This forum is dedicated to connecting hosts with other hosts. Sign up to get the latest updates and news just for AirBnb hosts! Note that we are not affiliated with Airbnb - we are just passionate hosts!
Hi,
I recently had a great guest stay over at our place. I left her a review today (she checked out yesterday). I would like to slightly edit the private guest feedback; when I go to ‘reviews’ in airbnb, it says that I have 2 days left to edit the review. Does this mean that the private guest feedback I left today morning hasn’t been sent yet or will it be resent again?
Thanks!
Call Airbnb. I believe it would be the public review you can edit. You can read a review right away. Call and find out to put your mind at ease.
thanks…I will check with airbnb.
Hi everyone, first I want to say thank you for this great forum, I’ve been reading it a lot and it is extremely helpful.
For starters, we have been hosting for some time now. All great 5 star reviews in everything. Our price is relatively low compared to the other hosts in the surrounding area as we wanted to build up reviews before raising the price and we are in an extremely expensive location in the city but charging very cheaply night rate. It is ok with us as we wanted to experience how it would work for us and our family (we offer a private room in our home). The matter of the fact is that all of our guests are astonished happy when they get into our apartment as they didn’t expect it to be so good located and of great value. However today we received one bad review of a one guest who spent two nights with us. They complained about our location (we are in the best area of the city), she said the restroom is not fully equipped for women (it was totally renovated just 2 months ago and it is very tidy and clean as well as cabinets with extra clean towels, bath gels and shampoo, we provide those in spite of the individual ones in the guest room, we didn’t put hair dryer in the restroom because it is shared and we didn’t want people to take long time in it but they have everything in their bedroom, including hair dryer, mirror etc), she said the room smells bad (we clean it to prestige condition because we thing cleanness is the top priority), she said we needed to renovate the kitchen (it has new cabinets and it is cozy), and she said the laundry area was dark and dangerous for women ( it is a private area in the back of our apartment fully secured by metal bars and completed inaccessible from the outside. They made many mistakes here including talking loudly during the night in the living room, having no decency to shower inside the shower are but making the whole restroom wet as they watch at the sink (i think based on the amount of water on the floor and everywhere), locked themselves out and called us late at night to open the door as well as kept buzzing at round midnight before we picked up the phone. There were other things too but we decided not to say that in their public review and went with the Good guest recommend bad review type. The problem is that now she has reviewed us and the review is a disaster and it is the last one showing on the listing. We didn’t want to make a fuss in the review about those things and we had some chats with her during her stay, she seemed overly satisfied and happy, I have know idea why she didn’t talk to us during her stay as we even shared meals together. She left saying 'thank you, your home is very comfortable and clean, I really want to thank you. I regret now trying to overlook her flaws and would like to edit my review, but as I see on airbnb the window is closed for edit.
I would like to ask what would you do if it were you? Would you write a public response assess each point she made? If so in what tone? Would you call Air to solicit to edit your review. She is a new member, our review is the only one in their profile.
Much appreciated any comment.
I would ignore it. If you reply, it will simply make people read her full review rather than the first few sentences. Try very hard to forget that she ever existed and move on towards making your next guests have a great time so that they soon bury her bad review with their great ones 
Thank you for the feedback and sorry for the late reply. We thought it over and we agreed this was the best option, just like you said don’t reply, however she is from China, and we are in Taiwan so we get a lot of bookings from Chinese people, I am Taiwanese and we understand mainland Chinese culture is quite different. We were having floods of inquiries and booking and since her review was released we didn’t get a single request or booking. Her review is on the top as it is the last one. Chinese people (as per our observance of their culture) will base on her experience and avoid booking. Something to note about most people from China, maybe will be helpful to other hosts too as to what expect. There is a lot of new money in China, so many who were in poverty at least one generation ago are now able to have a better life and go abroad etc, based on their culture, they think that ‘rich’ people will always turn a nose on things and treat people badly as to save face to show that they are in the upper part of the economical pyramid, so they think if they don’t find things to complain they are losing face and letting others know they are still poor.
We had many people from China, they are mostly like this so we try to please this factor when face to face, kind of recognizing them for their ‘achievement’. We are so disappointed (sigh) just hope her review submerge under the the good ones soon .
Thank you so much
Oh geez!!!
I am not fully understanding this. You mention the Chinese will read her experience and avoid booking. And you state you have noticed a direct correlation of zero inquiries/bookings from Chinese since her review.
Yet - the reason this girl complained about so many things is due to her culture so that she can show “rich” people she is not poor.
Yikes!! You may consider responding publicly to the review. I would be absolutely livid…and right now her review is costing you bookings. So it may not be a bad idea to respond. In your experience is it only a small segment of the mainland Chinese who don’t know to use the shower curtain and close it? And how does another Chinese person know whether to believe the review as truth or if the guest is trying to come across as a snob to prove they are not poor?
My gut is saying the same thing. I’ve had guests tell me that they will read negative reviews to see how the Host responds. They say that this is the most honest insight they’re going to get of the Host prior to meeting him/her. There’s a strong possibility of turning this thing around without getting into detail. What if the response was short and kind of vaguely disinterested like “Some people just aren’t a good match for Airbnb. I wish so-and-so well”.
You are fully understanding it. That is exactly as you described. If they fall into that category I explained, they must find (or even create) things to complain as to show others they are on the top so they can differentiate what is good or bad, even if they have no idea what they are talking about.
I hate to judge based on stereotypes, but unfortunately more often than not that is what is expected in Chinese culture, especially in mainland China. I did have great guests from China but even those, when talking in person at home (we live in the apartment) I could feel the tendency to go that way when they described places. I had to maneuver my way to acknowledge their so called ‘ability to complain disguised as upper class citizen’ so that i could avoid bad reviews in those areas. Unfortunately this girl still went ahead and made a completely inaccurate review. I am OK receiving bad reviews if I had failed, but everything stated was outright lying.
A major thing happened today: one of our guests, who is also Mainland Chinese and is our routine guest, he is here every week, contacted me and asked what had happened for such a bad review. Then I really decided to reply to her in the Public response. My routine guest said that he saw the review and he wouldn’t book me if he was seeing it (as a Chinese himself), he’s booked already many times with us in the past and he has many reservations with us in the future too, all through Airbnb. He said he was checking other rooms because he stays in different places on different days due to his work and he stumbled on our listing again and opened out of curiosity. He then decided to contact me. Now, I think if a routine customer would have this concern, of course other Chinese would think similarly.
I know for many westerners (although I am Asian, my wife is a Westerner) a detailed response would be too much, like we are trying too hard, but for Chinese people it is totally different.
In the end I decided to contact her via Air messaging system and she, as I expected, denied everything, and said that she didn’t know how the review appeared there. Talk about Poker Face… So I replied to her in detailed about each item and she said that my house and service is perfect. She said she didn’t write it (oh yea, a ghost did maybe). She was so embarrassed that she couldn’t even talk about it, just denied.
That’s a lesson learned for me, more of a confirmation actually about the Chinese behavior and maybe you who host them may be alert that this might happen.
Of course not everyone from a large nation is the same but we are product of the ambient. Do all German love beer? Do all Brazilians party and love carnival? Do they all love soccer? Do all Americans have guns? We can’t generalize or stereotype all but culture means that most people share the same set of tradition.
Currently having another guest from China as we speak. Nice woman and polite. Lets see the result. Didn’t have time to talk to her so no time for the ‘acknowledgement’ I mentioned.
As for the shower experience, even the most polite of my Chinese guests couldn’t handle the dry/wet shower as we have and they prefer to use a handheld shower head to put it out near the toilet to shower, I still haven’t found out why it is so, maybe I will just ask next time. And no, up to now no geographic segment of the ones more or less prone to behave like that.
As to how another Chinese would know if she is bluffing or if she is reliable, well, this I can say for sure. In all cases, they look down upon service people. Anyone providing them anything. If you are not a maker (manufacturer, big company office person etc) you are pretty much non deserving of credibility. Although I have a job that would ‘grant’ me respect in their eyes, every host-guest contract with is service of lodging primarily, so you guests see hosts as such.
You are right, that reply would work great deal with westerners, but with Chinese it is a very different story. I even had a call from a current routine guest (i hadn’t mentioned anything to him) about the review. That’s how things work in their culture.
I really hope if someone complains let it be about a valid point. Having to reply publicly to an hallucination sucks 