The reviews system is being updated

Jenny
Community Manager
Community Manager
Galashiels, United Kingdom

The reviews system is being updated

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Hosting connects you to strangers from around the world that you’d likely never cross paths with if you weren’t a Host on Airbnb. Reviews are an essential part and natural conclusion to each stay – whether a Host rates a guest or a guest rates the experience they had during their stay, reviews are displayed publicly for everyone to see. With that being said, sometimes reviews left by guests may feel unfair. You’ve told us that you’re frustrated with the current reviews system, so we’re updating the way reviews work as a result of your requests.

 

Feel more comfortable hosting guests without worrying about the possibility of receiving a retaliatory review or not having enough info about potential guests with the following upgrades:

 

  • Learn how you can dispute retaliatory reviews under our updated reviews policy.
  • Flag reviews from guests who commit a serious policy violation or violate your house rules.
  • Read specific details left about guests by other Hosts—and leave these details when any guest stays with you. 

 

Early next year, we’re also introducing a chatbot to make it easier for you to initiate a review dispute—without having to contact Community Support.

 

The same process applies to the reviews guests leave for you. Guests will still choose one to five stars for their overall stay. They can now also add a star rating—and specify what went well or could have gone better—in several categories. Only your overall star rating is factored into Superhost criteria, so your star ratings and feedback in specific categories won’t impact your Superhost status. 


Read more about it on the Resource Center.

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137 Replies 137

Hi Gillian, thanks. I will go through my comments and will flag it. I have already got rid of one unfair comment and I have another which is being reviewed by airbnb.

 

I still have two others to get rid of and I have proof that they had been written only as a revenge because I had asked the guests to be respectful 

 

Thanks again and have a nice day.

Kate721
Level 2
North Avoca, Australia

The new email format for a review isn't user friendly.  We host multiple properties and send all the emails containing reviews to our owners.  Now that the format has changed, the owner can't open the review unless they have an Airbnb account.   Why do you keep changing things, when they were just fine :-((

Gillian166
Level 10
Hay Valley, Australia

what I find a bit annoying, that should have been fixed, is that after you write a review it takes you to your Travelling homepage, or a "Refer Hosts" page, and not back to where you were, ie. the hosting Inbox. It's just annoying to have to do those extra clicks and also I don't like being advertised to by ABB all the time. I know you have a host referral scheme, do I need to have to pushed at me almost every day? 

 

The other option, to write other reviews, takes you to a page that shows you the outstanding reviews, but this isn't helpful either because i can't see the message history or the private note box where i might have made notes about the guest. So i have to manually navigate back to my Inbox (i have this saved on my bookmarks bar)

If these "upgrades" were being beta tested by actual working hosts, I believe some of these tiny issues would have fixed years ago. 

Bhumika
Community Manager
Community Manager
Toronto, Canada

Hello @Gillian166 ,

 

I am happy to see that your feedbacks cover all the aspects, even for the product side. I have made a note of it. Keep it coming 🙌

 

Bhumika

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Solveiga2
Level 2
Dublin, Ireland

Me as a host I am dreading all those new updates. **[Inappropriate content removed in line with the Community Center Guidelines]

it already takes me 2h to get my one room ready for the guests, and although the room is squeaky clean, the house isn’t. And I can’t afford to spend so much time cleaning all house every day.

unrealistic expectations primed by Airbnb during review process will result in unfairly lower review scores for hosts with increased pressure to be better, to bend over and backwards until the host or will stop giving a thing or will leave the system. 
I do a lot of extra for guests, so I am not the one who doesn’t care, but I can’t do any more as I exceeded my limit, I think the pressure on the host from Airbnb side is too much

Bhumika
Community Manager
Community Manager
Toronto, Canada

Hello @Solveiga2 ,

 

Thanks for sharing what you feel about the updates. But I would like to highlight that we are adding the ability for both guests and hosts to leave more details in their reviews. Guests will still choose one to five stars for their overall stay. Though they can also add a star rating in several categories, they are not mandatory to fill.

 

This can still be valuable for Hosts and help them understand what kinds of details to call out in their listings to set more accurate expectations with guests upfront. 

 

Bhumika,

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@Bhumika  We hosts do not get any feedback from the reviews beyond the 5 categories they mark us for, even though the process actually has a lot more detailed info, this is never shared with us. 

 

 My listing description would be 1000000 words long if I had to start calling out details to set accurate expectations for city apartment non-homeowner types.  

 

and, let's all say it together:
g u e s t s   d o   n o t   r e a d! !

You are right, the more the years go by and the more the system of Stars and reviews becomes a nightmare.

Hello Jenny nice to chat with you. 1 month ago I had a bad guest experience… I gave her a 2 stars review and at the moment in her profile she has again 5 ️…. The next host will not see the right evaluation. Probably was the same for me. Think useful investigating. Arbnb suppler answered that they have to contact the guest…….

I am finding that marked down reviews of problem guests  means that Air BnB still put them as 5* when is not what the review said. This is the same * rating they give to very good guests. It is very hard to rely on  past reviews when assessing a potential guest if you know it could be quite inaccurate...

Gillian166
Level 10
Hay Valley, Australia

I can't keep track of the order of replies here @Jenny  @Bhumika 

but today I left a review for a newbie guest who was ok, but failed to follow any check in instructions, didn't read any messages we sent, oh but she could find the msg box to ask for both early check in and late check out! she was noisy, we dont' have rules about that, but you know .... it's a farm, respect the serenity, they used excess towels and left wet towels on the bed (this is utterly unacceptable as you wouldn't do this to your own bed, it's beyond careless, it's just rude), dishes in the sink (yes, this is fine, we don't ask them to wash up). anyhoo, they are young and it's their first stay, I didn't want to ding them hugely. so I gave her 4* for communication and rules. no doubt she'll still have a 5* rating even after this one stay.  

but this is a concern, and i've asked this already so please can someone confirm. 

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is the guest going to see our feedback, or is it for hosts only? 

 

i know as a guest, the review process suggests my feedback will go to the host. 

i know as a host, i receive zero feedback. 

and another question, where is the link to log some kind of complaint about her breaking House Rules?  exactly how is this new system working? some further details would be appreciated. 

(beyond, "we'll ask and get back to you", because surely by the time a new thing is rolled out, you have the answers to give hosts)

Jenny
Community Manager
Community Manager
Galashiels, United Kingdom

Hi @Gillian166 

As changes are rolled out, we work with the team to get clarifications on anything Hosts raise.  It might take a bit of time, but we're doing our very best to provide updates when we can.
 
With regards to flagging the house guest, you should contact CS and early next year we're looking to have a chat bot to make the process more streamlined.
 
Thanks for your patience while we're collecting feedback and waiting for updates.
 
Jenny

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Gillian166
Level 10
Hay Valley, Australia


@Jenny wrote:
 
With regards to flagging the house guest, you should contact CS  

If you were a host, and you read the CC boards (and other places) would you contact CS over something like that? 

 

I'm afraid I'd be terrified they'd misunderstand, issue the guest a refund, and suspend me. The advice from most hosts here is to avoid calling CS.

 

Also, this is adding extra pressure to an already ill-equipped team, is that wise?  

Thank you for taking the time to answer our many questions, we appreciate it. 🥂

 

 

@Gillian166 @Jenny 

 

Hey maybe you can explain this in English better than I can, 

What is the reason for airbnb to remove reviews given by the host, do airbnb see it as bad publicity or what,

 

I have read all these post here and it made me think about a bad review I gave a guest a couple of months ago I just checked it's been removed, 

What I said was true who gave airbnb permission to remove that review and I know when he left us he went to another airbnb, Do they see him as a more valued customer than me because he books a month at a time? 

Emilie
Community Manager
Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

@Sudsrung0 Reviews, whether written by Hosts or guests, are subject to the same policies and would only be removed for specific reasons, all outlined in those policies. Have you asked the Support team about this specific case before?

 

Thanks, 

 

Emilie

 

 

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