Importance of stars when reviewing guests

[Inna22]

A guest booked for one night and messaged me in the morning that they had to leave at 4 am due to non stop train noise and wanted a refund. There is no train service at night. I also disclose the train in multiple places in the listing and potential for noise is checked off. When I said that, she became angry that I did not trust her. This guest has 6 five star reviews. I saw that and it don't do any further research. I went back to look at her reviews and she pulled similar stunts before. If we bother to leave a review for a bad guest, we might as well mark the stars correctly. Otherwise it has the opposite effect- we are beefing up the positive review count for them

[Alex893]

@Sharon1014 excellent idea. I would love to see the number of completed stays

[Laura2592]

@Sharon1014 there are a lot of hosts who don't leave a review for guests until they leave one for them. We tend to do that. Not all guests leave reviews. So I am not sure that saying nothing is equivalent to saying something bad.

[Colleen253]

There are also hosts who just don't leave reviews, period. As weird as that seems.

[Sarah977]

If you opt not to review a guest because they didn't bother to leave a review for you, that would be okay, from this host's point of view, if the guest already had reviews that you felt accurately portrayed your own experience with the guest. 

But if the guest had no reviews yet, or your experience was quite different than what other hosts reported, I'd say you would be doing other hosts a disservice by declining to leave a review.

@Laura2592

[Laura2592]

@Sarah977  as I said we tend not to leave reviews for those who can't be bothered to review us. Its definitely on a case-by-case basis. 

[Kelly149]

Unless something really terrible needs to be said I don’t review first. 
@Laura2592 

[Tresa4]

@Sharon1014

Great idea about including a guest’s number of stays Sharon. I wish Airbnb would consider a “super guest” classification. Similar to Superhost.

[Emilia42]

@Tresa4 Be careful, some of my worst guests have had a bunch of stays/reviews and all 5-star.

[Anonymous]

@Inna22  As I'm sure you're aware, hosts who don't use Instant Book can't see the star ratings. 

I find it pretty annoying when hosts think a low star rating is somehow a substitute for putting the relevant information in the text review. But when it's the other way around, I have a hard time seeing what you have to complain about.

Everyone always whines about how guests fail to read the listings. Well, you failed to read the reviews. Whose fault is that?

[Inna22]

@Anonymous no, I had no idea that IB can not see stars until I made this post. How can this make sense? I saw 6 reviews and 5 star total. For what I usually get, this is a really high count so I assumed there was nothing further to investigate. We have both tools- stars and text and we should utilize both. And yes, it is on me for not reading but I do think I have a pretty good reason (this time)

[Anonymous]

@Inna22  Sure, but therein lies the problem with 5 stars being the Default rating.  It can mean "perfect" or "barely acceptable" or anything in between.

As a non IB user, I've never had the privilege of seeing guests' star ratings, so I actually have no idea whether they would be useful as a data point. I don't agree with Airbnb withholding this info purely as a way of nudging hosts into IB, but based on your story it doesn't sound particularly helpful as a screening tool.

[Inna22]

@Anonymous I think it is absurd that they are withholding that information.

I did find it pretty helpful when I was busy with 6 properties. I relied on seeing lower stars to trigger a deeper look. Off the top of my head, I recall one guest having several comments about smoking. I discussed that with him specifically, my penalties etc and he did not smoke at my place. Even though it is in my rules, house book and there is a note on the wall, someone like him would have smoked anyway. Another guest had a party mentioned in his review. I specifically called him to go over all of my rules and protections (party squasher, noise monitor). This not something I would do with any random guest without red flags. He cancelled his reservation. He was not missed. Now that I am down to one house and barely any reservations I should get in the habit of taking the time to read everything. 

[Sarah977]

While it is another tool in the toolbox, star ratings left for guests are just as unreliable as star ratings left for hosts.

I've mentioned this before, but it bears repeating in this thread- on another hosting forum I follow, a host asked for input from other hosts as to what star ratings they would give the guest stay the OP outlined. The answers ran the gamut from "They didn't trash the place? You got paid? 5*s"  to "No way is this even a 3* guest in my book. I'd never want a guest like this. Slam them."

These were all experienced hosts who responded, so as you can see, star ratings are entirely subjective and what might be a 4* guest to one host might be a 1* guest to another.

@Inna22

[Inna22]

@Sarah977 so true and fair enough. We all have different hosting styles. I am sure I am not everyone's five star as a guest even though of course I think I am 

[Huma0]

@Anonymous 

Yes, it's very annoying. As a long-term host I don't get many IBs, but had one where the guest had two reviews but a 4.5 rating in each category. I guess that means that one host rated him 5 stars in each category and the other 4, or between them, they gave a combination of 4 and 5 stars.

It caught my attention but, as both reviews were positive with no issues mentioned, I assumed it was no big deal and let it go. I mean, 4.5 out of 5 isn't bad...

Well, I lived to regret that decision. Even though the guest had confirmed that he understood certain things mentioned on the listing, such as traffic noise, and was okay with those, he began complaining almost as soon as he arrived to the point where I had to ask someone to switch rooms with him. He continued to constantly complain and usually about stuff that's all written on the listing.

I understand now why the less than 5 star rating. He didn't do anything terrible, but he must have driven one of his other hosts crazy too. Why couldn't they have found a polite way to mention this in the review?