Scammer guests

[Melissa280]

I know there's been other posts on this, I wish Airbnb would actaully listen to experienced hosts.

We had out first 1 star review a few moths ago. 97% of our reviews are 5 stars. He complained about the pillows so I gave him new ones. He complained the toilet overflow and I explained we have a plunger but he didn't care. Complained and complained, yet he didn't leave his 6 night stay early. He demanded his $100 pet fee back in the middle of his stay so I complied, thinking it might help and we wouldn't get such a terrible review. But after he left he contacted Airbnb and managed to get 70% of his money back which was taken out of my next pay, and then he submitted a scathing 1 star review full of lies. I contacted Airbnb about the review and they sided with the guest. I asked how he could even leave a review when they robbed me of my money and stayed the full 6 nights. Airbnb didn't say a word. 

This week we had a guest who checked out a few days ago. She seemed happy, only had 1 issue she messaged me about spiderwebs in the backyard, which I took care of right away. She asked to extended her stay but we couldn't as we had another guest checking in that day so I assumed she enjoyed her stay.  Yesterday I got an email through the Resolution Center saying she is demanding half her money back. She looked for things in our listing to go after us (Guest: "you claim this is a 3 bedroom but it's only one", she said when it fact it's stated 3 times in our listing that it's a 1 bedroom house that can be made up with 2 extra beds for an addtional fee. She didn't even want an extra bed, she just looked for an angle of attack. Then she found the old 1-star review from the crazy guest that claimed black mold was all over the bathroom, so she said the same.

This time, I am not giving a dime back.

She has already left a review but I haven't left her one as I would rather just wait for it to go public in a few weeks before it wrecks our other reviews and Superhost score. Now I'm worried not only will we get a crappy review that devestates us during busy season, but we may a lose a chunk of money again too.

Does Airbnb not value Superhosts? I do my best to communicate with the guest during their stay but it doesn't matter with these people. How do we prevent these scammers from extortion and fake reviews?

[Gwen386]

@Melissa280 I am sorry to hear about the problems you’re having but I have a few questions/suggestions/recommendations. 

I don’t understand your reimbursing the pet fee. Did guest have a pet? Then you should not have refunded it. That only opened a can of worms that guest now believes he can get more out of you. 

Spiderwebs—It is extremely important to clean, clean some more, and clean until you’re tired. After I feel I have thoroughly cleaned, I go back and take a final look. One night I was lying in my bed and sat straight up! Darn, I had forgotten to dust the blades of the ceiling fan. I’m just lucky the guest didn’t ding me. Then another time I noticed the glass panels on the entrance doors weren’t clean. Darn, I wondered, how did I miss that. I was happy I spotted that before guest checked in. It’s so easy to miss stuff. Now I have a checklist to make sure everything in my apt has been looked over. 

Yes, there are still some guests who will complain no matter what, but as long as you know you gave 100%, then you just can’t let it get the best of you. There’s a saying—this too shall pass. 

[Melissa280]

It was guest from several months ago that received not only the pet fee but most of their money back from Airbnb and left us a 1 star review. That's why I no longer give any money back. Let them leave a bad review,  there's no way for us to remove them anyway.

We are in Portland Oregon and in the middle of spider breeding season (August-September) and the house in tucked in behind some trees. The inside of the house is spotless, no webs but spiders can get in. We do our best to clean the ouside of webs but they happen. This guest was trying to find an excuse.

We once had a guest who took a photo of the bathroom side tub with a long dark hair saying it wasn't clean and threated a bad review to get money back (I clean the bathroom top to bottom, I know it was clean.) The guest had long dark curly hair, it was her hair! I am so tired of this game : (

[Mark116]

@Melissa280 post says the spiderwebs were in the back yard, not inside the house, @Gwen386 .  So, complaining about that is insane.