) Members can only contact each other through the site’s internal messaging system as we do not facilitate the publishing of emails or phone numbers with profile/ads. Users may share such information between each other after initial contact through our internal messaging system.
13. Cookies
We employ the use of cookies. By accessing this Site, you agreed to use cookies in agreement with our Privacy Policy. Most interactive Sites use cookies to let us retrieve the User’s details for each visit. Cookies are used by our Site to enable the functionality of certain areas to make it easier for people visiting our Site. Some of our affiliate/advertising partners may also use cookies.
14. Payments
(a) House Sitters are required to pay the fees as set out on the Membership page. Payments are processed through PayPal, offering both the option to pay directly via your PayPal Account or with a debit/credit card. The payment will be processed immediately. If a payment is not able to be successfully processed then the Account will not be fully activated until payment is successful.
(b) House Sit America does not process or store credit card information on its servers. All payments are processed by PayPal with PCI DSS compliance.
15. Identity Documents
The Website enables members to upload one form of photo identity. A “ID Verified” badge is shown on a users profile and or listing if we have approved their ID verification request. Uploading of ID document is proposed in encrypted mode (Https protocol) to improve the security of transmission and stored securely. We not use the photo ID uploaded for any purpose other than verification. In all cases, we commit to not communicating your identity documents to any person whatsoever including any and all images or information contained therein.
Your file will be examined by a website moderator and automatically deleted from our server as soon as the moderator validates (or refuses to validate) it. No submission data or file uploaded through the verification request form is kept.
The verification of the documents you send to us is assured by ourselves manually. Moderators may accept or reject a document on viewing it. In the event of rejection, the document received will be deleted and therefore not archived.
It’s important to remember our verification of member identity documents may in no way be construed as their authentication. There is no intention on our part to ascribe or to impute to them plausibility or to deny them plausibility. The verification that we perform on the identity documents a member send to us, is completed by website moderators and in no way can be claimed to be be identified with certainty.
16. Indemnity
(a) You agree to defend and indemnify House Sit America, it’s partners, officers, directors, site editors, advertisers, employees, affiliates and agents from and against any and all claims, causes of action, demands, recoveries, losses, damages, fines, penalties or other costs or expenses of any kind or nature including, but not limited to, reasonable legal and Accounting fees and costs, incurred by or claimed from House Sit America by you or any third party as a result of:
– your breach of this Agreement or the documents referenced herein;
– the material that you provide to House Sit America;
– any claim that you have breached any of these Terms and Conditions; your violation of any law or the rights of a third party;
– your use of this Site;
– your contact with or interaction with House Sitters and/or Home Owners;
– your interaction and/or dealings with third parties who advertise and/or market on this Site; or
– reviews and ratings or any responses left by you or for you on this Site.
17. Disclaimer
(a) You expressly understand and agree that you use the site at your own risk.
(b) This Site and the Services provided to you on and via this Site are provided on an “AS IS” basis.
(c) House Sit America facilitates an online meeting place for Home Owners and House Sitters and accepts no liability arising from the provision of the meeting place or subsequent connections.
(d) House Sit America does not screen anyone who lists with us.
(e) We do not guarantee the accuracy of the content that members publish on the site, nor do we check it’s correctness. It’s entirely the responsibility of members (Home Owners and House Sitters) to verify the information provided by House Sitters or Home Owners by doing their own checks.
(f) You understand and acknowledge that when using the Site, you will be exposed to User Submissions from a variety of sources and thus we are not responsible for the accuracy, safety, or intellectual property rights of or relating to such Submissions.
(g) You also understand and acknowledge that you may be exposed to User Submissions that are inaccurate, offensive, indecent, or objectionable, and you agree to waive, and hereby do waive, any legal or equitable rights or remedies you have or may have against us with respect thereto.
(h) By using this Site, you agree that House Sit America is not responsible or liable for any errors, delays in receiving, content, or for any claims, disputes or losses that may occur because of your dealings with a house sitter or home owner.
(i) Home Owners and House Sitters may have a contract or agreement between themselves. However, Members agree that House Sit America is not part of any such agreement or contract.
(j) House Sit America reserves the right to modify or discontinue provision of this Site and its Services, and to remove the data you provide, either temporarily or permanently, at any time, without notice and without any liability towards you.
(k) We will not be held responsible or liable for timeliness, removal of information, failure to store information, inaccuracy of information, or improper delivery of information.
(l) By using this Site, you agree that House Sit America does not guarantee the security of the portal or the services or the prevention from loss of, alteration of, or improper access to, your Account information or data.
(m) By using this Site, you agree that House Sit America may change the Membership fee from time to time. You agree that these changes are at sole discretion of House Sit America, and that House Sit America will not be held liable or responsible for doing so.
(n) House Sit America is not responsible for any computer viruses or breakdowns which may arise as a result of using this service.
(o) All correspondence and emails that you receive from House Sit America or a member of House Sit America are confidential. You are not permitted to forward these emails to another party without first obtaining the consent of the original sender.
(p) House Sit America is not responsible for resolving disputes between members.
(q) House Sit America is not responsible for any losses or damages that result from loss of user ID and/or password and/or email addresses connected to an account/accounts.
18. Limitation of liability
(a) House Sit America facilitates an online meeting place for Home Owners and House Sitters and accepts no liability arising from the provision of the meeting place or subsequent connections.
(b) House Sit America is not responsible for resolving disputes between members.
(c) House Sit America does not check Members’ details or qualifications in any way and cannot guarantee that information published by members on the site is accurate or true.
(d) House Sit America does not allow Members to post personally sensitive information on their profile, such as email addresses or phone numbers, and this is clearly stated on the listing forms. All initial contact must be conducted through our internal messaging system.
(e) House Sit America is not liable for any loss or damages arising from your use of the site, including actual physical damages and theft of your property.
(f) You irrevocably release House Sit America, its directors and employees absolutely from all liability and responsibility for injury, damages, illness, accident, death, veterinary expenses, loss of property howsoever arising which may occur to any animal or person at any time as a result of the use of this introductory service.
(g) House Sit America is not responsible for any losses or damages that result from loss of user ID and/or password and/or email addresses connected to an account/accounts.
(h) House Sit America exclude all liability in respect of loss of data, interruption to business (including without limitation caused by our website being non-operational for periods of time) or any consequential or incidental damages arising out of or in respect of a provision of the Services or the performance of our Website and systems.
(h) You expressly understand and agree that House Sit America it’s site editors, officers, directors, agents, partners, employees and affiliates will not be liable for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential or exemplary damages; this includes, but is not limited to, damages for loss of profits, goodwill, use, data or other intangible losses (even if House Sit America has been advised of the possibility of such losses and/or damages) resulting from
– the use of Services or the inability to use Services;
– the cost of obtaining substitute goods and/or Services resulting from any transaction entered into on through Services;
– unauthorized access to or alteration of your data transmissions;
– statements or conduct by members or any third party using the site;
– reviews & ratings left for Members on our site;
– dealing with information from this Site, such as but not limited to the risk of physical harm, of mental harm, of emotional harm, of dealing with strangers, animals, foreign nationals, underage persons or people acting under false pretences;
– issues, claims or disputes between you and other Users of this site, regardless of the nature or reason of the dispute, the allegations or any other circumstances surrounding such dispute;
– the use of our sample house sitting agreement;
– unauthorized use or alterations in any content you post to the site;
– your use of the site, including actual physical damages and theft of your property;
– any security breach or any other security intrusion;
– you knowingly publishing personally sensitive information such as your email or phone number on your profile/ad (which we clearly state is not permitted);
– your inability to keep your availability dates up-to-date
19. Members Obligations & Code of Conduct
(a) Members agree to ensure that all content, whether text, software, code, music or sound, photographs or graphics, video or other materials (“content”), that they post or transmit through the site is both accurate, truthful and current at all times.
(b) Members understand that their content will under their sole responsibility and that House Sit America will not be responsible in any way for content displayed on this web site, nor for any error or omission.
(c) Members agree not to post personally sensitive information on their profile, such as email addresses or phone numbers.
(d) Members agree that all initial contact must be conducted through our internal messaging system. From their users may share their email addresses and/or phone numbers.
(c) Members understand and agree that House Sit America has the right to suspend your use of the site if it is thought that you have not met your registration obligations or if your Account has not been fully activated through email verification.
(d) Users and Members understand and agree that by using this Site, they must agree to the Members Code of Conduct.
(e) Members Code of Conduct – when using our Site/Service, you agree:
– that you are at least 18 years of age;
– comply at all times in full with these Terms;
– keep your login details confidential and prevent any unauthorised access to, or use of, the Services via your Account;
– not create a fake identity or impersonate anyone else;
– promptly notify us of any unauthorised use of your Account;
– not access all or any part of the Platform or Services in order to build a product or service which competes with the Services (including the Platform);
– not to use our Site/Service for any spam or other unsolicited messages;
– not to interfere with any networks connected with the site or to transmit any objectionable material through the site;
– not to try to gain unauthorised access to the site;
– not to access or otherwise interact with our website using any robot, spider or other automated means;
– not to transmit any harmful computer viruses through the site;
– not to interfere the purpose of the site;
– not to violate the directives set out in the robots.txt file for our website;
– not to use data collected from our website for any direct marketing activity (including without limitation email marketing, SMS marketing, telemarketing and direct mailing).
– not to collect information about other members; and
– that under no circumstances will House Sit America be liable for any damages arising out of your use of the Site;
– to the members code of conduct check boxes located on the home owner and house sitter profile/ad forms.
– not to post critical & uncomplimentary remarks about each other in Reviews. Disputes need to be bought to our attention directly. This can be done by contacting us.
(f) More about our code of Conduct can be found here: Members Code of Conduct.
20. Direct Marketing & Emails
(a) As part of Membership, you will receive emails required for the upkeep and maintenance of your account. These emails are necessary and there is no way to disable such notifications.
(b) You may disable notifications of new messages received from other members. The steps to do this are in the FAQs for both Home Owners and House Sitters.
(c) If you subscribed to receive email alerts of new house sitting positions, you can unsubscribe at any time via removing those states via your Dashboard in the “Daily Email Alerts” tab, or you may unsubscribe via the link at the bottom of the email.
(d) Please do not mark any of our emails as spam with your email client!
(e) For new users who may not have subscribed already, we will assign a location we think you may want to be alerts for, based on the preferred sit locations you specified in your profile. If you’d like to change that, you can go to your daily email alerts page and remove that location.
Why do we do this? Simply because we want you to be informed of the house sitting positions on our site and so that you don’t miss out on an opportunity! Note we only do this for new users, so if you adjust your setting later on we won’t change those settings.
21. Offers & Promotions
(a) House Sit America may, from time to time, offer discounts to membership fees.
(b) Such promotions/discounts will be specified on the Site and associated social media accounts, along with the Terms & Conditions.
(c) Users/Members agree that these promotions may be removed or extended at the sole discretion of House Sit America, and that House Sit America will not be held liable or responsible for doing so.
22. Force Majeure
(a) House Sit America will not be liable by reason of the failure in the performance of obligations under these Terms and Conditions by reason of strikes, riots, fire, explosions, acts of God, war, governmental action, or any other cause which is beyond our reasonable control.
23. Site Availability
(a) From time to time down-time, either scheduled or unscheduled, may occur.
(b) House Sit America will use reasonable endeavours to ensure this amount of down-time is limited.
(c) House Sit America will in no way be held liable or responsible for the consequences of any down-time.
(d) Where House Sit America is aware of upcoming downtimes due to server maintenance or other, we may provide Users and Members with reasonable notice via online channels such as email or social media.
24. Report Abuse
(a) If you learn of any unlawful material or activity on our website, or any material or activity that breaches these terms and conditions, please inform us; You can let us know about any such material or activity via email to admin@housesitamerica.com
25. Monitoring
(a) Notwithstanding the provisions of this Policy, we do not actively monitor content.
(b) If you become aware of any material on the Website that contravenes this Policy, please notify us by sending an email to admin@housesitamerica.com
26. Messages
(a) House Sit America reserves the right to screen and view messages from all Members at all times.
27. Reservation of Right
If you breach or threaten to breach this Agreement, House Sit America reserves the right to suspend or terminate your Account and/or your access to any part or all of the Platform and Our Services at any time without prior notice. House Sit America may provide notice of termination by email, but is not obliged to do so. Please note that if your Account is cancelled, we do not have an obligation to delete or return to you access to our platform, nor are we required to provide you with a refund.
When we can suspend or terminate your Account/Membership:
– if we have found that you have stolen, caused accidental or non accidental damage to a person’s property without replacement; or
– if you fail to return a person’s property at the end of a house sit; or
– if you have caused or have allowed an animal in your care to suffer any form of animal cruelty or neglect; or
– if you allow a non member access to the site via your Membership Account; or
– yourself or someone you know uses the Site for commercial gains; or
– if you post inappropriate content on the site; or
– if you breach any of the Terms and Conditions outlined on this page.
– if you lodge a dispute with PayPal.
– if you are causing a nuisance to members on our site i.e. sending multiple spammy messages, leaving fake reviews, threatening and the use of inappropriate language e.g
– if you are deliberately causing harm to our site
– if you are using this site for a purpose other than to find a house sit
28. Deletion of Accounts
Member requests
(a) If a Member wishes to delete their Account, they need to contact us.
(b) Deleting your account has no grounds for a refund.
(c) Deleting an account destroys all the users data and no data can be restored.
Deletion of membership accounts
(a) House Sit America reserve the right to delete free Home Owner membership accounts which are older than 7 days AND have not been full activated via email.
(b) House Sit America reserves the right to delete account which it feels have been created by spam users.
(c) House Sit America reserves the right to delete new paid House Sitter membership accounts, where the creating user has used a stolen credit card.
28. Whole Agreement
These terms and conditions represent the whole agreement between you and House Sit America concerning your use and access to our Site and your use and access to the documents and information on it. No other term is to be included in this agreement except where it is required to be included by any legislation of the Commonwealth or any State or Territory. All implied terms except those implied by statute and which cannot be expressly excluded are hereby expressly excluded
30. Severability
(a) If anything in this contract is void or otherwise unenforceable then it will be severed and the rest of the Contract remains in force.
(b) If any unlawful and/or unenforceable provision of these terms and conditions would be lawful or enforceable if part of it were deleted, that part will be deemed to be deleted, and the rest of the provision will continue in effect
31. Jurisdiction and Applicable Law
These Terms, use of this Site, the Services and any dispute arising out of any User’s use of the Site or Services is subject to the laws of the Northern Territory, Australia, and subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Northern Territory courts.
32. Copyright notice
(a) Copyright (c) 2022 House Sit America
(b) Subject to the express provisions of these terms and conditions:
– we, together with our licensors, own and control all the copyright and other intellectual property rights in our website and the material on our website; and
– all the copyright and other intellectual property rights in our website and the material on our website are reserved.