Honeymoon period over - knocked on value

And Beachy Head - not beachy at all!

2 Likes

Yes I had a bad experience recently. Took me ages to get over the feelings of rage and frustration that I could not bawl them out myself. It gets easier with time and experience.

3 Likes

It does indeed! That’s why so many people bail - it’s not the easy money/make friends dream they thought it was. Ya gotta be tough!! :smile:

1 Like

Absolutely on point. I only do extras now because I WANT to and therefore don’t expect kudos…so when I get them, it’s nice…It takes awhile to get to this place in your hosting experience tho! It’ll happen, just keep doing what you WANT and let the rest go…Good luck!

This is the very reason I do not read my reviews. Some people think they are doing you a favor with comments like this. I do the best that I can, but I know some people will say negative things. The comments used to cause me a lot of anxiety. I am much happier not reading the reviews. It makes the experience more fun for me.

1 Like

What if you get some constructive feedback? I have twice received some valuable feedback from guests’ private review comments. Once was about a Roku remote not working and the other was about a bathtub draining slowly. Both were 5-star reviews, but if I hadn’t read the reviews, it could’ve led to a bad review by a subsequent guests.

Or some Kudos? I guess it’s just me but I can’t imagine having more reviews that cause anxiety than ones that make me feel like I’m the greatest host ever. But Rod does what he has to do.

I’ve read tens of thousands of posts on this forum and rod is the only host who has ever reported not reading his reviews.

@Cafrin So… I just received my worst review ever today. I was completely blindsided because the guest was really nice and we had some excellent interaction. Three stars for everything except communication. It does still sting even after all this time hosting. She said my house smelled of cat :fearful:
She had a point. There’s a new cat in the neighbourhood and a turf war is going on. But the review was kind of mean. Anyway, my saturday night has been spent scrubbing everything with bleach. My son actually came down to say is there a gas leak, everything smells so weird!
So yeah, there’s always all the odd guest who will complain about something random. But then again, it can be a wake-up call.

3* on everything bar communication? Then more shame on her for not mentioning any of HER other issues if the communication was so good. I understand that the review process can flag up issues, but pity that some guests wait until then to raise concerns. (I’m not sure what the solution is about the cat turf war - We live in a farming area so we get different smells! :laughing:)

Whenever I stay in an AirBnB I find a checkout time of 10am slightly annoying. I expect a minimum of 11am if not 12 noon. Of course one can see that before booking but some times one oversees that and the whole, just ask and we can accommodate an hour is the same, unnecessary annoying.

A check out time of 10 am is annoying…really?
My 5 bed entire house takes a team of 2, 4 hours to turn over for a check in at 2pm. How would you suggest we do it to suit your preferences?

That’s the thing - if I’m on vacation somewhere I find 10am check-out annoying, that’s how it is. How you (or any other host) deals with the logistics is not my concern really. A guest doesn’t think like that. I’m also hosting and am aware of the conundrum, still I expect minimum 11am.

I’ve found a great number of listings have a check out time of 10 am. it’s one of the trade offs for saving a lot of money I suppose. The great thing about Airbnb is that there are so many listings that no one should have to choose a listing with a 10 am check out.

What I find slightly annoying are guests who don’t read the listing and then expect the host to change to accommodate them.

5 Likes

I said that before: I just wish Airbnb would finally allow an easy filter for Check-In times.

That would give my listings quite a boost with flexible Check-In and Check-Out times.

1 Like

There’s a handy little exercise that Airbnb hosts can undertake if ever they worry about, or actually get, a bad review.

Think about your very favourite book in the whole world - the book you’ve read over and over again, the one that you’d take to a desert island if you could only rescue one book from your sinking yacht.

Find the book on Amazon. Think about what a wonderful book it is and why you love it. When you get to the page see how many reviews it has - note that other people love the book too (1422 on the case on my personal favourite for example)

Then notice that they’re not all 5 star. Note that you can filter so you see only the bad reviews. Read a few.

Now you know that it’s a GREAT book. And you know that the people who have only given it one star are complete and utter MORONS, right? (145 in the case of my favourite book). They are obviously totally, completely, unquestionably wrong.

But that book, your very favourite book in all the world, gets bad reviews too. It’s not just Airbnb hosts :slight_smile:

10 Likes

I find that MUCH more than slightly annoying, personally. But I guess I have to deal with it in order to earn their money.

2 Likes

Genius approach!!! Bravo!

1 Like

I have flexible check-in and noon check out. Flexible because I never know what will be going on the day someone wants to check-in and try my best to accommodate whatever that is.

I had one 3 star review (or maybe even 2, I can’t remember) who complained about it in the public review. When she booked I had guests checking out at noon and asked if 6pm check-in would work for her and she said yes. No issue…until the review. If she had wanted something different she should have said so. Just because I asked about 6 doesn’t mean that was all that was available. I could have it turned over in 4 hours if necessary (less if previous guests are super clean) but she never asked. Can’t please everyone all the time. Btw, this is the same woman who constantly complained of cold showers and when I would arrive she had the hot water heater turned off. Of course, she complained about that in the public review, too. Thankfully she canceled her second trip that she had already booked with me. Marked me a 1 or 2 for communication for communicating too much. I would always follow up to ask if she had hot water and she would never respond.

I’ve been hosting for a year now and there are always a few random guests that knock me on value–I think they’re just hard to satisfy; also a lot of people who are new to airbnb seem on average to give lower ratings–I suspect they just don’t know what is the market average.

Also, I BELIEVE a lot of guests don’t realize that the other star ratings (value, location, cleanliness, etc.) is public? Because as a traveller and when I rate hosts, once I get to those ratings, Airbnb states something like, “only hosts can see this”, so maybe they don’t try to be as nice. One time I had someone give me 4 stars on value because “there wasn’t enough wildlife” haha I’m still a little upset about this when I think about it, but it’s also kind of funny!

I now batch my reviews so that when I read guest reviews I do it all at once (saves me anxiety throughout the rest of the week)!

2 Likes

Personally, Joan, I’ve always felt the White Cliffs could do with a bit of bleach …

3 Likes