My way of rating guests

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There has been a lot of discussion about getting rated and rating.

I the beginning like most hosts I was pretty easy on the guests, but looking at how guests rate us. We stopped being nice.
Also we found that this was the only way to help other hosts, and to reduce people that can use instant book.

This is how we do it now:

Guest start out with a 4 star, and only guests who give the little extra get 5 stars.
Guests expect us to go the extra mile for them, we expect them to do the same if they want 5 stars.

Cleanliness/Hygene:

5 stars: you took out the trash, took of the bedding
4 stars: normal
3 stars: not done dishes, leave food in fridge
2 stars: trash everywhere

Communication:

5 stars: proactive on communication about arrival time or delays.
4 stars: normal communication
3-2 stars: turn up late or early without notice. (ringing our doorbel in the middel of the night)

Houserules:

5 stars: friendly and polite, ask if you want something. Show they respect out place.
4 stars: normal behavior
3 stars: noisy, leaving garbage, no control over kids.
2 stars: complaints/remarks from other guests

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You are right.

I think I am too nice with guests rating.

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Does it even matter what you rate the guests? The only thing that seems to have bearing on future booking requests in an IB situation is the Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down.

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@felixcat you don’t look at your guest’s ratings/reviews?

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@felixcat on another thread @Faheem posted a screenshot of a new wording for instant book where guests will need an average of 4.5 stars to be able to IB. I don’t have that yet, it must be in a beta testing

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That’s a pretty good rating system, but to be useful it would need to be public. Have you published this, or are you planning to publish it, on your listing? I’m tempted to borrow it for my listing - can I? :slight_smile:

I just did a review for my just departed guests, and they certainly would have got much lower reviews if I had been using your system. One thing that did bother me a bit is that they parked dishes containing uneaten food by the kitchen sink. I don’t necessarily expect people to wash up and put stuff away, but it’s highly desirable (particularly in India, and a hot place like Bombay) to throw away uneaten food in the rubbish bin, and rinse out the dishes. That way it doesn’t attract vermin, at least. I would have expected Indians to know that already, but apparently not.

So, by your rating, they’d have got a 3 for cleanliness, probably. Though I don’t know if I would have the stones to actually give a guest 3 stars. :slight_smile:

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I hope everyone looking to lower the grades of their guests makes the expectations clear. People are NOT mind readers. @Chris have your guests reacted to your grading scale? Have you tweaked it after getting their feedback? I was just in an ABB where they wanted the bed stripped of linens and towels on the floor. On thie forum I read hosts complaining of exactly those things being done. Now when I specifically tell a guest to do something in the guest guide (Turn lights out when you leave) and they don’t, I mark them down a star on my review.

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+1 on clearly communicating expectations. It’s just as well we cannot read each others minds. If we could, we would not survive long as a species. :slight_smile:

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You are right, people are not mindreaders But same goes for us hosts, we need to get into guests minds when we make the listing, make sure they read properly and there is no misunderstanding. (We even need to check for discrepancies between Browser and App version of AirBnB but that is a subject for another thread)

But on the other hand, it seems the latest generation of guests expect 5 star hotel service, for a hostel price.
Most of the first time guests have a low score, if I check the room and point them to the house/cleaning rules they answer: “I did not read them, this is my first time using AirBnB…”

We do not aks for a separate cleaning fee, and in my houserules I explain that we want to keep the prices affordable but that we expect the guest to do some basic things like removing and sorting trash and do the dishes. They do not have to vacuum or clean the bathroom.

And no, I have not seen any reaction on our reviews. It seems they don’t care.
I think only 10-15% of my guests is really a 5 star guest with the real AirBnB mindset, the rest is the ‘I-want-a-cheap-alternative-for-a-hotel’ type of guest.

Also I noticed that my 5 star guests are mostly long time AirBnB users with plenty of good reviews.

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I when get a booking request I always read the profile and read the reviews.

And for an instant book setting at my place guest needs to have a 4,5 - 5 star average.

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Locally, the only option is to accept only guests with a Thumbs Up from prior hosts or to have no requirement at all. Star ratings aren’t a factor as of now.

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I read the reviews, but they tend to be overly inflated. Often, there is a review for the individual traveler paying for the booking, but all bets are off when a party of 8 shows up.

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These are my options:

IB.JPG843×981 60.5 KB

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That’s useful. Hopefully it will roll out to everyone soon. As of now, the options are Anyone or Guests Recommended by Previous Hosts.

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It just shows how all hosts are different. I don’t mind if they don’t take out the trash, it only takes me a couple of minutes. I don’t want guests to strip the bed, I don’t mind doing a few dishes and I love it when they leave food that I can eat.

But I ADORE guests who clean the bathroom :slight_smile:

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@Chris This isn’t standard for everyone, here in the UK it’s this atm

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I agree. I think this rating makes sense and I am way too lenient in my ratings, as well.

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A “couple of minutes” here a couple of minutes there, I you count all those minutes together it is a lot. Especially if I have multiple rooms to clean.
I am not doing this for fun, I run a business, I have no personell. Time spend on cleaning, is time I cannot spend on anything else, spending time with my other guests for example.

If they leave food in that is still sealed, I have no problem with that. Especially when they tell us they left it.
But most of the time they leave open half empty packages, they go straight in the bin.

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I have the same feeling, also with the reviews I write.

As other hosts don’t see rating, what do you think of seting something similar with the tone of reviews as a way of encoding rating? For example:

Enthusiastic and grateful = 5 stars
Descriptive and neutral = 4 stars
Neutral and short = 3, 2 stars

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I wish I could set this, but it seems we don’t have this option in my country, Spain! I just can set IB for people that match Airbnb requirements or people that, besides this, are recommended by other hosts -the same than UK. Which country is yours?