Charging for Extra Guests AFTER a guest leaves; Leaving a negative review

[Andrea4434]

It’s on me, I did not notice that the family of four only reserved my property for 1. I charge an extra $25/night after the 2nd person. One of the four was under two, the other was 3 which should have been accounted for. The family was nice, communicated well. They did trash the cottage in terms of moving furniture around and leaving food crumbs on the floor, behind the sofas, on the sofas and in the pea-pebble driveway (not easy to pick up as it had rained and there was orange cheetos everywhere). The home was somewhat of a disaster. It took 5 hours to clean when it normally takes me between 2-3. 

So two questions:

Is it too late to ask them for $75 for the older child? They have left already.

How bad is it to leave a review stating the mess they left behind? The mom was so nice and warned me in advance: "I just want to let you know, my kids tore through this place. I tried to put everything back as best I could. Some things are in the closet so my littlest one wouldn't break it. If you can't find something, it’s probably in there. I'm sorry."

I am going to give her 3 stars for cleanliness and 5 stars for communication and observance of guest rules. They did follow the rules, except for reserving 1 out of 3 (technically they needed to reserve 3) and they did communicate very well.

I have never left anyone a negative review before. I feel it’s my due diligence to other hosts. Unfortunately, I was the first host for this family (or other hosts did not leave reviews).

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

@Andrea4434 If the guest disclosed the number of people in the group in the original messaging, you really should have taken care of the adjustments to the booking before their stay began. Changing the price after checkout is not a good look.

About the review, I don't think it's necessary to apply the positive/negative binary here. It's perfectly fair to state the positives while also noting that the property required 2+ hours more cleaning than usual due to young children. 

[Mike-And-Helen0]

Like @andrew says, your review just needs to be truthful.

I agree that charging them the extra now is a little late.

[Ian-And-Anne-Marie0]

@Andrea4434 

I don't see the extra charge as an issue. If your listing states the fees then they should be charged. Offering accommodation with a scalable charge like this does leave it open to abuse, so you need to adhere to the charges otherwise you will be more regularly abused by guests wanting to get away with a cheaper option.

To this note:

"I just want to let you know, my kids tore through this place. I tried to put everything back as best I could. Some things are in the closet so my littlest one wouldn't break it. If you can't find something, it’s probably in there. I'm sorry."

I'd reply:

"Thanks for the note, if we can't find anything we'll let you know. We were unaware of any children attending as you only reserved for one person. I'll send a payment request through for the difference as you more than likely just overlooked that in your booking."

[Andrea4434]

Thank you to all who replied. You were very helpful to me! I appreciate it.

[Sarah977]

@Andrea4434  Apologizing because the children "tore through here" is so ridiculously lame. She's blaming the kids? She's the parent of a 2 and 3 year old. What does she think her parenting job consists of? It was up to her to oversee those children and clean up after them. Sounds like the 2 and 3 year old are in charge of things and mom is just some helpless victim.

[Rose277]

I had one like that and I no longer accept children or pets. I have had Recent bad guests so I do rate them low, my public review tell future hosts that I left personal comments to guest suggesting improvements, and I mark that I will not accept them again.