There are some people on the pet care app Rover who are breaking the law, and they don’t even know it.
The app is an easy way to find care for your animal. 5 On Your Side reported a couple of years ago that many people on Rover who offer pet boarding services were doing it without the required license.
A viewer recently reached out to us asking for clarity on those rules, so our team went back to the experts who know and enforce the law.
A really important question is: What is the difference between pet boarding and a pet sitter?
“Pet sitting is taking care of an animal in the animal’s own home. Boarding is taking care of an animal outside of its own home, for a fee,” explained Dr. Patricia Norris, director of North Carolina’s Animal Welfare Division.
Norris says there’s a legal difference there too.
“The definition of boarding is in the Animal Welfare Act,” Norris said. “Pet sitting is not defined in the Animal Welfare Act. That is considered a general definition.”
The Animal Welfare Act says that offering boarding services to the public for a fee requires a license. Violations can result in a misdemeanor charge and a fine.
Pet sitting, on the other hand, is not defined and doesn’t require a license.
Why?
“The difference is when the animal is in its own environment, it’s not exposed to a lot of the dangers that you will see where you’ve got a facility where animals are coming in and out,” Norris explained. “We’re talking about disease mitigation, talking about sanitation, talking about proper confinement.”
Take a recent investigation from the North Carolina Department of Agriculture. It found a Charlotte couple was boarding someone’s dogs in their home. One of the dogs, named Beanz, was let outside, off leash. Beanz ran away and was later found dead in the road.
The Charlotte couple admitted to advertising boarding services on Rover and Facebook, but they didn’t have a license. They were fined $1,000.
Norris says pet parents should be aware of the dangers of unlicensed boarding before using Rover or other pet care apps.
“Make sure you know where your pet’s being kept, because some of these unlicensed facilities are nothing more than an airline crate in someone’s basement or in their unheated or uncooled garage,” Norris warned.
We asked Rover if they check to see if users in North Carolina who are required to have a boarding license actually have that license.
Rover provided a statement reading in part: “In order to create a profile on our platform, all users, pet parents, and care providers alike must accept our Terms of Service, which includes specific language on adhering to local laws and regulations.
Additionally, pet care providers who sign up to offer services through Rover must pass an enhanced background check, which includes local, state and federal databases. Rover team members review every sitter’s profile, and sitters must pass a safety quiz focused on pet behavior. We also have a 24/7 Trust and Safety team, which supports our community around the clock. In the rare instance that a safety incident occurs, they thoroughly investigate and take actions to protect pet parents, care providers and pets.”
5 On Your Side asked if Rover does anything to check whether app users are following the rules.
A Rover spokesperson replied, “Rover believes that local pet care providers are in the best position to evaluate their individual requirements based on the type of pet care they intend to provide. The laws and regulations vary significantly across states, counties, cities and even neighborhoods.”
Norris said they’ve tried reaching out to Rover about this problem and have gotten similar statements.
“We’ve tried, and we get an automated response that says on our website. We say that the providers must follow all statutes and laws, and that’s all we get,” Norris said about Rover’s response.
