Hello - I have a inquiry pending from someone with only an H as her profile picture and a phone number requesting to stay at our place and besides the zero profile it says she’s been on Airbnb since 2016 with no reviews. Do you guys come across this situation?
I have seen people write on her about scams and phishing but how do you know?
4 years is a long time to wait to start scamming. I would accept, then if you really feel a need to know more just ask.
RR
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We’ve had a few guests who’ve had accounts for years, but no reviews. Haven’t had a problem so far. As @RiverRock says, if you need to know more, just ask.
JF
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This is not a red flag. She may have created her account for another trip but decided to stay in a hotel. You may require guests have real profile pictures if it is important to you.
ETA: You may also ask her if this will be her first AirBnB stay. Keep your tone friendly rather than paranoid. Often you’ll find the answer is, “oh no, my husband usually books for us.”
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I don’t analyse my guests to see who is acceptable and who isn’t but it’s not at all unusual to have an account for several years and then start using it. Not everyone travels a great deal.
The trouble is that if you start seeing potential guests as people indulging in scams and phishing activities then you’re going to waste a lot of time and brainpower. You’ll also get stressed and, if you refuse too many people, will get shoved to the back of Airbnb’s search results. Your occupancy rate will be affected.
Yes, you’ve probably seen a few posts here about scams but that’s because no busy host is going to take precious moments out of their busy day to write about the 99.9% of guests who are trouble-free.
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I’ve definitely had at least one guest that had an account for several years with no reviews. Not really sure why the guest created an account and never used it. Maybe they were planning a trip and it fell through. Who knows. I do require e-mail, phone number, and governement ID verifications on the guest profile, but I don’t care about the profile photo or if they have no reviews. (I would care about bad reviews, though).
I can’t speak for others but we have one (in the name of my other half not me) that we use when we travel and I think that stood dormant for several years. If I remember rightly, we’d started the account and then decided for some reason to use a hotel.
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I was in a similar situation as a guest some years ago. I hadn’t at that time even thought about being a host.
My very first Airbnb experience was really unpleasant and, as can happen, sent me back to good hotels - until those prices seemed to double. I hadn’t booked another Airbnb in at least 3 years - maybe even longer, when I needed a location where hotels seemed to be either $250+ or, say, $50 (shuddered to contemplate, and I’m not a snob!). Booked a $100 night place and had a delightful experience!
Host did not comment on my “one review in 3-4 years, though she was conscientious about everything.
Needless to say, I’ve learned a few things since my first booking.
I created my Airbnb account at least two years before I ever used it, either for hosting or as a guest. It wouldn’t bother me if someone had an account for years and hadn’t used it.
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Thanks All! So I accepted her request but did say to her I’m surprised you were able to book with no photo and just a phone # for her profile. She already wrote back and said others normally book and she didn’t even realize and fixed her profile!
Thanks all - this is such a great group of Airbnb gurus!!
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You can’t see a profile image until it’s an actual booking.
JF
FYI, this is dependent on your booking settings.
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I don’t worry about these guests because, until 4 months ago, I was one of them. I opened an ABB account in 2014 but found VRBO more accommodating for traveling.
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Do you know you can ask folks to verify their profile before you accept their request? Or, if you have IB, you can set this, as well as “positive review from other hosts” as a requirement if you want. When people without these things send me a request, I politely ask them to get verified and to tell me a bit about themselves since they don’t have any reviews. It just makes me feel better, and they always do. Haven’t ever had a problem.
I’ve had this happen fairly often; I’ve crafted a message for these situations. My most recent response is attached below - I answered her initial questions and then asked her to provide some information -> I had no response from her.
There, however, have been some that have replied with information and explanations that made sense, then became compliant with my requirements, and then turned out to be fantastic guests.
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I’ve had two of these in the last few weeks. I thought it was odd, but didn’t let it stop me from hosting.
One left the house quite a mess, the other damaged a nightstand (cpap leaked water) and towel (both caused by his teen aged daughter.). He proactively told me about both issues and offered to pay for them.
I’ve hosted others without reviews and had no issues.
do not I repeat do not allow them to book -
there are 3 reasons I can attest to for the situation
- they use airbnb as a hotel service - never writing reviews means they can treat you how the want to
1b. if your a new host so much the better - they book then cancel then ask for discount
- they take over your home wiether its a room in your house or flat /annex etc - theyre attitude will be we have paid so we can do what we want when we want - disregard you take over
they are all parasites
sorry to be bearer of bad news
its possible the host above got lucky
Or it is possible you were unlucky.
RR
3 Likes
According to my profile, I’ve been a part of Airbnb since 2015. I don’t even remember creating an account. My guess is that I probably created it out of curiosity after hearing about it. The earliest review I have is from 2017. I don’t think it’s a red flag when a guest has had an account for awhile without any reviews. And like someone said above, if they were on Airbnb for the purpose of scamming they likely would have done so all those years ago.
Some people don’t travel…ever! When I last flew my mom from Florida to Colorado it had been her first time out of state in 15 years.
As far as her photo just being the letter ‘H’, maybe she linked her Air account to her Gmail or another social media site and it’s coming up that way because of that? My account is linked to my Facebook acct and when I started hosting I had to change my profile picture to something more current as it was my old FB profile picture from 2015 
RR after 10 years of hosting I seriously doubt it - just heard it all before- before this forum set up there used to be an internal airbnb one - and it happened alot 2011-12 (hosts complained alot about it and airbnb office spent alot of time those years fending off angr hosts at every monthly meeting - then there was a lull and it kicked back off 2014/15 peaking 2017
that was a terrible year for guests using other peoples pages - friends booking via another friends page - kid booking on behalf of thier parents and not telling me, fake profiles - I can go on and on…