Guest not willing to pay for breakage?

I had guests only 2 weeks ago who said they broken 2 champagne glasses and sent me a photo of the box of the new ones they’d bought to replace. Win some you lose some.

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That’s exactly what we do, yes it means having to move things around when we let our home out, but we only do it a maximum of 14 nights per year (for UK income tax reasons) and only for wedding guests/bridal parties at a local venue.
We are fortunate enough to be able to be very selective but it doesn’t stop accidental damages from time to time.

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Absorb the cost. Consider putting cheaper wine glasses in your listing. No one is going to mark your review down for the type of wineglasses.

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In my home, we use pretty expensive wine glasses, & on average, I break at least 2-3 a year. In my listing, they get durable stemless wine glasses. I haven’t had a guest break one, nor have I received complaints about them.
I wouldn’t try to charge a guest for breakage, & would chalk it up to the cost of doing business. As an aside, Amazon has some fairly nice wine glasses, that have proven to be much more durable than the pricey ones. Worth checking into… As stated, I seem to do more damage than my guests! :joy:

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I’d move on from that one as others have suggested here.
It’s disappointing never the less.
One of my guests had to pay after breaking a shelf and some items in my Airbnb bathroom.
He offered and I accepted it- as it was his second item breakage in the two times he’d stayed!!

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The tipoff was her wording: “A glass was broken” instead of “we broke a glass.” She was not taking responsibility. My kids used that language when they were teenagers.

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I remember when I found a glass French press I the trash with no mention from the guests. Sheesh.

In Mexico, that attitude is actually reflected in the language used by everyone I have dealt with. Passive tense seems to always be used. “It broke”, never “I broke it”.

I had a buddy in college who spilled a whole pitcher of beer on our pile of backpacks while we were playing pool. He came over to the pool table and said, “uh, beer was spilled”.

After that, we all used “beer was spilled” as an excuse for all things large and small. Late for work? Beer was spilled. Bump into someone? Beer was spilled. Bad haircut? …

A few years ago, I got a group email, a divorce announcement. The subject was Beer was Spilled.

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I just look at it as the cost of doing business and is “priced” into your nightly rate. There are plenty of times that I have gotten beyond what I have charged for the room when guests leave behind food items, personal effects, whatever. I do my best to attentively clean the room, but things do get left behind and I have no idea who they belong to.

??? If you thoroughly clean the room, how would you not find things a guest left behind and know exactly who they belonged to? I don’t understand what “do my best to attentively clean” means.

It’s either thoroughy cleaned or it’s not.

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I overlook things sometimes. You have a good day now. :slight_smile:

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I can’t stand guests that use the 'I stayed at this Airbnb and they never made me pay for breakages".

Different hosts have different rules, policies and ways of doing things.

One size, does not fit all.

OP this us a lesson to be learned… Always use low cost items in your Airbnb…

That way, when it gets broken, you won’t bat an eyelid.

Don’t hate me for this, please. But I don’t keep expensive glassware, for exactly that reason. You can’t buy one replacement glass, and they don’t want to pay for the set.

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Replacements.com is a good place to find a single glass (or plate, or knife…) to match your set, at least in the US. And eBay can be a good place to buy fewer than a set, too.

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Thank you, Pitonview!

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I would put in my house rules that if you break something, stain towels or linens so they cannot be used again, you will be billed for replacement. And yes I would pursue the cost and especially after the review. I recently had a guest wipe sun tint on a white bath towel that would not bleach out so I’m charging her for it. Towels are meant for drying clean bodies, not wiping face tint on.

nope, reviews are more important than the wine glass. I am not going to make any guest uncomfortable for a wine glass. I just want to make sure they had a wonderful time so they come back next year. There are many wine glasses in thrift shops that are beautiful, high- end and inexpensive. just buy those.

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Absolutely not, I would never charge for a broken wine glass. The guest was right, not ‘haughty’ at all. This is a cost of doing business as accidents happen.

The same goes for sheets and towels. Unless of cause the damage is willful. I read a host the other day demanding payment for blood on the mattress when he hadn’t used any protector under the sheet.

hello from the Adelaide Hills. :slight_smile:

I wouldn’t charge for a broken wine glass, in restaurant world they only have a life of about 7 uses! I’ve had 3 wine glass breakages in 2022, and one was even a Riedel. We put very nice glassware in our more luxe couples listings, but we also get a good deal on Riedels by ordering through friends who own a winery… I recently got very lucky and got a pair of speigelau champgane flutes for $8 in an op shop, so again wouldn’t be too sad if/when they are broken. It’s bound to happen at some point.

For our cottage I now buy Ikea wine glasses, we bought 2 dozen so i have spares, and really they are actually very nice wine glasses. Also I actually prefer guests pop the glasses in the dw, because handwashing is a very easy way to accidentally break a glass. I actually ask guests to let me know if there were any breakages and I write “it’s ok, it happens to us all!” to let them know i’m not going to get cross over a broken glass, and if they tell me about I’m just so happy they were honest and communicated with me, instead of me finding out during the turnover.

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