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It’s so buried at this point that no one see it. Funny thing is that he gave me a 3 for review but where he could write about missing amenities he checked of everything. Only guest to ever say that I am missing sheets, etc.
One thing Hosting has taught me is to let go of issues more. I used to get so upset of guests stupidity and meanness but now I just smile and say, (to myself) thanks for the money.
I have a similar mind set when people are surprised that I do my own cleaning… yes, most expensive cleaner in town because it is all profit!
I don’t want to detract from the problem of retaliation reviews but I don’t think Airbnb removes hosts over a bad review or two. They threaten to but I don’t think they do it.
Did you try to initiate a conversation with that potential guest? Or you just declined due to the already existing similarities?
Airbnb isn’t going to remove guests for this reason and they aren’t going to do investigations. Since the recent bad publicity about Airbnb maybe something will change but I wouldn’t count on it.
This is another thing that seems unlikely to change but they might decide to remove all reviews or remove host reviews of guests.
I have had several guests whose profile says they are “also a host” but no listings and no reviews on their profile from those listings. I haven’t had any problems with any of them but it does make me wonder why I’ve had so many and where their listings went.
We do all our own cleaning, too. We’re too much perfectionist not to. Hahah
No matter how lying, false and / or discriminating a review is, Airbnb refuses to remove it.
My wifes medical condition was once outed by a guest in a review, but Airbnb refused to removed it due to “transparency and freedom of speech”.
While I’ve not had a negative review, I recently had a guest who left disparaging and false comments in response to the negative review I had left for her.
I wrote about this experience in a different topic (unauthorized guests / photo shoot)
I chose to leave a review of this guest because she had (3) 5-star reviews and I wanted to alert other hosts. She never left a review (of me) so after the 14 day period expired I saw the commentary she had left after seeing my review (of her)
Her strategy was, when you can’t dispute the facts, you call the host a “Racist”. Since our minimal communication was documented on the message app, my interactions with her were minimal (and documented with AirBNB CS), and there was the significant messaging with ABNB CS during the photo shoot, they quickly concluded that she was out of line, and immediately removed her post review.
The confusion I have is that despite my ratings of her:
Her rating (total of 4 reviews ) only moved from 5 to 4.5. That seems oddly skewed and different than the way I’ve read hosts are rated.
I scraped by in my math class but still have a grasp on basic math and seems like their overall rating should have dropped to shy over 4% !? Am I wrong?
Appalling that guests are allowed to mention illnesses and disabilities of hosts without repercussion!
Haha me too. My last snotty guest wrote me a book size review of what I should have done and I wanted to respond Thanks for the money!!! but decided ignoring her altogether would be even better bc she wanted attention and I do not care.
In approx 500 bookings we have had a total of two bad reviews. Interestingly …
My guess is that these “guests” are probably repeat offenders. They know how to manipulate the system, they know what they can get away with, and they rely on other hosts “giving in” to avoid bad reviews.
While I deplore the fact that AirBnB seems to always side with the guest, even when the guest is demonstrably lying for financial gain, I have learned the following:
We have received only two bad reviews so far in over 300 guests. Airbnb wouldn’t remove the first one because they said it was our word against the guest’s. But it was so long ago that it doesn’t matter. Even at the time, it didn’t affect our SH status.
Airbnb did remove the second one, because the guest said we hadn’t notified them we have dogs—among other complaints. But our dogs are mentioned multiple times in our listing (including the HR) and shown in our listing’s pictures. The other things the guest complained about were also shown to be untrue by our listing.
What I concluded is that if a guest’s negative review says things that are refuted by our listing itself, Airbnb will remove the review.
That’s a shame. I’m both a stellar host and a stellar guest. But I also try to exclusively book instant book hosts which eliminates host bias as a factor.
We’ve had only excellent experiences with hosts who stay here with us. Many hosts. Many Superhosts.
This forum seems completely split on that one!
There are several folks here who will wholeheartedly agree with you, and several (myself included) who will disagree on the basis they’ve had generally good experiences hosting hosts.
Yup, we’ve had similar; and the “hosts” get treated the exact same as any other guest. No extra treats or favours. So far, all good reviews from them.
JF
It’s just an “acceptable” form of discrimination. Substitute most any other group and there wouldn’t be an even split.
It’s a slippery slope when guests can and do get away with whatever on one’s property because one might get a crappy review. If that is our only line of defense, I do hope that forthcoming ads for hosts include more realistic expectations. Like a cage.
I’m sure that’s true. Perhaps I should have said “Never host someone who makes a big deal out of also being an AirBnB host. In my experience, this generally indicates they will expect special consideration.”
That is probably the case. The same for the guest who wants to make sure you know they are a lawyer, film producer, “influencer,” or any other profession that’s irrelevant. Unless you are a professional housekeeper or possibly a contractor, I don’t need to know.
Edit to add: At parent - teacher conference time it was a red flag if a parent said “I’m a teacher too, so I understand…” This was quite often followed up by some version of “you should do it my way.” That’s exactly the problem with hosts who compare your listing to theirs.
I stopped doing Airbnb room rental as a result of an incident with a guest which some sort of mental issue. The guest lied about her identity. I had to call the police to try to escort her out because I caught her going through my other guests bedroom and stuff. She was still allowed to write a review. In her review, she said that I was dangerous and that she had to call the police on me. It was the other way around. Airbnb saw all of this in the messaging system because prior to contacting police, I contacted them. I was pregnant so this was a scary situation. Since Airbnb allowed that negative review. Thry removed my review on her because I mentioned her real name. I was trying to warn other hosts. I canceled all the future bookings, which were about 23 total. I lost my superhost status that I had maintained for two years. Airbnb seems more interested in guests no matter what they do more than Host safety.
You had the evidence and the CSR believed the GUEST! Far out!
I doubt it. It is only because they are the guest in your situation, in my opinion.