Up to $2,000 protection on every booking

Every booking on OnlyPaw is backed by the Care Guarantee — a dollar-figure protection that covers vet emergencies, injury and property damage caused by a provider on the platform. Your first booking is deductible-free. Subsequent claims carry a $250 deductible.

What the Care Guarantee covers

The Care Guarantee applies to any confirmed OnlyPaw booking, on any of our six services (boarding, dog walking, pet taxi, grooming, training, pet sitting). It covers, up to $2,000 per booking:

• Emergency veterinary care — if your pet is injured or falls ill as a direct result of provider action or negligence during the booking window. Includes ER visit, diagnostics, surgery, medication, follow-up care attributable to the incident.
• Injury during a walk or transport — leash escapes, dog fights caused by provider handling, road-traffic incidents during pet taxi service, drop-related injury during grooming.
• Injury during boarding — bite wounds from other resident pets in a shared home, environmental hazards on the boarder's property, escape from the boarding premises.
• Property damage caused by a provider in your home — up to $2,000 for damage caused during in-home pet sitting or mobile grooming (broken items, water damage, damage to soft furnishings).
• Recovery of a lost pet — reasonable expenses (up to a $500 sub-limit) for microchip lookup, veterinary quarantine on recovery, and shelter fees if a provider loses your pet during the booking.
• Return-home transport — if the provider cannot complete a boarding stay for any reason and OnlyPaw cannot locate a replacement in time, we pay reasonable transport home for your pet.

What the Care Guarantee does not cover

Being clear up front so there are no surprises when you claim:

• Pre-existing medical conditions that flare during a booking without provider fault.
• Routine or elective veterinary care unrelated to the booking incident.
• Damage from the customer's own pet to the provider's property (this is covered under a separate provider-side guarantee, not this policy).
• Losses from off-platform arrangements. If you paid the provider outside OnlyPaw's escrow system, the Care Guarantee does not apply — book and pay in-app to stay covered.
• Claims filed more than 14 days after the booking end date. File promptly — same day where possible.
• Claims where the customer refused, in writing, to follow reasonable provider advice (for example: leaving a pet with a boarder despite disclosure of an active infectious condition).
• Wear-and-tear or minor property scuffs under $50 that are typical of pet occupancy.

How it works

1. Something goes wrong. Tap the red Emergency button on the booking screen — that starts the incident record and puts you in touch with our support team within 90 seconds.
2. Get immediate care first. If it's a veterinary emergency, go directly to the nearest 24-hour clinic. Save receipts and any diagnostic reports.
3. File the claim. Within 14 days of the booking end, submit the claim through the app: incident description, receipts, photos, vet reports. Booking records, chat logs and any GPS/photo evidence are attached automatically.
4. Claims triage. A member of our Care Guarantee team acknowledges the claim within 24 hours and requests any additional evidence.
5. Decision. Straightforward claims resolve in 5–10 business days. Complex claims (multi-party, contested facts) may take up to 30 days.
6. Payout. Approved claims are paid to your original payment method or to the vet clinic directly. Coverage is up to $2,000 per booking, less the $250 deductible on any booking after your first.

How the Care Guarantee sits with our other safeguards

The Care Guarantee is the dollar-figure backstop on top of, not in place of, the other protections that run on every OnlyPaw booking:

• Provider verification — government ID + selfie match + service-specific knowledge test. The Care Guarantee assumes these have been done — they always have.
• Stripe escrow — funds held until you confirm the service completed correctly. Disputes are resolved through escrow release/refund; the Care Guarantee steps in for actual harm, not simply an unsatisfactory service.
• Live GPS + photo proof — the evidence base for any claim is captured automatically during the service.
• 24/7 emergency line — the fastest way to start a Care Guarantee claim is the in-app Emergency button.

You can read about the full safety stack on our Trust & Safety page.

Comparison with other pet-care platforms

Reasonable use policy

The Care Guarantee is designed to protect pet owners from real harm caused by a provider, not to underwrite ordinary life risks. Coverage is subject to a reasonable use policy: repeated claims that appear to originate from the same underlying cause and that a reasonable pet owner would have addressed after the first incident may be denied. Fraudulent claims are grounds for permanent account termination and referral to law enforcement.

Effective from 11 September 2026. Subject to a reasonable use policy. Coverage limits are per booking and expressed in USD; equivalent local-currency coverage applies in markets served in other currencies at OnlyPaw's stated rate. The Care Guarantee is a platform-provided guarantee and is not a regulated insurance product; where local law requires an underwritten policy for equivalent coverage, an equivalent underwritten policy is arranged and disclosed at booking time. Full terms are available on request from support@onlypaw.net. This document is a plain-English summary; the definitive terms in the event of any conflict are those in the Care Guarantee Master Agreement, available on request.