We are adding a pool this summer and I noticed that some hosts charge extra for pool heating, running the pool heater during the stay. Other extra services are a mid-stay cleaning and bed change, etc.
Since there is no way, that I have seen, to collect this fee throught the AirBNB site, do most hosts just get the credit card information and charge it that way? I have a Square account but that seems clunky. Maybe send the funds through Paypal. I don’t know. Technology keeps changing and I am not up on the latest ways to collect funds from individuals. Any thoughts.
You need to add costs to your listing (can’t remember where) and collect through the Resolution Centre, @Victoria_Dolci
Don’t try to charge extra for pool use. That’s just silly. Rather, increase your nightly rate a bit. You now have an amenity that others in your current price range do not, therefore you are justified in raising you price a bit above the others.
BTW You do not want to try and just bring a pool up to temperature for someone’s 3 day visit. Water takes quite some time to go up 3 degrees, and almost no time to go down 5 degrees when the heater is turned off. You want to set the temperature and let the heater do its job. Recommended temperature is 84F, btw.
If you feel you simply must charge for a mid-stay cleaning and linen change, then you’ll have to decide how long of a stay needs mid-stay corrections, and charge more right up front when the guest is inquiring/booking for that number of nights or more. Yep – a pain in the tail. Again, if you get a lot of ‘longer’ stays, simply adjust your overall daily rate up a bit; it’s less hassle in the long run. You can then, in your description, say something like “Stays of more than X nights include a free mid-stay cleaning and linen change.”
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Regarding the pool heater, I don’t know anything about your climate, and you likely haven’t finalized your pool design or choice of heater, but I mostly agree with Ken. The problem with pool heating is that it can take a long time to heat it up. You would potentially need to start heating your pool 3 days before your guests check-in, so it might be better to keep it heated all the time. How often guests want to use it is going to determine the most efficient way to heat the pool, but you don’t know how often they will want to use it and you don’t now how charging extra might change that.
Also regarding the linen change, depending on the listing and location, etc., you may want to require at least a weekly linen change just so that you can keep an eye on things.
Anyway, @Helsi 's right that you should collect all guest payments through the resolution center. It’s not great, but keeping payments on the platform is better. Of course, if you are listing on multiple platforms, then you may still need another payment method.
I would think that you could request the extra payments through the resolution center. You simply send a request for extra funds and when guests agrees, Airbnb charges it to their credit card and sends you the payment.
Great ideas. I think you are right about charging extra for pool heating. We are in Florida and it gets down to the 40’s sometimes so the heater will be working hard to keep up. I can’t imagine anyone wanting to swim when it is in the 40’s but they do.
Good idea about the free mid stay cleaning. Probably would offer it after 2 weeks.
Mid Stay cleans work for me, as a host I can check up on the state of the property and keep my linens white.
I just had a 2 week stay book. My longest yet. I took the booking on the condition they let me do a mid stay linen change. My sheets are white and letting them go for 2 weeks would have made them “off white”. Even 8 sleeps is too long on a set of white hotel quality sheets.
I’m in FL too – Fort Myers. Our pool is old style passive solar heat – pool water pumped up to the roof, through black pipe under black mesh, then back to the pool. You KNOW how cold it’s been the last couple night… I checked pool temp this afternoon – 84F. Hard to beat that!!! Not hard down here to keep a pool up to reasonable temps as long as the heater isn’t on/off/on/off. Just let it run and do it’s thing.
We just figure pool privileges are part of what guests are paying for, whether they use it or not is up to them. There’s a house a couple blocks away about the same size as ours. Their listing in a room in the house. Ours is a detached cabana. They have nothing for breakfast except coffee. We offer choice of a dozen full cooked breakfasts. They charge $50 a night in Season. We charge $99 a night. We’re booked. They aren’t.
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@Victoria_Dolci. I was thinking about this also. A neighbor of ours did something similar to the below link (copper tube design) for their pool in New York state back in the 1980s and used his pool year round without active heating.
Combine this concept with a small pump and solar panel and there is no operating cost at all.
Anyone reasonably handy can build one in 4-8 hours. Parts are only $150-200. Then, you will have a hot pool all winter long making you money.
More ideas follow - there are a lot of ways to do this. If you want to keep it hidden, install it on a nearby shed roof or behind a fence / hedge / etc:
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Ours uses the pump which is already there as the filter pump. It takes water from the pool, runs it through the pool filter, and then up to the roof for heating before going back to the pool. The piping to the roof has a 3-way value so you can control how much water goes up to be heated – none, half, and full. We run half or none in the summer, and full in the winter. You DO want black pipe and a black cover. Black is heat absorbent, giving you an added boost of temperature.
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@KenH I’m south of Tampa and it’s been cloudy so the passive solar heating has been working very hard to get to 77. I’m hoping that it gets warmer this week.
@Victoria_Dolci makae sure your pool has a cover and a reel or retraction system. Not only does it help heat the pool, it keeps debris out. I got a clear one this last year and that heats the pool up too. When I cleaned it last year, in 20 minutes it burned the lawn!
I have a private room/bath in my home and price according to the most popular host, who doesn’t have a pool and has a similar setup. We’re both a little higher than anyone else in the neighborhood, but we’re also solidly booked and they aren’t for shared homes. She and I are always tweaking our listings according to the other one. The one down the block with a pool but a bath that is in the middle of the house and the host has dogs and kids charges $10 more a night and is always open. Go figure.
Raise your rates $5-$10 per night. Get solar for the pool And enjoy!
If I have a guest for any stay over 6 days, I change the sheets and check the towels after 4 days. It’s hot and humid here and towels go off, so I’ve just changed them out. Plus linens get icky after a week. Ugh. So I do a mid-stay change, especially during the summer.
I have a clear cover - did some research after the blue one finally gave up the ghost and man, after it burned the lawn in 20 minutes during a hosing off, and the blue one never did, I’m a believer that the UV going through the clear really works. Of course, black hides the dirt, pollen…
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Another Floridian here and agreeing with those who believe that charging extra for the pool isn’t a good way to go. Put your prices up accordingly. Then all guests have the use of the pool. It sounds much too complex to heat the pool for some guests and not others, charge some extra and not others…
And how would you handle it if guests who haven’t paid for pool use use the pool? You might not think that they’ll blame you (in reviews if you’re unlucky) if it’s cold, but speaking as someone who had a guest complaining to me that the ocean wasn’t blue enough, they will.
If you try to charge for mid-stay cleaning the chances are good that you’ll have guests who blithely refuse the service and then you find that you’re left with horrible linens, stained towels and a dirty rental. Remember that the mid-stay clean is for your benefit more than theirs.
Guests hate to be nickeled and dimed. Even if you say in the listing that there are extra charges for various things, guests still won’t like it when they are charged. Grumpy guests = bad reviews and no referrals or repeats.
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You’ve assimilated!!! 
The VRBO across the canal has a heat exchange pool heater and no cover. Guests heat on-demand and I can only imagine the horror of those electric bills!
You will be unlucky. Grumpy guests. ugh.
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@casailinglady – you’re right – I forgot to mention the insulated cover and roller-bar. The one for our pool runs about $125. We keep the cover on when night-time lows are cooler than 78F or thereabouts , and show guests how to roll/unroll it (works better with 2 people). There are good covers and no so good covers. Our last one was clear and a major pain as the ‘bubbles’ started breaking after the second season and we spent 'way too much time netting floating bits of plastic. Our current cover is much better – Gold colored in the water side, dark blue heat absorbent on the surface.
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Agree 100%.
I just did one yesterday. Yes, I did a bedding change.
Had full instructions from OH on how it should be done. Iron bottom sheet on bed etc.
Walked in, stripped bed and guest said “can I help?”. No no, all’s good says I. He didn’t take no for an answer, both of us did the bedding and he sorted out the towels.
I like guests like that.
JF
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where did you find that for $125? Mind you, my pool is 14x32, so covers can get $$$$. So far, so good, I got mine on Amazon.
That looks great. My husband can make that for both our pool and the Air pool.
If it were me I would build several small ones using 50 foot copper coils each, to have the option to add or remove units during the season.