Dog walking scheduling and billing, with the gaps stated up front.
Recurring walks, a rate for every visit type, holiday and after-hours surcharges, a request link for clients, and tips paid straight to you. This page also says plainly what is not built yet: walk visits do not generate invoices on their own.
No credit card to start · no activation fee on OS Walk · month to month
Recurring walks that stop when you want them to
Most walking revenue is repeat work: the same dog, the same days, week after week. A recurring schedule takes a client, the pets, a visit type, the days of the week and a time window, then creates every visit on the round. You choose how it ends: on a date, or after a set number of visits. Leaving both blank is refused on purpose, because an open-ended schedule is how a system ends up generating visits nobody is tracking.
Generation is capped at 90 days ahead and 60 visits, and when a cap rather than your own end condition stopped it, the response says so. Cancel the series and no more are generated. Each visit it created can still be cancelled on its own, so one holiday week does not mean rebuilding a schedule.
- Same walker every time. Set a client’s preferred walker and new visits go to that person automatically. If that staff member has left or been deactivated, the visit is left unassigned rather than quietly handed to someone who no longer works for you.
- Unassigned is loud. The round counts unassigned visits and calls them out, so a gap does not sit quietly until the morning of the walk.
- Multiple pets. One visit can cover more than one pet from the same household.
- Five visit types. Walks, drop-in visits, overnights, meet and greets and transport share one round and one client record. See pet sitter software for the sitting side.
Per-visit rates and surcharges, never guessed
Set your prices once. The system applies them when a visit is booked, and says so when it has nothing to apply.
One default per visit type
Walk, drop-in, overnight, meet and greet, transport. A price typed on a single visit or a whole schedule always overrides the default.
A flat holiday surcharge
Switch it on and name the amount. It applies on the dates in your business holiday list, which walking shares with the rest of your calendar rather than keeping a second one.
Early and late visits
A flat surcharge for visits that start before or after the times you set. If you do not set times, it uses 7 AM and 7 PM.
Client requests: they ask, you decide
A walker’s day is theirs, and a link in the wild should not be able to fill it. So the public walk page creates a request, not a booking. The owner picks a route you marked client-selectable, a day and a time window, and sends it. The request waits for you on the round, flagged as a request, and nothing about it counts toward the day until you confirm. A declined request is recorded as declined.
The page is off until you switch it on, and it shows a stranger nothing about your clients, pets, prices or existing visits. Asking twice for the same slot does not create duplicates, and the reply is identical whether or not the email already belongs to a client, so the link cannot be used to check who your customers are.
When a walk cannot happen
Cancelling a visit with the backup plan lets the business offer the client an alternative, such as indoor play, using wording you control, instead of just a cancellation. The heat check supports the same decision: the walker gets a safe, caution or danger reading from the forecast and an estimate of pavement heat before setting out, with thresholds you can change.
Tips and free-walk credits
Tips. When your business has connected Stripe, the owner’s report card offers preset tip amounts and a custom amount. The tip is processed through your own Stripe account, and Animal Friends OS adds no platform fee to it. A tip is recorded as pending until Stripe confirms it, then as paid, and staff can read the tips for a visit or for a client. If Stripe is not connected, no tip option appears.
Free-walk credits. The report card includes a way for an owner to say a visit did not go well. That creates a free-walk credit for that client, one per visit, which a manager can apply to a later visit; the card for that visit then notes that a credit was applied. The feature is on by default and can be switched off in walking settings.
What is not billed yet
If your business lives on prepaid packs and automatic invoicing for walks, check that against this list before you start. If you collect payment in person or by your usual method and mainly need scheduling, proof of visit and happy owners, this is where the product is strong. The proof side is covered on the dog walker app page.
What the software costs
OS Walk is priced by active walkers rather than by location or staff seat, so a sole walker pays the lowest tier and a growing team steps up in bands. A business that also runs grooming, boarding or daycare gets walking included in the main plans at no extra charge.
| OS Walk plan | Walkers included | Price | Text segments a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Walk Solo | 1 walker | $19 a month | 250 |
| Walk Team | Up to 5 walkers | $39 a month | 500 |
| Walk Growing | Up to 10 walkers | $79 a month | 1,500 |
| Walk Large | Up to 20 walkers | $119 a month | 3,000 |
| Walk Unlimited | Unlimited walkers | $159 a month | 5,000 |
Prices are read from the same pricing table the product bills from, so this table cannot drift. No activation fee on any OS Walk plan. A business that also books grooming, boarding or daycare gets walking included in the main plans instead, which start at $69 a month plus a one-time $49 activation. Full pricing
Texts to clients, including report card links, draw on the monthly text segments included in your plan.
Questions about scheduling and pricing
Can I schedule recurring dog walks?
Yes. A recurring schedule runs on the days of the week you choose and ends on a date or after a set number of visits. Visits are generated up to 90 days or 60 visits ahead, whichever comes first, and the page tells you if a cap stopped generation. You can cancel the whole series, and the client’s usual walker is assigned automatically if you set one.
How do per-visit rates and surcharges work?
You set a default rate for each visit type: walk, drop-in, overnight, meet and greet and transport. You can add a flat holiday surcharge, which applies on the dates in your business holiday list, and a flat after-hours surcharge for visits that start before or after the times you set. A price typed on a visit always wins. If you never set a rate, the visit stays unpriced and is shown as unpriced, never guessed.
Does it invoice clients or charge cards for walks?
Not automatically. Today a walk visit stores its price and feeds the expected-revenue counter on the round, but it does not generate an invoice or charge a card on its own, and walking has no prepaid package or walk pass yet. Tips are the exception: owners can tip from the report card through your Stripe account. If you need invoicing and prepaid packages for walks today, this is not the right fit yet.
Can clients book their own walks?
They can ask. You share a public link, switched on in your settings, where an owner picks a route you have marked client-selectable plus a day and time window. It arrives as a request that stays off the round until you confirm or decline it. A stranger with the link cannot see any client, pet, price or existing visit.
How do tips work?
If your business has connected Stripe, the report card shows a tip option with preset amounts and a custom amount. The tip is paid through your own Stripe account, and Animal Friends OS takes no platform fee on it. If Stripe is not connected, the tip option is not shown. Staff can read each visit’s tips and each client’s tip history.
What does Animal Friends OS cost for a walking business?
OS Walk starts at $19 a month for one walker and goes up to $159 a month for unlimited walkers, with no activation fee and a 14-day free trial. See pricing.
Set your rates and schedule a week of walks.
Add your visit-type rates, create a recurring schedule for one client and see what the round looks like before you pay anything.
No credit card to start. Month to month. Bring your clients and pets with you.