Building and Improving the Superhost Program

Airbnb
Official Account

Building and Improving the Superhost Program

Superhost Criteria.jpg

 

As our global host community grows and becomes increasingly diverse, Airbnb’s programmes and policies need to grow and adapt as well – both to ensure the success of people from all over the world, and to show our appreciation for hosts’ hard work and amazing hospitality. That’s why we’re updating the Superhost programme to make it more fair, inclusive, and valuable to hosts everywhere.

 

 

Review rates

Great reviews are essential to earning Superhost status. They also help create a community where trust and transparency is shared between guests and hosts. But, hosts can’t control whether or not their guests choose to leave a review. After examining global data and speaking with Superhosts in a number of countries, we discovered that review rates aren’t consistent worldwide – some travellers always leave reviews, while others rarely do. This discrepancy can put some hosts at a disadvantage when it comes to consideration for Superhost status. In order to make the evaluation process more fair for everyone in our global community, we’ll no longer require that hosts have at least a 50% review rate in order to become Superhosts (or retain their existing status).

 

 

Cancellation policy

As part of our effort to make sure Airbnb programmes are built to meet the needs of all hosts, we’re also updating our cancellation requirement. Previously, we required that Superhosts have zero cancellations, but for hosts with an extremely high volume of bookings across multiple listings, that standard is impractical. To make the programme more fair for high-volume hosts, we’re now allowing one cancellation per 100 trips booked over the past year, which means a cancellation rate of less than 1% across all of your listings. It’s important to note that we still take cancellation as seriously as ever. Over the past five years, the Superhost community has worked hard to earn the trust of their guests and we will continue to reward that trust by recognising the most reliable hosts with Superhost status.

 

Both the changes to our cancellation and review requirements will take effect on the 1 July quarterly Superhost assessment. We’ll also be updating hosting dashboards at this time to reflect this new criteria.

 

 

Stay tuned 

We’re committed to continually improving the Superhost programme so that it works for the entire host community. That includes using clear, fair qualification criteria and making it valuable for every Superhost. From the overall design of the programme to how it rewards the community, we’re looking at different ways to not only make your hosting experience more positive, but also help you be more successful. So, please stay tuned, there’s a lot of exciting news to come.

674 Replies 674
Emilia42
Level 10
Orono, ME

@Airbnb  And next you'll tackle those one off retaliatory reviews, yes? 

Especially hurts when you are just gently enforcing Airbnb policy like not giving keys to an unregistered guest of a guest who turns up early and demands access 😞

exactly this happened to me 2 weeks ago. The guy who booked arrived late and gave his colleague the code to the key box without informing me.

 

Airbnb support found the revenge review did go with their guidelines.

This was not true

Email Airbnb Leadership

Jonathan I have never found a way to do this. could you tell me how please?

 

U must charge a very high rate in Ur "House Rules" for "extra Guests" cause AirBnb will pay regardless of the Guest's response !!!

@Yolanda8, This is no longer true.  I charge $15 /person/night and Airbnb does not honor this charge.  I just had a guy bring in 10 people one night, over the agreed upon number into my home and Airbnb only offered $200 of the $480 I requested, for the 5 nights he violated my house rules.  Once upon a time, Airbnb supported hosts when you provided evidence of the violations, now, they expect the host to suck it up and take the lost.  So, really you are no longer running your business as you see fit.  It is unfortunate that the guests seem to know this and are using this to their advantage.

@Jewel--KJ-And-Aaron0  If the guest brought in 10 extra people, why would you let him stay for 5 days? If people violate your rules, it's up to you to kick them out.

@Sarah977, Thank you for your question.  Honestly, I really didn't realize we can kick people out for not following the rules.  I thought that's where Airbnb supports our rules.  My thought process is, why have rules if they will not be honored by Airbnb.  After reading many of the comments, it seems the host will end up on the losing end no matter which route you take.  I try not to create a hostile environment, when people are in my home, so that the non-rule abiding guests don't get any other bright ideas.  These people should be banned from the community.  I know I am not the first person he did this to, yet there were no bad reviews.  We try to screen our potential guest and ask them to agree to the rules before we approve them.  Also, I thought I would be supported on the back end by Airbnb.  Clearly I was wrong in my assessment and have to take this lesson into account moving forward.  It may mean moving away from Airbnb, if we will not be supported as hosts.

@Jewel--KJ-And-Aaron0  The thing is, even if Airbnb did support hosts as far as guests violating house rules, all they could do is tell the guest they have to comply or leave. But they aren't going to send someone to your house to enforce that. And if they were to try to charge their credit card for, in your case, extra guests, the guest could dispute the charge with their credit card company and stop payment or temporarily cancel that card. 

 

The thing hosts have to keep in mind is that Airbnb is basically just an online booking service. They don't care if guests trash your home or go overcapacity, or drive all over your lawn. Our homes belong to us, not Airbnb, and ultimately it is up to us to protect our investment.

That’s one thing I like about living g in the same dwelling I also host, I personally greet them on the deck when they arrive and they are to notify me and hour prior to arrival so I can expect them and let them in. If I see a dog that was not told to me or any more guests then what they booked. I gently explain that I need to go in and change the charges for the pet fee and the extra guests. Now I am not saying that I won’t ever have a guests that refuses, but I do take pictures and have CCTV so it shows proof of the pet or extra guests. I feel for those whom host off site because essentially y’all are hosting blindly and YES we should have more protection from Airbnb staff. I do feel like they are always on the guests side because THEY are afraid of bad publicity but yet that’s exactly what they do to us and punish us and make us take the bad reviews. There is always gonna be a “Karen/Ken” out there and it’s not fair to us. 

Hostess of Hunters Dream B and B

@Yolanda8 

 

Hi Yolanda,

 

Maybe I misunderstood your comment, but based on my experience:

 

I host a house for 6 guests and charge a flat rate up to 4 guests. Guest #5 and #6 will pay $25 per night.

 

 I can't tell you how many times people reserved for only 4 guests and show up with 6 guests without paying the extra fees. Because I have security outdoor cameras, I can see how may guests are actually staying there.

 

After their check out I send them a money request with screenshots of the security footage. 100% of the times they decline to pay.

 

Once that happen, I hit the ''Involve Airbnb'' so I can get the extra fee payment...the only thing that Airbnb will do is call and message the guest so they can pay on their end using their credit card. 

 

If the guest decides not to pay (for the 2nd time) I would not receive any payment. It's ridiculous, right?

 

One or 2 times, I got lucky and Airbnb decided to cover 50% of the extra fees, but they NEVER charge the guest if they refuse to pay for it...

 

Maybe I'm doing something wrong on the process?

Mike from West Palm

For me I had a new member to AIRBNB who clearly did but read the amenities of my listing.  She didn’t stay and left an amazingly untrue review that AIRBNB allowed.  Now it will take me 26 more reviews to reach a 4.8 so I can qualify for Work Collection (my target guest).

Been there done that... guests said all was lovely then a few hours later after they rested and showered, they left - didn’t tell me or Airbnb. Left a one star review saying I had sheets for curtains - I don’t. Airbnb found that the review didn’t break their policy so there it sits on my record.