We had a guest “check” herself in - she just walked into the house as the back door was open which I am uncomfortable with. She booked yesterday and we had sent the usual message to let us know what time she would like to check in and that we can make anything after 3pm work. Her reply was that she would get to the airport at 5, so we expected her at 6 (PM I thought :)). When I woke up in the morning there were several messages from 5 AM asking if she could come in the morning and then that she just walked in. We had the cleaning service scheduled for noon - 3pm, but as one of her message said she wanted to sleep and talk later, I cancelled the cleaning service which I had to pay for as I cancelled without the required notice. She is now mad because the place according to her is VERY dirty. It is not clean to our standards of course, but was very lightly used for one night before her. Problem is the cleaning service does not have an opening until next week and I am very concerned about her giving us a bad review. She is not very nice, and is not taking any responsibility for her part in this. She also parked in our driveway, blocking all of our cars - we state in the listing that it is street parking here. I feel that she will hate everything no matter what. I brought a plate of cookies down, and she ignored that. I am wondering if I should ask her to leave? Have any of you ever had that type experience? Technically if I cancel her before the check in can she leave us a review? Would that hurt my superhost status? Would I have to refund her?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
First, to prevent this in the future follow one of several strategies: have a digital lock with a code that doesn’t work until check in time. Or don’t give check in instructions until the room has been turned over (which is what I started doing after a guy showed up early.)
Second, if you cancel she can leave you a review. You can also leave her a review. Most hosts do not want to host this kind of guest so telling us in the review that this guest arrives hours early and lets herself in would be very helpful.
Third, I would call Airbnb and see if I can cancel on her. The only worry I’d have is making sure it’s a penalty free cancellation. I’d cancel, give a full refund and get her out of there. I have no tolerance for people like this in my life. If you are desperate for the money you may have to make a different choice but if respect and dignity have more value then cancel. No doubt some people would say no refund due to her violating the rules but that’s not how I operate.
Physically prevent early walk in with locks etc… The only time it happened to me, another guest let the early guest in so over rode my management and I hated it. His room was ready but I cancelled him because I was unhappy with the disrespectful behaviour.
I would cancel because she is disrespectful and it will only get worse. I wouldn’t refund her because she broke rules. Blimey she might have walked in on another guest!
She could have walked in on guests staying the day before. This is just ignorance
In a guest/host relationship someone has to take charge. And it sounds as though the guest has definitely taken charge here.
I know this is harsh but it’s the case, I’m afraid.
She shouldn’t have been allowed in, she shouldn’t have been allowed to park where she did, she shouldn’t have been able to get into a dirty room (sheets not changed?) etc.
I don’t know anything about the property of course, but it’s hard to see why this behaviour was allowed.
First of all, this guest totally played you: No normal guest will say “5” without specifying anything else, all this while supposedly not being aware that when you arrive that early you have to pay for an extra night. So first of all get mad at the guest. Then at yourself: Who has a door open at 5am? Who allows guest to enter a lightly used room? What is lightly used? Was the bedlinnen dirty? The toilet seat?
Just prevent this kind of thing from happening in the future. If someone says “5” play stupid and reply: “By 5pm your room will certainly be ready to occupy.”
We once had a couple specify 1am, so I was thinking LATE checkin. Them showing up 24 hours early made me realize they were thinking EARLY checkin 
. Just to say, never suppose anything except the dumbness of people 
.
Its still so amazing how people can be so rude and disrespectful. I’m sure if the tables were turned she wouldn’t appreciate someone barging in on her. She sounds like a self centered little witch. Good luck to you with this situation. I hope you can cancel her.
Thank you so much - you are correct. We normally have this door locked, but with busy season over and in a super safe neighborhood in the mountains, that is why that happened. Won’t again. I called airbnb and I would loose my superhost status if I cancel on her so I have to suck it up for a whole week. Not sure yet how I am going to pull that one off. I’ve been hosting for years, and never had an am/pm situation, I guess there is a first time for everything - just when you think you’ve seen it all…
Sounds like a case for the 24 hour clock. Then there’s Jaquos story of a guest saying what time is that exactly!
No cancellation for rule breaking?
I would call again and see if you can get her cancelled. We had a situation once where we were not comfortable with a guest and were told we would lose Superhost status if we cancelled them but we called again and spoke to someone else and ended up being able to cancel penalty free.
This is baloney. She is a rule breaker. Your rules have your check in time, correct? Call again and demand to be treated according to Airbnb policy.
It looks like this is going to end badly for us unless someone out there has a great idea. We did get the cleaning service to squeeze us in, but before they got here the guests had left. It was right after asking them to move their car which was blocking 3 cars in our driveway (our listing says street parking). So we gave her everything she asked for and had to say something about the broken house rule so my partner could get to work. I am glad that she is gone, but the next thing I get a call from airbnb that she wants a full refund because of the miscommunication on check in and the place being dirty. I explained to airbnb that I believe she left because she doesn’t want to park on the street, that she got to check in when she wanted and we had resolved the cleaning issue as she had asked, but I am not holding my breath. In many years of hosting, airbnb seems to always side with the host, not to mention that I am pretty much guaranteed a bad review. We do get mostly good guests, but this is pretty disappointing. However, it makes me feel so much better to read all your replies. Thank you so much. It is so nice not to be alone in this. I’m really glad you all are here.
I don’t have a great idea other than she was wrong to let herself into the place. It seems that you are acting like you did something wrong. Airbnb takes your good nature as weakness I suppose. In any case you are rid of her, maybe you can rebook the space and please eviscerate her in the review.
I don’t see why she is entitled to a refund because you didn’t do anything wrong. She came in before your stated checkin time so if course the place wasn’t clean yet because you didn’t have time. Please do give her a 1 star review so hopefully other hosts don’t have to deal with her. Sounds like an awful person. So sorry you’re having to deal with this.
Before we call the guest self centered and little witch, let’s remember we are in hospitality
business.Few moments that make me wonder. Why did you cancelled cleaning that would start at 12? That’s a whole 7 hours after she arrived. Did you tell her that cleaning will be done in 7 hours and If t’s ok with her?
What I see here is that she still expected to have a clean room. Since she arrived so early she thought that cleaners will arrive later and the room will be cleaned anyway.
Also " broken house rules" statement as a guest i would take badly even if I broke house rules. Obviously she came there after overnight flight and was exhausted. When people are tired they can be confused…and block 3 cars.
Another moment about " confusion with check in" . If she is from an area (like Europe) where 5pm is called 17 o’clock then it’s very clear why she thought you understood her correctly .
If someone is so confused they block 3 cars they shouldn’t be the hell driving!
Nonsense. Europeans understand both systems, including am and pm. I have never had anyone muddle this. Also if you’re wanting check in hours earlier than the listing states, at a time when the previous guest is likely to be in bed and the host in bed you raise the issue! She should have paid for the previous night or arrived later. Never mind a refund, put in a counter claim for the night before!
I am from Europe and it’s not nonsense to mix up times. It happens all the time . Even if I say 5 , they always ask me in a morning or night. It just happened in Milan when I said 3, she asked me if it’s morning and it was morning and the host let me checking at that time and noone talked about me paying extra day
And no, guests don’t HAVE to pay for extra night If they are not asked. Many hosts don’t mind at all if they are not booked let guests in earlier even this early. I did and still do on a regular basis. And always appreciate if a host does it for me.
This guest raised an issue rightfully so because as to her understanding all was arranged and she expected to arrive at 5 am I to clean space.
She just asked for early check-in . But early check-in doesn’t mean that room should be dirty and not ready.
I think if OP clarified to her that she thought the guest was arriving at night , it would be much less confusion and anger on both parts.
I can only comment on the Spanish language, but they don’t have an equivalent to our am/pm.