I am pretty sure my guest was lying

the house was fairly clean after her stay. but it was pretty obvious that there were more than her fiancee and herself staying there. 10 towels for two people for 2 nights and both beds were used.she said they just had friends over after a day of skiing but it was pretty obvious they had stayed there.
the heat was turned up to 78 (i leave it at 68 and ask people to turn it down when they leave.
all the windows were left open.
her first reason for the open windows was that it was too hot in htere that they had found the heat turned up that high and they couldnt find the thermostat so they opended the windows.(no one has ever had a problem finding the thermostat) then later she said they opened them right before they left because the house smelled like smoke. (they had burned down a house across the street the day before and i had checked with her to make she she was ok with everything…thinking if need be i would refund her one night)
none of this sits well with me but i did give her an ok review as i did not have proof really but now i feel bad as i really would not want to host her again. and i really think she is a good liar.

I’m sorry to her about this experience of yours but why would you give her an OK review? You should have state the truth or at least the facts.

If you can’t prove there were more people there, you can’t use it. I had people using all my towels at the house and there were only 2 of them. And I have a camera so I know there were only 2. You know what I did? I left less towels.

Do you have anything in your House Rules where you can charge them for leaving heater on or anything else that they did?

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i ask that the heat not be turned up higher than 68 and that it be trurned down when they leave.

i did see two cars parked in front of the house on sunday morning. one from mass where she said she and her fiance were from and one from nj.

thank you …you are right!

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If you SAW 2 cars and you SAW that they spent the nigh you should open a resolution ticket and ask $ for the extra guest. A photo could help in case you took it.

I’m not sure what you could do about the heater. It should be mentioned in the House Rules that you give penalty. I say:
Lights, A/C, gas, or any flammables must be turned off while out for your fun day. (0 tolerance policy, will deduct from deposit up to 50$ a day! )

However, I wrote it to have them to be aware. I never really charged anyone.

You should open a resolution ticket.

Hi @Alison_Dodd

I know it’s something we say often on this forum, but why not install CCTV and then you can clearly see guests come and go.

Do you have it in your house rules that only guests who have booked and paid can be in your property.

Two things that make it easier to deal with troublesome guests.

I wish I had had this stated when I had the two clueless middle school teachers stay. They left all their fans on while gone, (including two that they had purchased and brought in the room without informing me) plus left the bbq unattended and smoking one night and set off the smoke alarm while cooking. It was partly them who caused me to remove the propane stove from the unit and put in a cooktop. Now I don’t have to worry about flammables except for the Q. Long way of saying That I like your wording and may steal it. :rofl:

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Hosts have to assume that guests are not going to read. We have the choice of charging accordingly or prevention.

With some issues, I charge accordingly. For example, some guests use the AC constantly during their stay set to ridiculously low temperatures and others hardly use it at all. But I assume that all guests are going to be of the first variety so ‘AC used at full strength’ is accounted for in my pricing. That’s a lot easier than expecting guests to do as requested - and it saves me the bother of doing the requesting.

Then there’s the prevention thing. Example; I really don’t care too much if guests sneak in a few extra people (as long as it’s a short stay) because it doesn’t add anything to my costs. I leave guests x number of towels and expect them to be used. There’s one roll of paper towel in the kitchen, three loo rolls in the bathroom and so on.There are no spares of anything (bedding, towels etc.) in the rentals.

P.S. @Alison_Dodd . Please, please leave accurate reviews of your guests for your fellow hosts. Thank you! :slight_smile:

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thank you jack…yes that is whati realized upset me. i did not give her an honest review and that is not fair to others.
i iwll never do that again.

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Thank you Alison!
…

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Is it enforceable though? We had a guest who lied and said he was the only one coming. Showed up with a car full of people (thankfully my husband was there to do laundry in the basement to witness.) Later even more guests show up and husband has to ask them to leave. So I charge the person for 2 extra guests (only $20 total) and he agrees to pay. It’s been weeks and still he hasn’t. All Airbnb does is say “do you have proof?”.

Did he agree on the platform? If not, you won’t get your money. You do have to have proof. In the future make sure to put the messages on the platform, make them pay immediately or their reservation gets cancelled. Or take cash on the spot.

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Yes, he agreed on the platform then didn’t pay. We also sent Airbnb photos of the additional guests showing up. Airbnb’s response was “It is so late at night, the guests won’t be able to find someplace else to stay.”

That’s ridiculous. Clearly we have to take matters into our own hands when possible.

I share your pain Alison - I frequently encounter lying guests and people knowingly breaking my house rules. 100% always leave an honest review - there is literally no other method to weed bad guests out of the community than for hosts to be honest about their experiences. Although its expensive, the Nest thermostat has more than already paid for itself by way of preventing me from calling the AC repairman 2 to 3 times year, as I was doing previously. Now with the Nest, I can lock the thermostat in a range that won’t allow guests to adjust the AC out of the range. My power bills are now relatively stable and zero issues with people breaking my AC from cranking it up and opening the windows. Try looking into getting a Nest, I’m sure you won’t regret it.

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Exactly the reason I eventually installed Ring door cams on all my properties. Despite my maids catching guests in person with more people, despite an obvious extra use of towels, bedding, etc. - Airbnb literally never enforced my extra guest fees until I started providing proof by way of pictures. Without pictures or video, its your word against theirs, and if they never admit to the guests in writting in the messages, then Airbnb will not back you up. Get a Ring door cam, all of mine have more than paid for themselves within 2 months of installing them.

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Does the Ring take pictures / video without the button being pushed? So for example: Booked guests enters, then more firends show up later, but door is left open for them and they don’t ring the bell. Will there still be record of them? And would we still receive notification that more people arrived? Thanks!

It’s up to you to create the settings that would allow this. Mine records based on motion sensor as well as physically pushing the door bell button. You can can adjust the motion sensor to a range that will cover the area in front of your door.

Thanks! I appreciate the info. There are so many different kinds and we are trying to research which would be best as we have 2 entrances for each unit of our duplex that needs covered.

In this case you’d probably miss the arrival. Ring only records for 30 seconds. And if you set it so that it’s very sensitive it will be going off all the time. At least that’s the case with mine which is a 1st gen. The new ones are supposed to be better in a number of ways. I think it’s worth investing in hardwired cams that record 24/7 if you have a separate place and you aren’t living onsite.