Bad experience. Can I check reviews given by guests to other hosts?

Hi There
Im a new Airbnb host. Our experiences have been by and large very positive.
However, yesterday we had our first truly awful guests.
They were a married couple who were clearly in the middle of a spat when they arrived. They couldn’t even agree where to park the car. My husband had to go out and ‘facilitate’ after I failed. We could hear them argueing for some time. Initially it was a blame game. He booked the apartment under her profile & didnt read the amenities section so did not realise until they arrived thst there was no air conditioning. He was in BIG trouble.
The next morning the accusations were "You dont love me. Take me home now!"
They didnt let us know they had checked out until they got home.
When we checked the apartment our things were thrown everywhere. Someone had obviously thrown a book bringing the artwork down off the walls. The damage was nothing that couldnt be fixed easily but rather a sure indication of what went on.
Im sure you can guess the rest.
When they left the applied to Airbnb for a full refund. They said the place was uninhabitable, smelt of dead meat (how creative!) they couldnt bbq outside as it was too hot (there was a total fireban statewide) there were cobwebs on the gate. And the kicker, her husband said the spare bed wasn’t comfortable! :grinning: Consequently, they had to leave without giving notice as they were scared their child was at risk if they stayed.
Im feeling fairly pragmatic about the refund outcome. And Im sure they will give us a hell review but as we’ve only ever had 5s it will stand out and then be buried by other good ones.
My question is; Is there a way to look at how potential guests have reviewed other hosts before I accept them? That way if there is any odd pattern I can see it. Especially if they’ve tried to get a free holiday after they have arrived and changed their minds about staying.
Thanks for listening to my noobie tales of woe.
And thanks in advance for any thoughts or advice you might have :blush:
Bonny

Of course you can see reviews that previous hosts have given a prospective guest – just click on their name/profile, and scroll down to see reviews they have received.

Given them a truthful, impersonal review “Guests did not read the listing and were disturbed to get what was listed rather than what they wanted. Guests also engaged in a loud personal dispute which resulted in damage to the property. Cannot recommend that others host them.”

Use the “Anything you want to tell AirBnb” section to tell Air exactly the same things you wrote above.

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Thanks so much Ken.
Id really like to use some of your straight to the point but very diplomatic wording if I may?
What I meant to ask is whether I can see reviews given by the guest.
If they give trash reviews to everyone then theyre really not worth having.
B :blush:

You will have to poke around to hunt for them.

Choose a review that another host left this guest. Then click on that host’s profile or listing. You will need to scroll through the reviews left for this host in order to see if the guest left a review for them.

But there isn’t a way to just see a list of all the reviews the guest left all the hosts.

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I look at the reviews that guests leave for other hosts before I accept their booking. Click on the guest’s profile and you will see the reviews that prior hosts have left for them. Click on the profiles of the hosts who have left the reviews for the guests, scroll through and you will find the reviews that the guests have left for their prior hosts. The problem is that if the guest cancels they are not eligible to write a review.

I’m sorry you got such horrible guests. I hope you took pictures of the damage they left. It might make the Airbnb representative see that they just don’t want to pay. None of the complaints you’ve listed here would have any impact on their child’s safety, so I believe that Airbnb will side with you.

The dead meat complaint is ridiculous. By definition, all meat is dead and if they want to barbecue clearly the smell of meat doesn’t offend them.

Of course you’re welcome to use my text. EllenN has the way to see what reviews potential guests have written about other hosts.

Seems like WHOLE LOT OF WORK to me…

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Which can be a lot of work if the host has many reviews. And there’s of course no guarantee that the guest left a review. :frowning:

And unfortunately there is no guarantee that a psycho guest won’t decide he hates you for some reason. The strangest things can set people off. I currently have only two reviews below 4 stars: they are 2 and 3 stars. And they were given for the same reason - the guest was upset that I wouldn’t hold on to his luggage after checkout. But in neither case were there any obvious red flag in their listing. Mr 2 stars aka the French Lunatic did write a guest review (for someone else), which, while positive, was in hindsight a little… peculiar. But I don’t think I read it before booking - I was greener then. And if I had, I doubt it would have stopped me from accepting him…

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I recently rejected a booking from a potential guest who had complained at one place that people were smoking outside and at another place that the bed wasn’t firm enough for him. In both cases he shortened his stay. I’m glad that I took the time to check the reviews he left as our neighbors smoke in their driveway which is next to the guest bedroom window and our mattress in the guest room is pretty soft. Another time we had a guest who left reviews for prior hosts complaining that neighboring children were playing in their yards (he said that as he was paying hotel prices, which he wasn’t, that he should have a hotel level of quiet) and that the host barbecued outside the guest room window. My husband accepted his request to book over my objections. He was a horrible guest. In my view, it’s well worth the time it takes to check the reviews guests have left for other hosts.

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I always use my gut instinct and it hasn’t let me down. You can tell a lot by first photo, how people write and of course a few reviews but often people start by saying it’s first time they use Air (no reviews yet) and in those cases I’m patient and helpful, unless my instinct kicks in, I’d trust them like a friend and treat them like one too.

EllenN, I think it is a great idea to do it. I have discovered that there are quest now that are becoming “Professional Guest”.
I think that it is very smart to check guest’s reviews on prior host, I am starting to do it on a regular basis now.
I had two in a row this year. One gave me great review, but on a star rating gave me 3 stars overall and one, left 1 star rating overall. The first guest is a smart cookie. This guest e-mailed me just two weeks ago, wanting to stay in touch. What a two face.
I lost my Super Host status, and was forced to reduce my rates for the time.

EllenN, very smart, it is the only way to protect oneself as a Host. Great Idea!!!

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Is there anything wrong with starting a blacklist of guests.

One place where hosts can add a name of a guest, location and have categories to select reason: abusive, threatened, unfair review, damaged things, stole things, …

The list would allow hosts that didn’t leave a guest review or allow them to add the more details about that guest.

This list would be available to other hosts who could fall into a similar nightmare.

I used to be like this. However, after hundreds of guests I’ve come to the conclusion that you really just can’t tell in the end. My worst guests all seemed great in communication and many had good reviews already. Some of my best guests were not so great at written communication but fantastic people. I just take anyone now and run with it! (I should add that I’m a live-in host so can be in control on site).

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This seems to work: If they’ve sent you a message, you can click on their Airbnb profile and use Google Chrome’s AirReview app/widget/whatever it is to see the reviews about the potential guest AND the reviews the potential guest has written.

I use it too and it’s great. I use Instant Book so reading review is meaningless to me because I don’t have the option of accepting or declining but if I have time, one the day before arrival I check any reviews the forthcoming guest has and any they have given.

That way, I can head any problems off at the pass by discussing with them (in a lighthearted way, of course :slight_smile: ) any problems they, or their hosts, have had in the past.

I’d missed the OP first time round - I have had SO MANY couples who have argued while they’ve been here. One was so bad that early on check out morning, he stomped off and left. Took the car. She was left alone in the apartment with just their dog, no transport for the 200 mile journey home and with five hours to go to check out time. That was fun…

So I guess I’m the only one who cares what happened…maybe only due to the dog. So what happened?

The guy had left so very early but I called him and said ‘Oi. Look. You can’t do this. What do you expect her to do? What do you expect me to do? I need her out at 11 this morning. She has no car. She’s got the dog. She’s hungover…’

(I didn’t mention that they’d both been pretty drunk the night before which probably fuelled the argument).

He paid attention and slunk back. He collected her, the dog and all their luggage and they were gone by check out time. :slight_smile:

I did find a syringe under the sofa but assumed (nicely) that one of them (or even the dog) was diabetic…

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