Guests with good reviews turning out to be a disaster?

I have a policy on my contract that states no parties! They must agree to the contract before booking. That has saved me any worry.

We have had similar experience with places not matching online pictures and description. Soo disappointing which doesn’t help the whole brand. I can see where it could be possible to delete a review if it is the exception to the rule but then I would suggest an onsite review of the property to find out for sure what is going on. When I was a B&B operator we had an association that would review in person each B&B to make sure they met the criteria. Right now we are made to be more competitive with each other in a location they helpful.

@Onefroggiegurl There are some Airbnb review policies that will cause them to remove a review, but simply stating that the place wasn’t clean or not as advertised wouldn’t cause it to be removed. It’s actually like pulling teeth for a host to get Airbnb to remove a guest review and there are tons of bad reviews on the site, so I kind of doubt your review was removed simply because you were honest about horrible conditions.
What can cause a review to be removed is discriminatory language (referring to a host’s race, nationality, sexual persuation, etc), profanity, mentioning Airbnb involvement in a case, or accusing a host or guest of being a thief or some other subjective and unprovable accusation. You can say “Some of my belongings disappeared from my room, I didn’t feel safe here”, as that is a statement of fact, but "The host is a thief ", no.
And they might remove a review if the guest comes across as some crazed ranter.
However, there do seem to be some shady operators on Airbnb- so-called hosts with hundreds of listings who make a ton of money for Airbnb who seem able to get away with things that regular hosts don’t. They are able to remain on the platform with 2.5 or 3* ratings, they manage to have false reviews on their profiles, and other things that the company might overlook because of how much money in guest fees these listings bring into Airbnb’s coffers.
I always advise people to book listings with a real host, rather than listings where you can see that they list scores or hundreds of places.

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@Onefroggiegurl P.S. Many people don’t realize that reviews are not necessarily in chronological order- there are some algorithms which order the reviews according to various criteria. Like the reviews from guests from the listing’s home country wil appear first. It also depends what country you are accessing the site from.
Some hosts or guests have complained that their review was removed, because they were looking near the top of the review page, assuming that since the stay was recent, that’s where it would be. But it could just as easily be on the 3rd or 4th page of reviews.

No, we were contacted by Airbnb & informed the owner contacted them to have our review removed & that it would be…

I don’t believe you.

I smell :poop:

It’s simply not how it’s done.

JF

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I only stated facts, nothing discriminatory or as a character assassination. Another of the Airbnb reps read my review & stated we didn’t violate their rules in our review… these people kept calling until they reached a rep who FINALLY agreed to delete the review.

Wow! Some people in this group are absolutely nasty. I have proof of everything I’m saying, but believe what y’all want. I know what happened.
Airbnb saw photos of the horrible conditions & thought we should receive a partial refund to go elsewhere (somewhere clean). The owner didn’t feel it was fair that we received some money back AND were still allowed to leave a review… THEY raised a stink, the review was deleted.

No, folks here have got fairly well tuned bullshit detectors, and most experienced Airbnb hosts know how difficult it is to have a review removed. But simple facts wouldn’t suit your anti Airbnb narrative, would it?

JF

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Wow … isn’t it just awful that @beneluigi (and others here) actually Ask Members to Weigh In with their Experiences?! (fainting).

Perhaps none of us should ever post a topic without putting in at least 1 hour of research first? :laughing:

Good luck with that …

I just wondered if anyone else was noticing a new pattern of bad guests with good reviews since the covid situation began. I didn’t mean to open the gates to people insulting each other.
I tried to delete this thread but sadly I cannot.
I’ve gotten my answer (thanks to all who chimed in before things got salty) and hopefully everyone can just move on now.

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@Agirlfromcle

Agreed - the pattern is there - for sure. Many here, and on other forums, have been remarking on it in growing numbers for a month or so.

The theory seems to be that people are looking to party somewhere other than home.

For this reason, when we do re-open with our new unit, we will not allow IB until things settle down and will do personal check-ins for 100% of guests. Anyone showing up with extra people, pets, etc will get cancelled on the spot.

Don’t worry about the barbs tossed here - that is just how it is sometimes. We are more testy than usual with the broad situation.

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If you mentioned in the review that you received a refund from Airbnb because of the condition of the place, that would be something the host could cite as reason to remove the review.

How are you able to do that on AirBnB without it being prejudicial? If you have Instant Book you can’t pre-disqualify someone because they are local, and even if you have to approve them first you get dinged if you reject too many requests to book. Is there any way to make your rental a destination property only and not one for locals?

I hate to say it but when we have bad guests they are almost always from AirBnB, especially local or last-minute AirBnB guests.

I had a local IB, I sent him a few questions, he did not answer right away and an hour later I cancelled as uncomfortable. I have only had this happen once in 3 years though.

RR

I had the same situation for the first time in two years. Guy from an hour away booked on IB saying “Looks like a great place for my friends and I to get away” I have a question in my IB message that requires them to answer a question “What area is shared with the neighbor?” He didn’t answer in the initial booking, nor when I asked him three times (in various ways). Each time he responded “Okay” or “Sounds good” so I know he got the question, and just ignored it. I cancelled under “not comfortable” and he immediately answered with apologies, but too late. He was already being a dingus turnip, so I wasn’t giving him fourth chance.

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I like “dingus turnip”!

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Hello, I’m so sorry to read your share and what’s been going on. I’m glad to see you put in a 2night minimum. Not sure what you charge per night is but you could raise your minimum stay to 3,raise your price per night, and or both. Also I’d like to suggest if you haven’t made this a requirement to increase your deposit. I believe you have 14 days to make a complaint with airbnb which should give you plenty of time to take pictures of the destruction and get it worked out. They will take it out of the deposit for repairs. Don’t know if you’ve listed your place as a no party home. So many ways you can protect yourself. Also I know that many host aren’t writing reviews unless they’re positive so don’t let that hold you back not that it will make that much of a difference if their reviews a good and your the only one reporting problems. Oh also raise your cleaning if that’s the problem.
When our county went into" stay at home" we were restricked from doing STR only 31 day or longer so you may want to check to see if you can even do STR’s. Most like at this point you probably will. They just lifted ours on May 15Th. Good luck

I’m still on what your questions that ask every guest. Sorry not making sense to me.

If you do instant book, you can have a message to them before booking (it might show up for all bookings but I only really get concerned if it is an IB). My message welcomes them, blah blah blah and then says something like “To make sure that you have the best vacation possible, please read the entire listing and advise what part of our property is shared with the neighbors” I want to weed out people that think the house is out by itself in the woods (aka party place). If they realize the house has a driveway shared with the neighbors, my hope is that partiers will look elsewhere.