Improving price transparency for guests

[Stephanie]

Today, CEO Brian Chesky announced that we’re updating how prices are displayed to guests in Airbnb search results. Our goal is to maximize price transparency in places like the U.S., where showing nightly prices (before fees) is currently the travel industry standard.

Guests who currently find nightly prices in search results will be able to switch to showing the total prices. The total price includes the price per night, Airbnb service fee, and any Host fees for cleaning, pets, or extra guests. 

We’re making this change, along with a few others, to help you stay competitive and meet guest expectations. Get the details on the Resource Center. 

Displaying total price and simplifying checkout

What’s your strategy: Build your cleaning costs into your nightly price, or charge a separate cleaning fee?

[Dave52]

@Stephanie   My guest interface has displayed "$XXXX total" in the listing search results for as long as I can remember, in both app and browser.  Click on it and you see the Price breakdown.  What's changed?

[Marie7084]

What a joke!  Many hosts, including myself, are barely making it.  Guests want to do nothing upon checkout, guests want a super clean space but want to pay a lower cleaning fee, guests want early check in and late check out but do not want to pay for it, guests want a manager to respond 24/7 like a hotel, having no clue what after hours manager fees are.    Guests want a discounted rate, but not a discounted low rate property.

We will not even mention the power of getting 4 stars instead of five stars on a review because a guest did not like the weather or wifi was not fast enough when they had 12 devices connected at a remote cabin in the mountians.

I pay more now for cleaning than ever in my 15 years as a host.   I have been covering over half of the fee charged to me, taking it out of the nightly rate.  What happened to airbnb's attitude that cleaners need to be paid a living wage?   Gas is more, supplies are more, wages are more.    It gets to the point that a host can hardley even cover their bills, after they pay the cleaning company, the manager, the utilities, the mortgage, taxes, insurance, supplies.   Not to even mention all the little damages here and there caused by guests that airbnb cover never covers. 

I am thinking about selling all my airbnbs and going back to dependable long term rentals.  Never have to deal with a review ever again.  Yahoo!

[Donna1157]

In light of ABB wanting full sunshine on pricing with no surprises...

Will ABB also include up front their service fee, (14+%)   and inform guests that it is ABB charging and pocketing that fee -  not the hosts?

[Jenny]

Hi @Donna1157 

Yes, When guests choose the total price display option, both the total nightly rate (inclusive of any Host-set fees) and the Airbnb service fee are listed as part of the pricing breakdown. We explicitly call it the “Airbnb service fee” as a line item.

Hope this helps!

Jenny

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Donna1157 I am always amused when hosts talk about Airbnb charging a high fee and talking about them 'pocketing' it.

The truth is that Airbnb rarely has made a profit as they have significant costs providing visibility to our properties. 

Now I am sure they could be better run and more efficient but as there are few better options I guess we are stuck with them

[Gillian166]

@Donna1157  I was assuming this was the case, and you're right, so many guests don't realise that there's a large ABB fee tacked on.

[Deb22]

Exactly!  It’s hypocritical of Brian Chesky to focus just on cleaning fees which are not what dramatically drives up the cost of a booking vs stated nightly rate. Airbnb should disclose ALL fees upfront including it OWN portion of service fees if guests are to understand upfront what their stay will cost in total. 

[Charlotte7]

Airbnb telling hosts they can no longer ask guests to strip their beds is not taking into consideration larger properties like mine, which can sleep up to 22 people in up to 17 beds. It would take a huge amount of time for me to strip these, whereas, since covid, guests have been stripping their beds before checkout. It takes a couple of minutes per person and no one has ever complained. My prices won’t be as competitive if I am forced to add on even more time for changeovers (which is already approximately 14 hours in cleaning alone per changeover). I don’t think I am the only one in this situation. Having been a super host for the last 4 or 5 years, consistently receiving 5 star reviews, it’s a shame we have not been deemed able to gauge what is and isn’t acceptable for our guests, with details like these being imposed which aren’t feasible across all types of properties. 

[Marie7084]

Agreed.  My biggest place sleeps 18-20.    It takes a cleaning crew of three , bringing in clean laundry done offsite, to get that cabin ready in five hours.  Cleaning people need to be paid for their work offsite ( doing laundry for hours, linens for ten beds and 24 bath towels ) and cleaning onsite.    I pay $385 for the clean plus another $70 for the hot tub clean maintenance.  So, $445 on every clean, but I only charge guests $295 for the clean.   I guess airbnb expects me to charge zero now for the clean to make guests happy.  LOL

[Gillian166]

@Charlotte7  I don't think they are going to stop you from requesting that.  They just want you to disclose before the booking what the checkout routine is. Should be fine 🙂

[Martha943]

Pricing with clean included is much better and brings it into line with the EU where guests see the total price including clean.

• Improvements to guest checkout: We’re providing guidance to Hosts that if they have checkout requests, they should be reasonable and displayed to guests before they book.  
  
  This is a good idea. I do it at checkin but at booking will be better. 

However: 

"Guests should not have to do unreasonable checkout tasks such as stripping the beds, doing the laundry, or vacuuming when leaving their Airbnb. But we think it’s reasonable to ask guests to turn off the lights, throw food in the trash, and lock the doors—just like they would when leaving their own home. "

I don't think it is for AirBnb to say what is reasonable. It depends a lot of the cleaning fee, obviously. 
In France it is totally normal for guests to strip  the beds and run a vacuum cleaner round. 
I personally don't ask for it, but most will do it anyway. 

Many places in France have a low cleaning fee because of this: the assumption is that  you will leave the place in decent  condition. 

It's totally reasonable for people to know what to expect, and a good idea.  But  not at all reasonable for Airbnb to dictate what the expectations are - these are very individual to each host and each house. 

For instance  I accept dogs. I don't  charge a fee for them.  I do ask  that if  people bring  a heavy shedding dog,  they use the cordless vacuum to keep the dog hair in the house under control. Everyone has seen this as reasonable.

But now  Airbnb tells me it is not! So now what? How do I make my very reasonable request if Airbnb have deemed it unreasonable? 

[Jenny]

Hi @Martha943 

I've just replied further down to another Host who has concerns around the cultural differences surrounding check-out tasks:

At this time, Airbnb has not fully defined their checkout task guidance.  They look forward to workshopping this with Hosts in the coming months.

I hope this gives you some reassurance that your concerns will be considered during this process.

Jenny 😊

[Martha943]

Hi Jenny, thanks for getting back to me. That's great. 

As I said, I do think it's a very good idea to make the checkout requirements clear on booking, precisely because of these cultural differences.

But I do think that it's not for Airbnb to say what they should be, I think guidance should be about how to make the process clear to guests, not what the process should be.

I think @Huma0 's point about camping and shared situations is a very good one, also remote and unusual situations (which are increasingly a big selling point of Airbnb)  could have very specific needs. 

Look forward to hearing the next steps and thank you for the update 🙂 

[Marie7084]

  I also allow dogs and would hope guests would run a vacumm.  But, most do not.  I also do not get any bookings if I charge a pet fee.  But, my cleaning crew charges me an extra $100 on top of the $385 normal cleaning fee if they have to deal with pet hair all over the cabin.

I keep hoping airbnb will show hosts that we matter.  Instead airbnb keeps expecting hosts to make less and less.  It seems airbnb views hosts as expendable because new property owners will always list on airbnb., 

[Huma0]

@Martha943 

Of course, one size does not fit all. I don't charge a cleaning fee at all, so should my guests be required to do/not do the same on check out as a host who charges a £250 cleaning fee?

What about the overall price? What if it's a camping situation? What if it's a shared listing? There are so many variables. It just doesn't make sense for Airbnb to dictate, throw out food but don't strip the beds.

Personally, I would never ask guests to strip the beds (some of them do it anyway, so clearly it's not an uncommon thing for hosts to ask), but that's just me. In some places, it's normal for the guests to bring their own bedlinen.

Also, what about listing price? If someone books a luxury, high end, top price bracket listing for a holiday, naturally that guest would not be expecting to strip beds/take out trash or whatever. More likely, they would expect daily housekeeping. If someone is booking a room in a humble homeshare in an ordinary apartment in a suburb, and paying very little for it, should they expect the same?

Unless Airbnb develops some kind of formula for cleaning fees that takes into account the type of listing and the price, this whole strategy doesn't make sense.

[Mariann4]

The Norwegian version of this text does not have this wording, @Martha943 . It says they have received feedback that these tasks are considered unreasonable, not that they ARE. How can Airbnb demand anything when different countries are given different information?

As I've told many people before, also in Norway and other Scandinavian countries it is common that the guest has a full cleaning of the rental before leaving. Airbnb can't take it upon themselves to ban culture when they are so adament on how cultural differences are part of their filosophy?? That travelling through Airbnb is learning about other cultures?

Sorry, I'm about to make a generalisation but then I would be banned outta here as well...

This must not be thought through but decided in haste due to some hype in focus with some bad publicity, @Stephanie @Jenny 

And also @Huma0 

As for the pricing. It's been clear from EU that hiding prices and fees are illegal on this continent. We've had open and transparent prices on Airbnb for years!

[Martha943]

"The Norwegian version of this text does not have this wording. It says they have received feedback that these tasks are considered unreasonable, not that they ARE. " 
That's an interesting and crucial difference, implying that it's maybe the expectations that are the problem, rather than the actual tasks. Which would be much helped with the proposed solution of making them clear at the time of booking. 

[Jenny]

Hi @Mariann4 

I understand that there's some cultural differences surrounding check-out tasks and I've received a little more information around this which I thought might interest you:

At this time, Airbnb has not fully defined their checkout task guidance.  They look forward to workshopping this with Hosts in the coming months.

I hope this gives you some reassurance that your concerns will be considered during this process.

Jenny

[Mariann4]

Yes, I read the fine print @Jenny I saw that they will be spending time to develop this. The communication however is completely off. They send us European host the same info as the American ones and call for hoorahs. Only this is old news for us. And then they deem something unreasonable because a few American guests complain they have to pull off some pillowcases. Only here that is the norm. 

Airbnb needs to step off the one-size-fits-all-wagon. That's not how they started. That's not how they advertise. And that's not how is's working. Rembember the fight when they tried to make linen and soap mandatory? I don't think Airbnb do..... 

[Huma0]

@Martha943 

From what I understand, Airbnb has managed to avoid litigation by several city councils by positioning itself simply as a listing platform, and therefore not responsible for the business that is conducted via that platform, i.e. that they are 'hands off'.

So, what happens when they start dictating what hosts can and can't require in terms of check out instructions, banning the hosts from charging a security deposit etc. penalising hosts for reporting disruptive parties (by suspending the listings, even though it is the guests, not the hosts who have broken rules), etc. etc.?

There is something rather contradictory about this branding...

[Victoria-And-Todd0]

That "hands off" has never been really hands-off as Airbnb was canceling guests who's political views they did not like, dictating policies to hosts, unilaterally deciding who gets a refund etc. They were acting as property manager/agent.  So will be very hard to argue the "hands off" bit.