Practically, Can You Prevent a Blocked Guest from Entering Property under a Reservation from Unblocked Guest?

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Suppose you want to prevent a guest from ever entering your property again. Also suppose that the guest is determined to come back and has an unblocked family member/other make the reservation.

I suppose the Host could try to prevent that from happening by:

  1. Writing now on the platform that the guest cannot enter the property again, even if invited or as a guest of any reservation,
  2. Then blocking the guest,
  3. Adding to rules something like: “Blocked guests cannot enter the property. If they do so the reservation is subject to immediate cancellation without any refund and all guests in the reservation ejected from the property.”

I suppose this would work and certainly deter such reservation.

What do you think?

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At age 64.8 I have no time for speculation on what if’s that are unlikely to happen. That said I firmly believe that no amount of words would ever prevent someone from doing this if they were determined to do so.

I waste a lot of time but who has time for these flights of fancy?

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This seems like a veeerrrrry specific scenario. Care to share? (Bizarre that this bad guest is super determined to return – is it so they can finally get their chance to write a bad review?)

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LOL. Maybe this IS a flight of fancy and I have too much time on my hands.

I was just thinking of that last guest who gave us a ‘4’ and complained about the grill in a very incomplete and unfair way. I did get the feeling that this guest was a little strange, and they said something about wanting to return. We have no trouble booking in summer, when they’re likely to return, and I would not like to see this guest return. I also just have the feeling that if she figured out I blocked her (unlikely) she’d get around it, just to do so.

My concerns about the question I posted are:

  1. I think she might get someone to rebook just to dare me. She has that kind of energy. Would I really eject her? Call the police? How would they really respond (though they ‘should’ honor the ejection as the guests are not tenants)? AND really would I want this kind of negativity?? I don’t know that I would really follow through, although I might feel forced to so as to prevent a retaliatory review.

  2. Would posting the changes to the house rules be off-putting to potential guests?

So I’m inclined not to do this but curious what folks here would say, in addition to having too much time on my hands!

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As guests don’t read and as previously discussed, you like to write wordy things, I really cant see the point…how would you know it was a previously blocked guest?

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I might suspect if the guest had the same last name. Regardless, if the guest goes through the Orientation (most all do) I would recognize her.

As for reading, I would send her a message on the platform telling her that she is not authorized to enter the property again, whether she booked the reservation or was a guest or invitee of a registered guest. Further if she somehow entered the property she would be ejected along with the other guests and the reservation would be canceled without refund. I think that is succinct enough and targeted that when she eventually reads the message she would understand it.

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I think you’re reacting a bit too strongly.

I’m sure some of the hosts here would accept this guest back. I would.

Maybe take a day or two to think about it. I suggest you just let it go.

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Of course I’ll think about it, This is just kind of a thought experiment, not a decision.

I likely will let it go, am just thinking through the possibilities along the way.

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Quite possibly. There are two sides to every story. If she wants to come back, she has a reason. I’d like to hear it.

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Here’s what I do so that I know that only the people registered are the people staying.

  1. Don’t allow 3rd Party Bookings.

  2. Only allow registered guests on property - no visitors

  3. Require (it’s in my house rules and IB info) that the booking person and guests must provide full name, age, current mailing address and if the booking guest, their photo without sunglasses or hat much be in profile pix and all other guests must provide a selfie.

  4. Require the guest that booked be the first person to check in.

Then check your cameras to confirm.

I know many of the other hosts on this forum might think this is overkill but I live alone on the first floor with an alarm and a dog. I don’t go out of my way to meet the guests anymore but try to say hello at least once.

Since I added the above rules, I no longer have surprise guests checking in.

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In my country the police would laugh in your face if you asked them to interfere with a business matter.

They are there to deal with crimes and protect the public.

Why should they ‘honour the ejection’ it’s a civil matter. Your job as the business owner to enforce.

(Having said that in the US I understand sometimes your police forces take a different view).

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I did. She was a traveling nurse. The written review said something like “Great place, I’ll be coming back.” But 4 stars. That was about 6 years ago, maybe now I’d be less inclined to do that. But also a 4 star review doesn’t affect my overall rating (I probably had 400+ reviews at the time) the way it does for someone with 20+ reviews.

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You might be right as to what the police would do here. I don’t know.

But they are not tenants but guests and should leave when asked to leave. The civil matter would be whatever rights the guests have to press against the Host for the ejection.

Imagine the following. You invite someone over to dinner. They refuse to leave. Would the police agree to eject them if they refused? They should. The fact that these guests paid might give them contractual rights against the Host but they should leave, as they are guests. That’s my understanding.

As a practical matter the police might be more likely to intervene if the Host says that they are prepared to use force to get them to leave.

Or imagine someone goes to a hotel and violates a hotel rule that causes the Hotel to ask them to leave. The guest refuses to leave. The police ‘should’ assist with the ejection.

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I have. One guest left 5 stars for everything and 4 total. I ABB Messaged her and asked why the 4 star review and she said because of the ABB fees. When I explained the ABB fees for both guests and hosts, she apologized, booked again (she was moving here), and gave a glowing review. Now I explain the fees and ABB vagaries to newbies.

But not this one: Another guest came during spring break and there’s a ton of construction - ALL explained several times in Messenger. She comes from a spring break destination, so I was shocked by her reasons. I pointed out - privately - that she should have known better and that construction and tourists were out of my control. I did not respond to her review or mention the traffic. She had that aging sorority girl vibe and high maintenance during her stay.

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On another platform, we had a guest try to book, and due to an unusual name given, I profiled him and got really scared due to felony violent activity found on net. Girlfriend then tried to book…It became aclusterf,.,… Which eventually I owned, having declined and being unable to explain myself. We were able to part ways amicably through further reasonable conversation, (which this person, trust me did not deserve,) without having to host them. I had notified the OTA and they had either flagged him unable to book my site, or removed him from their platform due to my calls to them.

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Are you serious? Of course not. Police in most places would only get involved if there was some domestic violence, or other crime or threat going on. It isn’t the job of the police to make people do what other people want them to.

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I’m totally serious.

The guests not leaving when the homeowner asked IS a crime, criminal trespass.

If you invite someone to dinner and they refuse to leave, do you think you do not have recourse with the police??

You might say, ‘Well, this is different. They paid to stay.’ I respond ‘Let them sue me then. They are not tenants. They are guests and I can eject them from my home. If they want to sue me or if I have violated Airbnb terms in any way, those are separate and civil matters.’

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Am I the only one who is trying to follow this and thinking that there is something (or a lot of things) left out of this?

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LOL. I am often accused of overthinking things, considering hypotheticals.

I wouldn’t put it past this guest to do something confrontational. She was a little strange and had a kind of confrontational energy. So IF I told her she was not welcome to return I think that would be a trigger for her. If I really didn’t want her to return the best thing to do would be to block her. She would therefore not see the listing as available and that would likely be the end of that.

But that line of thinking did get me thinking how could I move from ‘likely’ to ‘guarantee.’ I’m a player of games. I used to play chess, now Civ V and these games require you to think through the possibilities.

Yes, you got it.

Anyway, I’m not sure I’ll do anything.

BUT I think this was useful if nothing more than for the trespass discussion that I think surprised some people. IF you do need to eject a guest you will likely need to understand the law indoor jurisdiction and speak it confidently to the police so that they feel that they must act.

I think It is VERY important to have thought through any ejection scenarios because the Host’s confidence will likely carry the day.

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Well, several of us have been huddling, talking off-line, conspiratoralizing, and we’re thinking it’s you, just you.

Have you often felt ‘left out’?

Talk to us.

Just kidding, of course. Are my thinking paths that weird??

[Don’t answer! I was normal before joining this forum.]

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