Service charges

[Julie6405]

I’m quite new to the Airbnb  business, I’m just wondering how many people add the service charge into the fees? I from Cardiff in the UK

[Helen3]

What do you mean by a service fee? @Julie6405 

[Julie6405]

the Airbnb service fee, so their charges. Some people add it on and I’m wondering how many people actually do!

[Helen3]

Airbnb adds their service fee to the booking @Julie6405 

[Julie6405]

@Helen3 im not sure if I’m explaining myself right. When people book my property they will see a price per night, then the cleaning fee then the total. When I’m looking at other properties, some have the nightly price, then a cleaning fee, then the service charge, then the total. I would like to know how many people actually add this fee onto their charges

[Shelley159]

@Helen3 I've put some dates into @Julie6405 's listing. It doesn't show the Airbnb Service Fee line item. Perhaps the listing is set up with a host-only fee?

@Julie6405 you may already know this: there are two ways to pay service fees. You can split the fee between the guest and the host, or the host pays the full fee as explained here:

Airbnb service fees - Airbnb Help Center

In both cases the service fee is administered by Airbnb as @Helen3 has said.

Are you perhaps in a category that doesn't qualify for a split fee, or did you choose to pay the host-only fee?

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Julie6405 No idea but it is almost entirely irrelevant as the guest sees pretty much the same price.

The two service fee models are

1) Guest pays 14.2%+VAT, Host pays 3%+VAT or

2) Host pays 15%+VAT, guest pays 0%

Intuitively the second option is cheaper BUT actually it is about 0.5% more expensive!

We always used to use option 2 (simplified pricing) as it makes the accounting easier for tax. Basically you get the Gross revenue from Airbnb and then apply their fees as a tax deductible expense.

Hosts have to use option 2 if they are software connected.