I use to be an Airbnb Host a few years ago and my experiences were fine. I just started again and paid all County fees, spent a great deal of money getting my house ready and have 6 Reservations. My problem is with this first Reservation. The Reservation was made by a Dad, who it turns out made the Reservation for his married daughter, husband and 5 Children. This Dad and his wife flew into my city also the same day the Daughter and her family did this last Thursday but is staying with a relative. I learned that I should of demanded the Reservation be made in the Daughter’s name. The Dad said that only 4 of the children would be at my house and one would stay with her Aunt. Second mistake, they said this because there is an extra charge per day for the 7th person!
This Daughter has been passive aggressive in being demanding from the onset. We have had a great deal of rain and my Yard Guy didn’t want to rake leaves until it stopped and dried up some. This Daughter wanted to let her younger 2 children out to play in the backyard-I told her it was muddy and full of wet leaves, and my Yard Guy would be cleaning it soon. She pushed it get done right away. She arrived late Thursday and I got another Yard Guy to come yesterday, Saturday. The yards have grass, but it is Winter and there is still muddy areas after he did a good job cleaning and racking the wet leaves!!
I list 3 Bedrooms with a Queen Bed in every bedroom and the Couch can be used to sleep on. She texted asking if there was a pull-out bed after she had been in the house for a day- she knows there is no pull-out bed!
WE provide Wifi with Verizon which is Wireless, and have a Jet Pack that services 5 Devices. There is 15gb of high speed data and then “unlimited” slower speed gb if the 15gb are used. We used this Jet Pack previously when we rented our house with airbnb about 20 times…no problem, and no one ever used all the high speed up in such a short time. Verizon notified me yesterday that I had reached the limit of high speed data within 48 hours!!
Verizon told me people in the house were Not using their Smart Phones data but using Social Media from the Jet Pack. Verizon said it wasn’t for movies but Face Time, Instagram and other Social Media. I told them there was only 2 Teenagers using it and they said there was more then 2 teens but it looked like at least 3 teens. So they have all 5 of their children in the house! (2 of the kids are to young to use Social Media) I contacted the Daughter and she first said they have Sprint and didn’t use their Smart phone data because they don’t get good reception. She claimed they used the Jet Pack data to stream TV programs because they couldn’t get our 3 TV’s to work. (we have Dish Cable with 250 Channels+ to watch) I told her why didn’t she call us if they had a problem? Then she said changed her story that we have some shows precorded and that is why they didn’t want to interrupt our shows! And so used our Jet Pack data to watch TV!
I am really Not happy with this family in my home… I am forwarding our Text messages through Airbnb messages to her father and Not communicate directly with her anymore because the Reservation is in her fathers name.
Any Advice would be appreciated— Sandra
Third party bookings are not supposed to be allowed via Airbnb unless it’s a business account. If after the reservation was made you had a system where you got the names and ages of each person, you would have caught this. I require Govt. Issued photo ids of every person staying (I don’t allow children.) and the person booking Airbnb account photo must look like the person book. The id rule is in my house rules so the guests can’t complain. (Well they can but they agreed to my house rules when they booked.)
If you discover a third-party booking, you need to have the guest contact Airbnb to make the cancellation and rebooking. Don’t get involved. It will waste your time. Also, never cancel on a guest, it will hurt your rankings. I have strict cancellation so if it’s after the 48 hour grace period I make sure that if the guest cancels I still get some money.
While it’s too late now, you need to clearly define your house rules in your listing, and insists that the person on the reservation is the person staying. I’m pretty strict and even require the person on the reservation be the person that arrives first. I think what you are seeing is a new crop of Airbnb guests that don’t really follow the rules either because they are ignorant or don’t care.
Regarding the Wifi usage - I’m not sure if you can meter the usage but if you can, do so and define that you get x amount of wifi and after that there is a fee of… I believe there are systems that can monitor wifi usage and put it in your house rules.
1.Get a camera that can tape video to show accuracy of guests.
2.Learn the word NO and while you don’t want to be rude, make your guests follow your rules. Airbnb won’t always back you up.
3. Only communicated via the Airbnb website or app. If you have to text, copy correspondence and send back via app to say per our text conversation, blah blah blah.
4. Read through the forum’s different posts. I’ve learned a lot. These days I rarely get a bag guest and if I do, I nip the behavior right away (in writing).
Well, that’s my two cents. Happy New Year.
I hate to say it, but most of the problems you’re talking about are more your fault that the Guests. First, you accepted a 3rd party reservation and did not cancel it as soon as you discovered the issue. Second, you are not on-site and do not have any sort of camera system to monitor who comes and goes from your property. Third, you let the daughter pressure you into the whole yard cleaning thing – they aren’t paying for a playground, they’re paying for a place to sleep. I’ll bet the place is filthy with tracked in mud. Fourth, you’re all upset because they are over-using your WiFi. Go to the house and disconnect everything; or have Verizon shut it down.
You haven’t told us how much longer they will be there; but you could always tell Air that you are uncomfortable with these guests, and want their booking cancelled without penalty to you because they violated TOS about 3rd party bookings and are blatantly having more people than booked (and not paying for them.
Both of you, KenH and Lynick4442 are right this is my fault and I have learned some big lessons. I am copying my texts with Daughter and sending them to her Father on the Airbnb site and only communicating with him. The Reservation is for one week and they leave on January 3rd., Wednesday.
I don’t want children anymore and am going to work on my Rules, etc. today, and tighten things up. I am considering asking for this booking to be cancelled without penalty as Ken wrote. I am going to see what wall her father comes off after I send him a copy of the texts and discuss it with my husband. This group has 4 different relatives in my town they can go stay with, two of which are Uncles being Medical Doctors. Thats for candid critique! Sandra
KenH has a good point. I put in my listing that the backyard is not included in the Airbnb suite I offer. Read through the forum for things like early check in and late check out and fees, etc. Luggage drop off, etc. Some of us are more chill on rules than others so you will see the spectrum of opinions but this forum has really helped me be a better host and I get better guess, reviews, and overall less aggravation.
Props to Verizon for being able to tell who is in the house and what age they are, albeit creepy. I can see an update of the classic 1979 slasher flick “When a Stranger Calls” where Verizon is not only able to tell you there is a serial killer in your house but they are live streaming the whole thing, Oh an a teenager. “The live stream is coming from the house!”