Sittercity has a rating of 1.3 stars from 144 reviews, indicating that most customers are generally dissatisfied with their purchases. Reviewers complaining about Sittercity most frequently mention customer service, background check, and credit card problems. Sittercity ranks 59th among Childcare sites.
This company responds to reviews on average within 8 days
No positive highlights yet
I love Sittercity. Over the years they have been responsive to each customer support inquiry I've made which is very important. They do their best to help check things out for both job seekers and those looking to hire. There are opportunities for everyone on Sittercity. Well-maintained and classy website.
Please don't be like me and several others. Create alarms, personal reminders, notifications about your subscription. They will never send you emails about renewal or monthly billing. I used the site for a few days. Sent an a few messages to get quotes. After that I never logged in again. Only to realize that they've been taking almost $50 a month for over a year. They won't compromise with you. You're essentially giving them money for free and they won't refund even though they know you have small children and came to them when in need. They will go on and on about your activity (or lack thereof) not having any impact on whether or not they refund you. I think this is their secret business model. I will be investigating more and will seek legal assistance because I feel scammed out of money. Please double and triple check you're being charged for the correct subscription and end it immediately. They keep your card on file so hopefully they don't continue to access it afterwards. PRO TIP: If you decide to move forward with a paid subscription, use a card/bank account that has a limited amount of funds OR use a gift card. This will help to prevent them from taking money in the event that you don't cancel in time.
Please don't be like me and several others. Create alarms, personal reminders, notifications about your subscription. They will never send you emails about renewal or monthly billing.
I used the site for a few days. Sent an a few messages to get quotes. After that I never logged in again. Only to realize that they've been taking almost $50 a month for over a year.
They won't compromise with you. You're essentially giving them money for free and they won't refund even though they know you have small children and came to them when in need. They will go on and on about your activity (or lack thereof) not having any impact on whether or not they refund you.
I think this is their secret business model. I will be investigating more and will seek legal assistance because I feel scammed out of money.
Please double and triple check you're being charged for the correct subscription and end it immediately. They keep your card on file so hopefully they don't continue to access it afterwards.
PRO TIP: If you decide to move forward with a paid subscription, use a card/bank account that has a limited amount of funds OR use a gift card. This will help to prevent them from taking money in the event that you don't cancel in time.
I had a sitter city account. I didn't use it for several years. I called them several times because my passwords never saved. Now I was removed for over use of messages. Is it my fault what the tell me to do didn't work? I only have a cell phone. Very unhappy this removed me forever.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. We take the trust and safety of our users very seriously, and our trust and safety team is always monitoring the site. Members are removed from our platform for one of three reasons: They are found to be under 18 years old. They failed an identity authentication or background check, or they are no longer eligible to be on our site based on our Terms of Use. We encourage you to review our Terms of Use here: sittercity.com/terms
I applied for work and hadn't submitted an i.d. for several days, meanwhile I was able to log in to my profile during that time until I finally submitted my I.d. when all of a sudden I wasn't able to log in to my account. My legal team will definitely follow up with this because this is outrageous!
Tip for consumers:
Beware of this site!!! Scamming surplus galore!!!!
Products used:
None
Hi, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing this issue. We certainly would like to look into this further. If you could please contact our Customer Success team at support@sittercity.com, we will collect more information and help trouble-shoot this with you.
Hard to contact customer service when help is needed and very little if any help provided when finally getting in touch with representative.
Hi, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing this issue. We certainly would like to look into this further. If you could please contact our Customer Success team at support@sittercity.com, we will collect more information and help trouble-shoot this with you.
It disturbs me to read a review about babysitting from a 12 year old that is using an internet service to find work in a strangers household. (Look below on this page) I hope that the parent went with the 12 year old or the babies were dropped off at the 12 year old house with parental supervision. However after calling and inquiring about this, apparently minors as little as 12 can use this internet service without parental supervision as long as the parent of the minor checks off a disclaimer box. I AM NOT OK WITH THIS!
Hi Sarah,
Thank you for your feedback. In order to be eligible to register as a care provider on Sittercity, you must be 18 years or older. Any member under the age requirement is not allowed on the site. For more information, please check out our Terms of Use: https://www.sittercity.com/terms
Sittercity was a huge waste of my time. I only had a nanny for 3 months and all because I forgot to ask my daughter's aftercare person about being open for Thanksgiving week. She doesn't want to keep my daughter for me anymore or take her to school, on Mondays and Tuesdays anymore. This is the second time that this nanny has done me like this. Sittercity is a disaster and now I am on my own finding someone else to watch my daughter. I am starting Prime Month in a few days and starting my 2nd job today.
Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. This is helpful as the team works to improve the app's user experience. I will be sure to take this back to the team.
The company charged me for 1 year of service with no notification and will not refund it even though I will not use the service. This is unethical practice and I recommend anyone thinking of using them stay away.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use. Members have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team.
You get no responses unless they are scammers. I had someone, obviously from another country, trying to scam me by asking for my bank information. Came up with this ridiculous story. You'd have to be an idiot to believe it but I guess people actually do. It doesn't say when the ad was posted so you don't know if you're applying to jobs from ten years ago or two days ago. Just a horrible experience.
Thanks for taking the time to leave your feedback. The trust & safety of our members is something we take very seriously. Keep in mind, Sittercity is a public site. Some scammers do find a way through registration, but we scan our site daily for this type of activity. Although some of them stay on the site for a short period of time, our Trust & Safety team is eventually able to identify these accounts and remove them. We also notify you of this if you were communicating through the site's messaging system. Please reach out if you are ever concerned that you are in contact with a potential scam account.
I have applied to over 20 ads for babysitters within the last 3 months. Not one single person has ever responded. That's not realistic. This site seems to be a real scam. I emailed and asked what's going on...was told oh you just have to answer as many postings as possible. Not when half of these postings are " supposedly" within 10 miles of me, have I not gotten at least 2-3 replies! Complete waste of time!
Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. This is definitely helpful as the team works to improve the user experience of the app. I will be sure to take this back to the team.
Definitely a lot better than care.com! I actually found jobs on there and people actually respond.
Hi Jackie - Thanks so much for sharing your review. We're happy to hear that you enjoyed your time using Sittercity!
I have never had so many parents be so unprofessional on any site or agency I have ever worked for-people scheduling phone interviews or in person and just not showing with no message to cancel. Maybe its the anonymity of the whole site that makes parents think this is ok behavior, but its just plain rude. If you no longer need someone or have to reschedule-just email. Send a text. Call.
Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. This is definitely helpful as the team works to improve the user experience of the app. I will be sure to take this back to the team.
I believe that I didn't consent to auto renewal when I signed up. They charged me more money every month after the initial month. When I called customer service trying to get a refund of the auto renewal on the same date, no one answered the calls.
Hi Vy, thank you for your feedback. We do apologize that you were unable to get in touch with a Customer Success representative when you initially called in. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews at the full price unless canceled. This is stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use. You may cancel the membership at any time through your Account Settings or by contacting our team. It appears your account inquiry was addressed by a Customer Success representative through email. Please follow up on that email should you have any additional questions or concerns.
I spend money for basic criminal check because apparently that's the only way to complete your profile? Weird. But anyway, I got charge and minutes later, I got an email saying something went wrong with my payment EVEN THOUGH I GOT CHARGE. It's stressful and not worth it to try. Customer service sucks, everything sucks and never get my money back.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing this issue. We certainly would like to look into this further. If you could please contact our Customer Success team at support@sittercity.com, we will collect more information and help troubleshoot this with you.
In 2013, I opened an account to find a nanny for my children, I have the job posted for maybe two weeks, and posted the job. Thought that with an non-active job that I wouldn't be billed for 10 years. Part of it is my fault for not checking, but the only communication I have record of from them is in 2013. Every single time they billed me they never sent me a follow up email or invoice. This is the worst company, they will do nothing to refund my money it's just a scheme to make money without doing anything.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated in our Terms of Use. Members have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team.
I signed up for their one month plan in August. Considering they give the option of 1 month, 3 month and 1 year, the scam they are running is getting people to choose the one month option and then auto billing them. They then refuse refunds and claim it was clearly stated. I purposely went with this site because it didn't have a recurring fee and now I've been charged for 6 months of a service I didn't intend on using. I am planning on reaching out to the better business bureau on Monday. Ridiculous.
Tip for consumers:
Don’t.
Hi Alissa, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. When you reached out to us, we were able to issue you a refund for the most recent charge and explained the following; all of our Premium Membership plans are subscription-based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use (https://www.sittercity.com/terms). We’ve found that most families prefer to have ongoing access to message local sitters. Members have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause and hope for your understanding.
Customer Service, Specifically Jessica G, is no help. Take note of alllllll these reviews of sitters who have done an amazing job and got bamboozled by SitterCity. Silly that a background check is a more important way to authenticate a person rather than an ID, social card, or 5 star reviews. Such stressful customer service and situations. 10/10 would not recommend
Oh no! We sincerely apologize for the troubles you've had with the service. Thank you for your feedback!
Pure scam and filled with so called Nannies/babysitter who are not really looking for work! They post their schedule with ridiculous hours! You reach out to interview after they respond to your listing, then you hear nothing back. Canceling my subscription asap! Care.com is just as bad!
Hi Theas!
We're very sorry to hear that you have not had success while using our site. Because Sittercity is simply an online meeting venue for families to connect with independent sitters in their area, we cannot provide any guarantees.
The sitters on the site are not our employees and they independently network on our site. Depending on the location and timing, sitters can be more or less active and it's ultimately up to each individual sitter to decide whether or not they would like to respond. However, we absolutely do stress the importance of (timely) responsiveness and professionalism to all of the sitters on the site.
If we can help you navigate the site in any way, please reach out to our Customer Success Team at support@sittercity.com!
Ever since I made a Sittercity account my references and I have been harrased by scammers. I get three out of state calls a day and so many scam messages. When I had a Care.com account years ago I lived in NYC so it was a lot easier to find well off families to watch their children. Now I live elsewhere and the only time I finally thought I found a family the mother wanted to meet me at a strange address, wouldn't speak to me on the phone, or text me. Obviously that is very sketchy. Now my references are very annoyed that they are being harrased. When I spoke to care.com about it they said there was nothing they could do to help. Also, the site wants money from you so you can have a more in detail background check. That is a way to get someone to pay unnescary money, most felonies are available on the internet for the world to see, unless the sitter hired a million dollar lawyer to hide it from the mad majority to see. Yet, what you are convicted of will not leave. I'm very dissapointed in the entire website, as well as care.com. I understand that they're are good families and sitters on both, but the amount of texts and phone calls I get from scammers is driving me bonkers. I would never have a in detail background check ever on that site, even having a photo of myself on there makes me nervous.
Do not use this service. Even when you cancel the company keeps charging your card. I've tried reaching support multiple times for a resolution and never get a response. I haven't used this company in 3 years and this is the 3rd time they have charged my card for the premium service of $144, even after deactivating.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription-based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use. Members have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team.
No job.
Deceived, conned, prompted into background check w a promise for refund.
Then no refund.
Ridiculous, cheap, deceptive, manipulative.
Tip for consumers:
Do not use/believe/trust Sittercity.
Products used:
Background check - basic: $24
Thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing this issue. We certainly would like to look into this further. If you could please contact our Customer Success team at support@sittercity.com, we are glad to review this for you!
I love Sittercity. Over the years they have been responsive to each customer support inquiry I've made which is very important. They do their best to help check things out for both job seekers and those looking to hire. There are opportunities for everyone on Sittercity. Well-maintained and classy website.
Products used:
Caregiver website
Hi Annmarie, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are happy to see you are enjoying Sittercity!
We prefer Care.com. Many more applicants and easier to search. We never met anyone, much less hired them, from Sittercity.
Sittercity charges you a monthly fee of $35, never emailing you to tell you you are going to be charged, so if you don't cancel, you will get a monthly charge on your credit card with no notice from Sittercity. It should be illegal to charge a monthly fee without an email from Sittercity with a statement. I requested a refund, and they gave me back a third of what they charged me. Very disappointing.
Hi Ann!
We're sorry to hear about your experience with our site. The sitters on the site are not our employees and they independently network on our site. Depending on the location and timing, sitters can be more or less active and it's ultimately up to each individual sitter to decide whether or not they would like to respond. However, we absolutely do stress the importance of (timely) responsiveness and professionalism to all of the sitters on the site.
All of our Premium Membership subscription plans automatically renew unless canceled in order to avoid disruptions, as we’ve found that most families prefer to have ongoing access to message local sitters. Our auto-renewing membership policy is stated on the sign-up page upon checkout and in our Terms of Use.
If you ever need any assistance managing your account, please reach out to our Customer Success Team at support@sittercity.com or give us a call at 888.SIT.CITY (888.748.2489). Please note our phone lines are open Monday thru Friday, 8am-4pm CST.
The company charge my credit card continuously even though I only chose one month subscription. Most helpers do not keep their words. Did not land one helper via the website.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription-based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use. Members do have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team.
Sittercity is a scam they need 0 starts. Not one sitter replied back in over months. I have messaged 30 people not even one person messaged back. Over 6months still no reply from anyone.
Hi there, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback! We are sorry to hear that you are experiencing this issue. We certainly would like to look into this further. If you could please contact our Customer Success team at support@sittercity.com, we will collect more information and help trouble-shoot this with you.
I think the site is a scam. I've been on there as a sitter for over two months, have applied to job after job (posted same day) with introductions and qualifications, and have received exactly zero responses from any of the posters. I would assume even one poster would take one minute out of their life to let a sitter know they've either found someone or don't need their services, but there is no response at all. Starting to doubt these "parents" are real.
Hi Terry, thank you for your feedback. I apologize for the lack of responses to your applications. If you are applying for jobs and haven't heard back from any families, know that there are many variables that can factor in after you apply for a job. The family may have already hired someone already, changed their requirements, or have a large number applicants to review. Like any job search, it can take some time to get a response. Once you submit an application, it is ultimately up to the family to reach out to you if they are interested in setting up an interview with you. However, we completely understand your frustration and are currently working on ways to encourage families to respond to applications, even if they have already moved on to other candidates. I will be sharing your feedback with our Product team for future considerations!
Sittercity’s mission is to make child care finally work. We’re building technology that radically simplifies the way families connect with sitters they love.
Hi Claire, thank you for taking the time to leave your feedback. I'm sorry to hear about your disappointment with your membership on Sittercity. All of our Premium Membership plans are subscription based. Once the subscription is upgraded to our Premium membership, it automatically renews unless canceled and is non-refundable, as stated on the plan selection page, purchase page, on your receipt, and in our Terms of Use. Members have the option to cancel at any time through their Account Settings or by calling, chatting, or emailing our Customer Success team.