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When a disgruntled guest writes a bad review Airbnb does not look into the guest’s behavior or the unrealistic expectation, as long as there is no racial or profane content they allow it. and, the Airbnb guest already knows how to get away with that.
I had a situation last summer where the guest got bitten by the mosquito from the open window. he privately reported the bedbug issue and left a very negative review with a two-star rating. Airbnb ordered me to produce the bedbug inspection which of course came negative. Airbnb unsuspended the listing but they did nothing about the review, despite the fact that the review was written based on the wrong perception of the guest- mistaken a mosquito bite for a bedbug bite. Airbnb said the review did not violate their police. It was ridiculous.
Another situation was that i had a guest from Saudi Arabia who booked for 2 weeks for 4 people but brought in 5 people. it was a slow season and I did not say anything and allowed it.
On the last day of her trip, she brought 6 other women in my house with the suitcases so they could wait here for their flight time. When I finally expressed my discount that she was supposed to ask my permission, she got upset and left without a thank you and wrote the most hideous review.
I tried to have Airbnb look into our communication which proved all of my claims, but they cared less. they said the review was not violating their policy and was going to remain. it was heartbreaking and very unfair.
what is interesting that it was not like that before when I started out in 2015. the agents and case managers were much friendlier to the hosts and more focused on training the guest’s mindset on the concept of homeshare. that culture is gone forever from Airbnb.
With their review system, Airbnb is indirectly putting the pressure on hosts on providing hotel standards and services, to the point that I have looked into other homeshare options and have gotten better prices and much nicer behavior.
Airbnb itself has created a culture that is arrogant and irrational, thus, pushing the hosts away. Hopefully, they will listen to the hosts and do something.
I’m sorry to hear about your challenges. I think we’d all like AirBNB to provide hosts some relief for reviews that are not reflective of reality or the ability to expunge an outlier review.
I try to vet my guests whenever I can to ensure that my accommodations are a good fit for both the guest and host. I also have added house rules (more than I started with) to offset situations like you encountered with unapproved guests.
Lastly, I can only suggest (if you have the financial ability) even in the slow seasons, stick to your rules. By allowing that 5th person, you might have, unintentionally, encouraged her to do as she pleased and break more rules.
I do have house rules too. I do not mind extending the hospitality especially if I can. It pays off with the right guest. I understand what you saying and thank you for your comment but it is very hard to gauge the guest ahead of time, besides Airbnb encourages hosts to show extra hospitality.
anyway, it’s all "preaching to the choir’ as some said above. I simply find other outlets and most of my booking comes from there and doing great.
It doesn’t matter. Look at any review system. Even the highest rated entities will have a few bad reviews; just move on. Don’t let it impact you personally.
Not taking it personally and then putting it behind you is the perfect advice.
We had one recently that knocked our BDC rating from 9.6 to 9.5. I had a five minute rant about those humourless, ungrateful, messy, ugly and unintelligible peasants that inhabit the province of Granada.
I felt better after that.
Now, ten days later I’d struggle to tell you the guests name
they were absolutely lovely to us in Granada and one of the only places I visited in the country where the Spanish sounded something like that which I learned in U.S. schools
Surely this only applies to hosts who allow themselves to be pushed away?
We hear so often about hosts who break their own rules, but expect their guests to abide by them. Then we hear from hosts who are in a complete panic about inaccurate reviews when it’s easier simply to ignore them. There are hosts who seem to think that Airbnb should be ‘looking after them’ in some way and who aren’t prepared to run their businesses themselves.
@jaquo I think a lot of us are lucky, in that we’ve had mostly good guests and haven’t really had horrible expriences that Airbnb should have backed us up on, and refused to. Sure, there are hosts who make it difficut for themselves, by tiptoeing around guests who are being disrespectful and ignoring all house rules, in fear of a bad review. Or getting in a big tizzy over a bad review, or thinking guests should be perfect and not leave whiskers in the sink or toothpaste on the mirror. Or expecting Airbnb to somehow monitor the behavior of their guests. But I’ve also read plenty of posts from long-time hosts with a history of great reviews and great guests, who suddenly get a real bad egg who manages to get their listing shut down for bogus complaints, or trashes the place and the host gets zero support from Airbnb.
Just because I’ve never had any experiences personally that make me want to quit Airbnb, I’m cautious about being smug enough to think it might never happen. It could.
People rarely will take such confrontation well. IMO it is best in that situation to smile and just say “we hope that you really enjoyed your stay”.
Then slam her with an honest review with “would not host again” - and that will follow her. We must pick our battles very wisely.
Yeah it’s not “right” what she did to you but there isn’t a good way around it without risking 1-3 stars. It isn’t the worst thing in the world to have a few people over “waiting for a flight” if they don’t cause damage and use extra bedding.
It could happen to anyone at any time. There are other things too that could affect business quite badly. You might remember when Netscape, AOL, AltaVista and so on ruled the internet - just because Airbnb is okay now (and I love using Airbnb) it doesn’t mean that it will exist, or accept all hosts, in the future.
So it’s not really a case of being smug, more like protecting our businesses and making sure that we have contingency plans.
Pandemics, carbon footprints, world financial disasters … not to sound gloomy but none of us can rest on our laurels because we never know what the world will throw at us. And then, we’ll wonder why on earth we wasted our blood pressure and stress levels on worrying about bad reviews.
What I meant by smug was that I could easily think or say that other hosts must be doing something wrong if things go bad for them re Airbnb, just because I’ve not had any bad experiences myself. But I know that’s not true, because I’ve read so many posts over the years where experienced hosts who’d been running a successful business for years suddenly got hit with a “We’re delisting you and oh no, we can’t tell you why, that’s private”.
Yes, down this way the dialect is pretty different, coarse and lazy is one description. It’s the constant dropping of the last consonant of words that kills me.
Any, going back to folks from Granada. Just had another one, scored tens across the board and overall a seven.
WTF do they expect? A mini Alhambra for €80 in February? Hot and cold running house maids and a fecking butler?
Hopefully the two Dutchies I waved good bye to today will rectify some of the damage done by those entitled, stupid, glitter wearing Granainos.
@hostess1 I find your forum handle ironic, in that you don’t seem to be suited to hosting at all if you are so fussy or lacking in communication skills that every guest you’ve had you wouldn’t host again. Everyone expects honesty and respect, but we are also realists and know that all guests don’t behave as we would like them to, or as we would behave. If you can’t cut people a little slack, or communicate with guests in a way that they don’t feel they can take advantage, I’d say that being a host isn’t a profession you should pursue.
Hang on a minute. You expect guests to be honest but you’re not? And yet strangely, you don’t see anything wrong with this to the extent that you’re happy to broadcast it on a public website available to everyone in the world to read?
It seems that this might be the best bet for you. You come across as someone who isn’t really very well suited to the hospitality industry and also someone who doesn’t understand how the Airbnb community works.
Is your answer even relevant? I am not talking here about an inaccurate review, I am talking about the dishonest, untrue and completely irrelevant review and by the way Airbnb suggests itself "to do a little bit more " for the guest. I did not break a rule, I extended my hosting. this is a waste of my time!.. look… bottom line is that the Airbnb review system is flawed on both sides, guest and host, and this why bookings on Airbnb have decreased. I work with booking.com as well, I have NOT experienced a decrease in reservation rate at all.
The problem is that the new hipster corporations like Airbnb are in the self-glorifying phase and do not want to hear the concerns of their consumers.
