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I’m a little confused. I’ve read that a guest can change their review in response to a bad review. But once they leave a review isn’t that it? Oh wait, they can reply to a review, is that what everyone is referring to? We had guests who the minute they checked in were giving me attitude and seemed annoyed with our house rules (I remind them of a few of them when they check in - please no shoes in the bedroom, turn the heat down when you leave for the day). And, unfortunately we had two things go wrong that I"m sure they will ding us for - the TV remote wasn’t working and there was a spider in the suite.
Anyway, based on their attitude and the two things that went wrong I’m expecting a bad review. They weren’t terrible guest, but certainly not pleasant and I would not want them back. So, I was hoping to just not write a review to avoid their review being posted, but then I read that if I don’t review them their review can post after the 14 days.
One last question. I’ve seen people say to wait until the last minute to post a review. is that so they can’t respond to it? Because, unless I’m mistaken they can’t change their review. Thanks for your help.
Yes, their review will post whether you review them or not. The idea of waiting is for them to not be prompted with the email that says “tallinseattle left you a review, see what they said.”
Have you had a read through Airbnb Help Centre as yet. If not have a look through it answers lots of these FAQ type questions including how the review system works.
I will say it again - read the manual. Airbnb has a reasonably detailed explanation of how Airbnb works. On their website. It’s after all in their interest too for users to know how to use it properly.
A forum like this is useful for advanced or unique situations, but to have to explain basics to every new user may not be productive.
I must admit to being on the side of being annoyed by the very very basic questions. To me it’s just laziness. They need to be looking at the help center before coming here. So much is answered by the Airbnb FAQs. (Not the ABB forum)… If they don’t know what happens if a guest cancels or they are mystified by how to add a photo, then they are definitely NOT ready for prime time hosting.
I’m afraid I’m not on the helpful side of answering the newbies’ questions on the basic stuff. I’ve occasionally felt the pull to participate, if only to lessen the burden of those that do…but so far I’ve managed to avoid it. It’s so much easier to do what was suggested earlier…just scroll on by.
It’s directed at you and others on this thread and on others.
Could you elaborate on how this technique works to achieve your goal? If a new poster comes to the forum and is told to go away that will, I suppose, deter them from asking any more questions. It may deter them from returning to the forum. But that isn’t going deter other new posters from coming to the forum with their beginner questions.
I’m annoyed too! Exaggerated eye roll annoyed! It’s so tiresome to answer the same question over and over. But it is what it is. I was on a Rover hosts facebook page. It was appalling how many incompetent, irresponsible people are watching other people’s dogs. At first I tried to be helpful for the sake of the dogs if nothing else but I eventually had to leave that page. Luckily after a bunch of us left the moderators made an Advanced Rover sitter page.
Another thing I see is someone asks a question and several people answer, “I don’t know.” I don’t get that either.
Sometime it’s not enough to read the manual, especially for those who’s English is not first language. Sometimes it’s just much easier to ask and get and answer.
I had the same thing on TA when I joined. I was referred by people to do research. Instead of just answering me they were lecturing me on how to not ask annoying questions.
If they didnot want to answer why not just leave my question ingnored instead of lecturing me and telling me that they are smarter than I am.
I get tons of questions from my guests before booking about "silliest " things. I just got a 2 months long wonderful guest who didnot even know the difference between private room and entire space. He is no idea also that there is such a thing as private bathroom and was pleasantly surprised .
If I send him to read the manual he wouldn’t even book through me probably.
I agree with @Yana. If you think a question is too basic just don’t chime in. There are plenty of others who are happy to answer the question. There is no need to post just to make someone feel bad for asking a question.
The only questions that irritate me are when the poster poses a question, but what they really want is for everyone to tell them that they were right and the guest was wrong.
Agree but I guess I really don’t know why new hosts come here asking for help to set up a listing. If they can’t even do that, are they really ready to host?
I personally am not going to take the time to answer those kinds of questions.
So sorry to have asked a basic question. I had tried searching for the answer both in airbnb help and in the topics in this forum. If it bothers you to answer don’t do it.
I read it and did not find the answer. I also searched the forum for the answer and got conflicting information. So sorry to have troubled you. There is misinformation or confusing information on this forum so I was hoping to get a clear answer.
If you search ‘leaving a review at the last minute’ it does come up with posts that explain. But basically:
The idea behind leaving a guest a review at the last minute is (as @KKC said) they won’t receive the prompt email from Airbnb that says ‘TallinSeattle left you a review, now leave one for her to see what she said!’. So by leaving a last minute review we’re hoping the guest will just forget to leave one in time and miss their opportunity altogether. The idea being that a bad guest KNOWS they’ve been a bad guest, so if they see you’ve left one they’ll assume it’s negative, and will leave you a negative one in return (when in reality we have a double-blind situation and they don’t get to see what you’ve written until their review has also been posted). So it’s not a fail-safe way of ensuring you don’t get a bad review, but many times it does work.
Another advantage of leaving it until the last minute is any other reviews you receive in that 14 day period will appear on your profile before your bad guest review (should they choose to leave one), essentially burying it a little bit.
As for responses to reviews: yes, your guest may respond to the review on their profile. But don’t worry about that, your potential guests won’t see it unless they’re digging really deep. And most likely it will just appear to be super defensive anyway.
If I have an issue with the guest and need to make a claim I always wait until they review me before putting in the claim request so that their review won’t reflect the problem. However I recently got caught out and I think this is very important for hosts to know.
The guest has 48 hours after writing their review to edit it.
This has changed my handling of guests and reviews considerably as when the guest understood I was contacting her for payment for damage she totally altered her review.
They can only alter the review during that time frame IF you haven’t written and submitted your review. Once you submit a review, everything is locked.
