GoDoG Client Policies & Procedures

🎉 Welcome to GoDoG!

We’re so jazzed to welcome you into our family.

It’s truly a privilege and an honor for us to be entrusted with your pet’s care. This document outlines a comprehensive list of our policies, procedures, and terms of service to ensure a smooth and professional experience.

This is a living document. By using our services, you acknowledge and accept these terms

🐶 About GoDoG

GoDoG has been dedicated to caring for dogs and cats since 2008. We are insured and bonded, and our team is comprised of W2 Employees rather than independent contractors.

We specialize in:

✅ Dog Walking ✅ Pet Sitting ✅ Overnight Care ✅ Behavior Modification ✅ Socialization ✅ Cat Care

Our mission?

Our mission is simple: raise the standard of dog care. Thoughtful group dynamics, serious safety systems, and genuine relationships — so your dog isn’t just walked… they’re understood.

📍 We proudly serve:

Park Slope | South Slope | Greenwood Heights | Gowanus | Carroll Gardens | Cobble Hill | Downtown Brooklyn | Fort Greene | Clinton Hill | Prospect Heights | Pro-Cro (Prospect Heights/Crown Heights) | Boerum Hill

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Our service territory has boundaries, but they are ever increasing. If you live just outside any of these neighborhoods or are a current client that is moving just beyond our service map, we invite you to still inquire about service.

⏰ Hours of Operation

📞 Office Hours:

Monday – Friday: 10 AM – 6 PM

Saturday: 10 AM – 2 PM

🐾 Pet Care Services:

Monday – Friday: 10 AM – 6 PM

🐾 Our Service and Billing Week is:

Monday-Sunday

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If you contact us for any matter that isn’t an emergency outside of regular business hours, you can expect a reply from us the next business day. If you have an emergency, please call or text 917-449-9969.
Evenings & early mornings, weekends, & holidays: Available upon request (subject to availability & additional fees).

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We need as much notice as possible to secure service for visits outside of normal business hours and cannot guarantee availability.

📌 Weekend Services:

Must be requested by Thursday at 6 PM.

Late requests may not be accommodated and will incur a late booking fee.

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There will be an $8 service fee for weekend requests made after 6:00 pm Thursday evening.

📌 Holiday Services:

Major Holidays (New Year’s Day, New Year’s Eve, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Thanksgiving, Independence Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day): 5 business days’ notice required to secure services.

Lesser Holidays (MLK Day, Presidents’ Day, Columbus Day, Juneteenth, Veterans Day, etc.): 3 business days’ notice required for cancellations. If we don’t hear from you, we will assume the scheduled service is needed.

Basically, we will automatically show up for regularly scheduled services on lesser holidays, and we won’t for major holidays, unless prior arrangements are made

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We will not come on major holidays unless we get a service request ahead of time. There will be a $10 service fee for late requests and a $15 late cancellation fee for Major holidays.

There will be a $10 fee for late requests for lesser holidays.

🔄 Scheduling Changes & Cancellations

📌 Standard Cancellations:

Cancel by 6 PM the day before to avoid a fee.

Late cancellations (after 6 PM): $5

Same-day cancellations (after 10 AM): We charge the full rate of the visit

Weekend cancellations: Must be submitted by Friday at 6 PM—otherwise, the full fee applies.

Missed Appointments: If we arrive but cannot access your pet (missing key, pet unavailable, etc.), the total service fee applies.

📌 Overnight Pet Sitting Cancellations:

3 days’ notice required for cancellations.

Last-minute cancellations (within 3 days): First night’s fee + 25% of total booking.

Major Holiday Overnight Stays: 10 business days’ notice required, or 50% of total booking cost applies.

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Moreover, regarding cancellation fees, if a walker arrives to your home and they are scheduled to use a lockbox, but it is broken or the key is not inside, we will charge the full rate of the visit. If someone is home, and they no longer wish for us to walk the dog, we will charge the full rate of the visit.

👣 Getting Started

✅ Reach out to us and let us know how we can be of service

✅ Or book an intro call via Calendly

✅ Create and account through Time to Pet

✅ Sign our waiver

✅ Schedule services!

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More Info:

  1. Out of the gate when inquiring about service, please tell us your exact address, or at the very least, your street and cross-streets.
  2. Please tell us how many days you are looking for services, which days, and select a two-hour window that would work for you
  3. Please tell us your dog’s breed, estimated age, and how they get along with other dogs
  4. Please tell us if they have a bite or aggression history with people or other dogs.
  5. Please let us know if they have any medical or health related issues.

Choose a time slot in Calendly from our website to book a call with management. We may follow up with some questions prior to meeting you. We will then email you an invite to onboard and create an account through our admin system called Time To Pet. Please fill out all of the questions with as much detail as possible and upload a thumbnail pic of your pup as well as a credit card for us to keep on file.

 

Please sign the waiver we send you through Docusign. Please note that if you have a guest dog or cat that is ever staying with you, and you would like us to care for them while they are there, we will require their owners to sign the waiver as well. We will just need their name and email to send it to them prior to service.

🖥️ Client Portal & Booking

📲 Manage everything through Time to Pet!

We use Time to Pet, an easy-to-use client portal that allows you to:

✅ Request Services

✅ Manage Appointments

✅ Update Pet Information

✅ Make Payments

✅ Receive Real-Time Notifications

 

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We utilize Time to Pet to manage all of our client’s accounts, communications, scheduling, invoicing, billing, and credit card processing. The software can be accessed through your browser or through a free downloadable app on your phone. We highly recommend the app as this will allow you to receive updates and notifications from us directly to your phone. Go to the app store and It’s a blue icon with a cloud and the outline of a dog. Any changes you need to make, say you changed your address, or have a new key code, or the feeding regimen has changed. All you need to do is update your account profile and will be notified of the changes.

📌 Important Booking Policies:

ALL service requests must be submitted through Time to Pet (no bookings via email, text, or in-app chat).

Appointment requests remain pending until confirmed.

Recurring schedules are set templates—if changes are needed, please contact management to update them.

Dog Walks: Require a 2-hour time window (3–4 hours preferred for better coordination & social pairing).

Puppies under 6 months: Require a 1-hour window.

Cat Visits & Small Pets: Require a 4-hour window.

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Most of you will come aboard with a regular schedule for which we will create a template. This schedule will be automated. It is the client’s responsibility to schedule and cancel services themselves through the scheduler.

All services are to be booked through Time To Pet’s scheduler. We do not accept emails, texts, or messages through the app’s conversation feed. If you wish to inquire about something first, that’s fine, or add a note in the conversation feed, but ultimately the request must be put in by you through the scheduler. There, it will remain pending until it is confirmed or denied and then you will receive an email.

If you don’t have a recurring schedule, or even if you do and you need to make changes, we ask that you give us s much notice as possible, preferably as early as Friday of the week before, and ideally not later than Sunday. That said, we understand that schedules may change, and we are amenable to accommodating extemporaneous requests throughout the service week.

Whilst you have “the power” to change your schedule, when it comes to changing a recurring template, we need to do that on our end, so just let us know.

When booking overnights in Time to Pet, it can be tricky in that e.g say that you want Monday-Thursday, well you’ll key that in, but it will add Thursday as an overnight, so the thing to remember is to just book the nights.

For sitting, if we are required to begin the morning of your departure date and stay til the evening of your return date, we will charge you a half of an overnight’s rate

We require at least two dog walks per week for us to provide you with service.

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We place a premium on building relationships with our dogs and their humans, therefore we prefer not to work with new clients who want sporadic walks, or for those who only want to use us once per week, or to those who only need us temporarily. This is our general rule. There are exceptions to the rule depending on the circumstances. Our pricing is tiered, and the rates reflect the number of times we are used during the week by any given client, with hree to five times and one to two times per week, having different rates (see rates )

Communications in Time to Pet

There are two conversation feeds juxtaposed. The one on the left is for the walkers and sitters to update you and for you to communicate with them directly. The one on the right is private and just for you and management.

Please use the private thread when you need to contact management as we only get notifications on that thread. So, if you have any question about billing, operations, scheduling, concerns about your pet or staff, and they need to be addressed with a manager, then please use the thread on the right. The feed on the left will be a running thread of daily updates from the walkers, including photos or videos ( up to 20 seconds ) and you may speak with them there.

Meeting your walker ahead of time

While introductory meetings are free, if for any reason after beginning with us or even prior to starting with us, you wish to meet a sitter or walker, that meeting will incur a charge of $25. A little bit about our staff. They are meticulously vetted, background checked, reference checked, and in many cases are dog owners themselves. They train for 30-40 hours in the field with senior team members, and the owner of the company before they are on-boarded. They then start with small routes to build their confidence, and skills, and forge unhurried relationships with the animals. They go through a two month probationary period in order to determine if they are the best fit for our culture and our standards

🦺 Safety & Equipment

🐾 Your pet’s safety is our top priority!

✔ All dogs must wear a flat collar with an ID tag & be microchipped.

✔ Leashes: Only standard 4-ft leashes allowed (🚫 No retractable leashes!).

✔ Proper-fitting gear required—we may recommend specific harnesses or collars for safety (available at wholesale cost—we do not profit from this).

✔ Backup safety collar required—service may be postponed or canceled if misplaced.

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When we meet, we will assess your dog’s “gear” (what they are walking on i.e. leash, harness etc.) and determine the safest, and most effective gear for them. We will then send you the suggestions and in some cases, we have wholesale access to the products, in others we’ll just point you in the right direction. Every dog is backed-up with either a slip collar or a piece of nylon with bolt snaps on either end. Safety is paramount. If a safety back-up is lost or broken by the client, we will replace for you, and charge for the replacement.

🔑 Home Access & Key Management

🔐 Ensuring secure & reliable access!

Clients must provide two sets of keys or use a lockbox.

If we cannot access your home, any locksmith fees are your responsibility.

One key set is kept with the walker; the other is securely stored in our office.

Concierge key services can be unreliable—we strongly recommend keeping a backup lockbox.

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If you live in a concierge building and we are to retrieve keys from the desk, we ask that you give them the company name if possible, so that there is no issue if and when different walkers come.

Dog Walks

Medications

We are happy to dispense of medications to your pet at no cost, unless we are administering injections or I.V fluids, please inquire about additional fees.

If a client cannot provide two sets of keys at the meet and greet, they will be responsible for the cost of us copying second set, or the labor cost for the time it takes the walker to bring that second set to the office, or the client may drop the second set at the office before the first date of service. If we cannot get to a pet or get back into a home to return a pet due to a broken lock, malfunctioning key pad or anything that prevents us from entering the home, that is not the fault of the walker, the client gives GoDoG permission call a locksmith if no one else is a able to let us in and will be responsible for the cost of that work and the labor cost of the walker’s time put in. If we must return to pick up a key copy for whatever reason there will be a $20 charge.

If you have new multi-lock key, or FOB that is difficult to copy, we’d prefer you use a lockbox, so that we can have sufficient access.

If there is a delay beyond five minutes in collecting keys from an absent doorman or concierge or the dog happens to be out with the babysitter e.g, we will start the clock and either add that time or shorten the duration of the scheduled walk.

Likewise, if we complete the walk, but were unable to re-enter your home due to any circumstance outside our control, such as keypad malfunction, or someone locked a top lock we weren’t given a key for, then we will need to add additional time while we wait with your dog for someone to come let us in or coordinate another form of home entry. If any delays are the fault of the business, the client is not responsible for any additional payment.

GoDoG will return or dispose of all sets of keys upon the client’s request. If no services have been booked within a 12 month period, GoDoG reserves the right to dispose of the keys.

A client should alert GoDoG if there is to be a third party accessing the home while we are caring for the pet. This primarily goes for sitting, but in the case that a worker will be at the home during a scheduled walk, please let us know.

We will not share pet care responsibilities with any third party not affiliated with GoDoG unless we specifically agree in writing. In the event another person has been given access to your home while we are visiting or staying during scheduled services, we will not assume responsibility for any loss or injury to your pet or damage to your home.

💳 Payments & Billings

💰 Seamless payments through Time to Pet!

✔ Payments are processed weekly—auto-charged to your saved card.

✔ Accepted Payment Methods: Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Diners Club, Apple Pay, Google Pay.

❌ We do NOT accept: Cash, Checks, Venmo.

📌 Gratuity Policy (Effective April 1, 2025):

A 10% gratuity will be automatically added to invoices.

If you prefer to adjust or remove this, let us know & we’ll update your account settings.

More Information

We require all clients to have a credit card on file before booking services. We send invoices weekly on weekends and charge for services then as well. We accept all major credit cards, as well as Diners, Apple and Google pay. Our service week runs Monday through Sunday so if you have overnight services that begin one week and end in another, we will either split the payments if there are equal days served per service week, or we will bill for the week that most of the sit occurs in. All services are subject to 8.875% New York State Sales Tax

🌧️ Inclement Weather & Emergencies

📌 Severe Weather:

If NYC declares a city-wide emergency, services may be canceled.

Clients will receive email notifications & social media updates.

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We work in most weather conditions and take all necessary precautions. In the rare event of extraordinarily intense weather conditions, GoDoG will use its discretion. We may shorten walks, spend time indoors with pups. Spend time in the shade hydrating when too hot or focusing on short walks and bladder relief when it’s freezing out. Whatever it takes to keep the pups safe and happy.

📌 Pet Emergencies:

If a medical emergency arises, we will attempt to contact you immediately.

If unreachable, we will seek urgent veterinary care.

Clients must reimburse any vet expenses incurred.

All pets must be up to date on vaccinations.

If a GoDog staff member is bitten or exposed to a preventable disease, clients are financially responsible.

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In the event of any emergency, we will notify you right away and depending on the severity or urgency of the situation, we will wait for your reply or take immediate action to protect your pet. We are familiar with all the local vets and the 24 hour emergency care facilities. In the event of a natural disaster, weather related event or crisis, GoDoG is hereby authorized to take all measures necessary or advisable in its sole and absolute discretion in caring for the pet’s and client’s property, including, without limitation, emergency veterinary cae for pets, and emergency repair services for client’s homes. The client agrees to defend, indemnify and hold harmless GoDoG. The cliAny medical expenses ent agress to defend, indemnify, and hold harmless GoDoG and its respective employees, members, agents, and affiliates from all liabilities, claims, and expenses, including attorney fees that arises from or relate to such decisions. In the event of an emergency, clients shall immediately reimburse GoDoG for expenses incurred, plus any additional fees or expenses for attending to such emergency. In thr to ensure the health and wellbeing of your pet.e event of a medical emergency we will try and contact you but if we are not able to reach you, we reserve the right to make medical decisions on your behalf, in order to ensure the health and well-being of your pet.Any medicial expenses paid for by GoDoG must be reimbursed by the client. By utilizinbg our pet care services, you consent, allow us to to provide your pet with medical attention if necessary and to reimburse any expenses paid. All pets must be upo to date with vaccinations should any employee of GoDoGbe bitten or otherwise exposed to any disease or ailment to receive from cleints pet which has not been properly vaccinated it’s the clienst responsibility to pay all costs and damages incurred by the victim. GoDoG reserves the right to terminate this contract ay any time before or during its term if the walker or sitter at their sole discretion determines that the clients pet posse a danger to the health and safeyty of staff

📸 Photo & Video Release

📷 Say cheese! Your pet may be featured.

We love sharing fun pet moments on our social media & marketing materials!

If you’d prefer to opt out, please notify us in writing before services begin.

📌 Home Security Cameras:

We love security cameras, and we highly recommend them, especially for puppies and the newly adopted. We ask that you let us know you have a camera and where it is. We also insist that cameras be turned off during overnight stays to protect the privacy of your sitter. If you’d like the camera turned back on each time the sitter leaves your home and returns, we can certainly do that.

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We reserve the right to unplug any cameras during overnight stays that have not been turned off

Aggressive Dogs

Many dog walking companies refuse dogs who show any sign of aggression whatsoever, we are not one of them. If we can help, within reason, we will. Our founder Jason has experience making profound differences in the sociability and behavior of dogs who have displayed mild to moderate levels of aggressive reactivity. Please inquire about his behavior modification services.

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If after working with Jason your dog cannot safely walk with other dogs or even solo with any of our walkers, then we will have to end services, and we will offer alternative solutions. We will not jeopardize the safety of any of our dog handlers or the dogs in our care. We also reserve the right to terminate service if we find out there has been a notable bite history that has not been reported to us. We expect and hope our clients will play on “team safety” with us, protecting everyone involved. Moreover, we will never knowingly jeopardize the safety

🐾 Referral Program

🎉 Love GoDoG? Spread the word! • Refer a friend = FREE pet visit! • Additional rewards for multiple referrals!

🙌 Thank You for Choosing GoDoG!

We’re excited to build a lasting relationship with you & your pet! 💙 🐾

📱 Need Help? Contact us via Time to Pet or during office hours.

🐕 Happy Tails Start Here! 🐾

Any other questions, just shoot an email or give a buzz!

Call Us: 917 449 9969