Question about verified home review

[Sherry39]

Has anyone completed a "verified home review " yet? I scheduled one today and then halted it when the "reviewer" wanted me to demonstrate that our door keypad access number worked and then wanted to record the contents of my silver ware drawer! Too big brother-ish for me. 

[Super47]

@Emilia42

These verifications have already been going on for several months now and this is just the pilot scheme where hosts are being offered the verifications for free (exactly as it was for the early adopters of Airbnb Plus)

Brian Chesky has confirmed on several occasions that in the near future, host will have to pay if they want to be 'fast-tracked' for verifications and receive their badge early. 

"Airbnb is moving ahead with plans to verify all of its home listings, adding its experiences offering to that pledge, the company said Friday. Still, it is grappling with how to carry this out on such a massive scale.

What’s more, in a recent Recode Decode podcast, CEO Brian Chesky said Airbnb plans to let Airbnb hosts pay to fast-track physical inspections and verifications of their listings, certified with a badge

Two-tier system.

A plan to let hosts pay for inspections isn’t a comprehensive solution for Airbnb’s verification issue. Some hosts could pay for these certifications, which involve multi-hour physical inspections, presumably giving them a competitive advantage, but millions of listings would not get such treatment"

Airbnb Hosts Will Be Able to Pay to Fast-Track Verification of Their Listings – Skift
https://skift.com/2019/11/15/airbnb-hosts-will-be-able-to-pay-to-fast-track-verification-of-their-li...

[Sarah977]

Seems to me if a host has pages of great 5* reviews, why would they concern themselves with being verified, let alone pay for it.

[Ann72]

@Sarah977  I was thinking the same thing.  Also - why so random?  They're verifying people who are established SuperHosts with many positive reviews when they should start at the bottom and weed out the horror-shows and work their way up from there.  Surely they have the capability to sort by low stars, keywords like "filthy," and the like.

[Sarah977]

@Ann72  It makes no sense at all. Airbnb can see what kind of reviews hosts get, and also, I should think, whether they have had guests report listings to them which were dirty or inaccurate or some bait and switch scam. 

You'd think that the whole verification thing is supposed to be about getting bad listings off the platform. And that's what Chesky said when he announced the program, in response to the Vice articles about scam listings. 

Yet there are listings with 2.5 ratings which come up near the top of search rankings in some places.

So what is this really about? The early free verifications are just so they can get the kinks ironed out and all it is, is just another money-making scheme for Airbnb to charge to "fast track" verifications? And those that don't go for it are going to have something pasted on their listing saying "This listing has not been verified"?