It did state that and personally I’d be doing what I could to get it removed, if it were me. This is a serious attack on a person’s character
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Well done! Bravely put and I much prefer what you said compared to your earlier thoughts. It was an “alleged” incident, not a proven one.
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This is a good point. One needs to weigh up the risks of reporting crimes in some cultures and the wrong people being blamed.
I made the mistake of reporting to police my son’s wallet had been stolen after he left it for a few minutes under a massage table in Bali. He’d woken in a daze from the massage and we returned within minutes and had $500AUD (his whole life savings at 10) Wallet gone. Thankfully we were leaving 2 days later as we received 3 death threats at our hotel the following day from family members of the then fired masseuse. Police are totally corrupt there so hotel moved us to a new room where we remained, in fear, until our flight.
The annoying thing is that I never expected police to solve the ‘crime’ but knew you had to make a police report to claim on travel insurance. Turns out our policy didn’t cover cash but the insurance agent didn’t tell me that when I called ‘reverse charge’. The hotel also charged me $20 for the ‘reverse charge call to Australia!!!
I don’t think they were trying to scam me, or I wouldn’t have refunded the money they say they lost. But I mentioned it because the customer service rep seemed to think it was significant.
I think they lost it or accidentally overspent it.
I expected another group of guests the first weekend of their stay and told them so- we had an emergency toilet if the line for the bathroom got too long and i didn’t want them to worry. Then the other guests found better accommodation (I was going to have to put some of them on air mattresses- they were activists, though, and a free couch in NYC is a free couch). We usually have a lot of extra kids running around the house, but in the end the only people who were inside past the porch were my immediate family, my in laws, and these guests.
So while they clearly hoped to blame a faceless person, they were accusing me or my family.
The woman was very apologetic but clear that they didn’t think it was lost, and the man was tossing their luggage in an angry fashion. So I believe them that they think someone walked into their room and stole cash from its hiding place. I just don’t believe that’s what happened.
Humans are hard.
Thanks for details.
Did they explain why they didnot think it was lost?
So they in fact didnot know who there were blaming ?
You know if i was sure my money were stolen and I was sure it was stolen in the house I would also blame the people staying at the house at that time. I also think if I was a guest and if I was refunded the money by my host I would think that I in fact was correct in blaming the occupants for taking the money. It’s like you admitted that yes that’s true we took your money by refunding it.
In my case I was positive my money were taken inside the house. The night before we went to the bank and withdrew 200$ . Then we went for dinner and spent a little.
And we went straight home. At the house I counted the money. This is how I know I had all these money . Then we went to breakfast in the morning. And when we were ready to take off money were missing. The guy who was serving us could have gone into the room knowing that we are outside .
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Hehehe sorry to laugh but I “love” how big fancy hotels charge you for the calls 20$ which could be a monthly salary of a worker.
I remember I stayed in Honduras with a b…ch hostesses ( she deserves this name , not local
But German expat ). I lost my key in the end and she wanted to charge me 20$.
I knew that workers there make like 80$ a month . And she had some locals working for her in a kitchen. So I told her, ok I will pay you 20$ but then I will go and tell these people that you charged me for keys quarter of their monthly salary.
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I wouldn’t have said that! That could open you up to others trying the same thing.
Maybe.
But the main audience is other hosts. They may read it as an admission of guilt, but they’d also see that the guest said they’d change my review because of it (I still haven’t hunted the review down, but from earlier comment it sounds like they did not change their review)… and reviews are how hosts survive. So I’m paying it forward.
I wish I could have asked them more questions (when did they notice the loss. Were other things in the room moved.) But the cab was right there, and I was trying to remember if we had any extra small children visit that week, and all that with the blood rushing out of my head. I’m sure my face went dead white.
My thinking on the refund was to prove that I made no money on their loss.
It was all in airbnb communication. Usually I offer good guests (which they were until the last 5 minutes… though a book went missing from the room… But I’m not assuming it was them that took it as a souvenir, it might have been an earlier guest) a 15% discount on a future visit. So I took 15% off their just finished visit.
She wrote back that it was a nice gesture But. It was the But that got me.
So then i felt a little harassed and was just like Fine, what was the total amount? I didn’t send it to get a better review, I did it to be Done with them.
I don’t think there’s anything I could do to prove me and my family were not involved in the loss. You can’t prove a negative. All that could happen is on their end, they suddenly realize they forgot about an expense or they find it tucked in a shoe.
But since they’ve made their decision that it wasn’t them, I don’t think they are looking too hard.
I’m hoping my next guests, who used to live in my neighborhood, will either be less distrustful or better at keeping their valuables on their persons.
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That’s a good point. I’m sure this is really weighing on you. Try not to dwell on it too much. I do the same thing and it’s hard to let it go but it’s the healthiest thing to do. One bad review won’t affect you much especially in the long run. It’s kind of like Amazon product reviews. You read all these great reviews and then one bad one. You tend to think the one bad review is wrong. Ultimately, these people were responsible for not keeping their possessions safely secured. As hosts, if we left money lying around carelessly and it wound up missing, who’s fault would it be?
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Ahh even based on the “nice gesture” how she said it I wouldn’t give them
The rest . But what’s done is done and the important thing if it makes you feel like you sone the right thing then it’s all good.
And don’t worry about this review so much. These reviews hold some
Hosts hostages. It shouldn’t be like this. We do our jobs good and we put so much effort and heart into this hosting business . I am a superhost for the past 2 terms and 97% of my reviews are 5*. Sometime I get guest’s who give me 1* on cleanliness or other issues and I am not shy to answer them publicly what I think of them.
I had mother and daughter staying recently who gave 2* overall. I didnot review them unfortunately because I was very busy and overlooked it. They stayed in my pool house all by themselves renting only a room. Started cooking bacon around 11 pm and other things though I warned about a big group coming next day and please keep everything super clean as I already prepared the house for this group.
Then she wrote that she saw some rat poop and roaches.
I immediately called my pest control guy and said that this the review I got.
He went to the house and said: Yana, these people are liars. There is no sign of rats or roaches at the house. It’s impossible because we treat the house every month.
Then I sent text meaaages to other guests asking if they saw any roaches and all of them said NO we never saw a bug in the house .
I trashed her so badly in my answer. I described how they cooked meat on a vegeterian kitchen, how they didnot take their shoes off , how they wanted me to heat up a pool for them paying 45$ for their room, and what liers they are . Hope next hosts see this correspondence and will never let them rent again.
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I agree! And so many hosts don’t write reviews for bad guests because they are afraid of retaliation or provoking a review. Meanwhile the bad guests keep renting. I have IB and it would have to be a really awful review for me to say I was not comfortable and cancel. And I have so many bookings with only a day or two notice I don’t always make time to look up past reviews. I do like that they are now show the guest’s star rating so those are important.
The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons.
(Somehow I had the impression that came from “The Vicar of Wakefield” (a fine work). But it seems that’s not the case.)
Random extract from TWOW:
But previously I should have mentioned the very impolite behaviour of Mr Burchell, who, during this discourse, sate with his face turned to the fire, and at the conclusion of every sentence would cry out FUDGE! an expression which displeased us all, and in some measure damped the rising spirit of the conversation.
For some reason, that one stuck in my mind from when I last read it.
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Just got the “we know 4.4 doesn’t sound bad, but it puts you in the bottom 10% of hosts” email from airbnb.
It’s really hard to put this review/guest behind me when I keep getting “helpful” reminders from the platform.
Going to wait on the merlot until I get a good review again. (I was so looking forward to November, when my 2 star review ages out, but now I get to restart that clock)
I’m ok, mostly, just venting here so my sister doesn’t get sick of me whining.
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And I’m in “like” jail, but assume I’ve liked all your responses, because i have.
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Wow, they really are charming people, aren’t they? I look forward to receiving such lovely emails if and when my rating drops.
Having said that, I’d try and avoid taking all this nonsense too seriously. Though I too have difficulty doing so. The aim should be to try to keep stress levels down. If possible, without the assistance of alcohol.
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It’s nice of them
To remind you that you are not terrific as they want you to be , but the fact is they are not our bosses. We are partners and this is what we need to keep in mind.
Though I do think that review system
Should exist. It in no way it should influence our behaviori as far as not speaking up and defend ourselves for false accusations .
reviews are important as we all look at reviews when we book . Butvyou can’t find a single business where 100% reviews are positive. If majority of your reviews are fine then this little
One you can ignore especially if it’s about a very specific incident .
Hi @Alia_Gee
Not to upset you further but for me, the review is the first one I see (I’m in the UK) focussing on your cat and the issue under discussion.
If it’s any consolation, as @KKC said, the review is really buried and says nothing negative until after you are forced to click for more. If I was just scanning reviews as a potential guest, I would have missed the negativity entirely. Also, the review wasn’t as bad as I had steeled myself for, so hopefully you’ll feel less of a sting than you fear. It’s so hard not to take these things personally because hosting is personal. You did the right thing in reviewing this guest as fairly and accurately as possible.
Now, on to bigger and better things! 
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Thanks. Our cat appears to be an interesting litmus test. People will give us 5 stars (or not) citing him for the reason a lot of the time.
I guess I’ll expect a dip in uk bookings. My poor husband last night said, “We’ll never host again!” … i hadn’t realized he cared so much, since this is “my” project.
So i showed him @KKC’s comment. (Thank you, Dusty!) And he calmed down a bit.
But he’s also thinking about diversifying our revenue streams more now (which I’ve been pushing for a while,) so it’s the thinnest of silver linings. (We don’t depend on Airbnb, but… It certainly helps)
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