Cat Sitting Tips: How a Professional Does the Perfect Visit

Cat sitting looks simple from the outside: turn up, feed cat, leave. But anyone who’s done it properly knows there’s a craft to it — and after thousands of visits across South Manchester, we’ve refined ours to a routine. Whether you’re covering for a friend, considering doing it professionally, or just curious what happens when we visit your cat, here’s how a professional visit actually works.

Before you ever visit alone: learn the cat

The best cat sitting starts before the first solo visit. Meet the cat with their owner present, learn where they hide, what game they love, how they take their food, and what “normal” looks like for them — because spotting abnormal is half the job. Get the practical details in writing: feeding amounts, medication, the vet’s number, an emergency contact, quirks of the house.

The visit routine that misses nothing

A good visit has a shape. Ours runs like this:

Arrive calmly. Announce yourself quietly — cats hear you long before they see you, and how you enter sets the tone.
Find the cat first. Before anything else, lay eyes on the cat and clock their demeanour. Greeting you at the door? Under the bed? Either can be normal — you learned which at the meet and greet.
Food and water. Fresh water (bowls rinsed, not topped up), food per instructions — and notice what happened to the last meal. Untouched food is one of the earliest illness signals cats give you.
Litter tray. Scoop, and pay attention: frequency, consistency, anything unusual. The litter tray is a daily health report, if you read it.
The health once-over. Eyes, coat, movement, breathing, behaviour — done casually through play and fuss rather than an inspection the cat resents.
Play and company. The heart of the visit. Wand toy for the players, lap time for the cuddlers, quiet nearby presence for the shy. On the cat’s terms, always.
The house. Post in, curtains and lights adjusted, plants watered, doors checked — so the home reads as lived-in.
Report back. A photo and a few honest lines to the owner, every single visit. Not just “all fine” — what they ate, what you played, where they slept.

The habits that mark out a professional

Never force a hiding cat. Sit down, talk nonsense, let them come. Trust is built in visits three and four, not visit one.
Count the exits. Know every window and cat flap’s supposed state, and check them each visit.
Watch water intake and litter output over days, not visits. Trends are where illness shows first — a diary helps.
Have a plan for the bad day. Know the vet, know the emergency contact, know what to do if the cat seems unwell. The day you need it is not the day to work it out.
Leave everything as you found it — except the cat, who should be calmer, fed, and mildly better disposed toward humanity.

Thinking of doing this for a living?

Honestly? It’s a wonderful job — flexible, local, and full of cats who become genuine friends. If reading a professional’s visit routine made you think I’d be good at that, we’re actually growing our team across City Centre and South Manchester right now. Have a look at joining Team Wendy — experience helps, but the qualities that matter most are reliability, observation, and genuine cat-love.

And if you’re on the other side of the equation — a cat owner who’d rather the person visiting had all these habits drilled in already — that’s us. We cover Didsbury, Chorlton, Withington and nearby, from £16 a visit. 🐾