Unfair cancellation rate

[JC4]

The most important requirement BEFORE booking my place is that the guest must have reviews from other hosts. I even wrote this on the very first line of the property profile and other places, including house rules.

A few months ago, someone requested a booking from her "parents account" because she didn't have reviews. Clearly, she tried to go around this rule. I had no choice but to cancel the request.

On another occasion, the guest who was staying in my place requested to extend her stay to which I happily agreed. Before I could even adjust the check-out date, I got a new booking. I called customer care, explained the situation. I had to cancel the booking.

Now, I see my cancellation rate is 14.28% which will cause my super host status to be removed on April 1st. I receive very few bookings a year as most of them are long-term so 2 cancellations greatly affect my rate. 

I've been a host for more than 10 years and a Superhost for several years as well. I had absolutely no control over these cancellations and I don't know who can review this or who to contact. 

[Emiel1]

@JC4 

Your first example is not a cancel, but a decline of a booking request

(If a guest is not a good match for your listing, you can also ask the guest to retract the booking request).

Your second example : it will not happen if you turn off Instant Book (temporary). But sometimes it is indeed just bad luck when bookings cross each other.

BTW

You profile does not show any cancellation message in recent years .

In 2021 there are only 2 reviews.

Are you sure it is about cancellation rate ?

[Emilia42]

@Emiel1 

FYI: Airbnb stopped generating the "cancelation review" on a host's profile at the start of Covid. Not sure if/when this will resume. I also know many hosts who canceled multiple reservations (citing covid) in 2020 and 2021 and still retained their super host status.

[Sarah977]

@JC4  You can't have a requirement for requests that guests have previous reviews. You can only have that requirement for Instant Bookings. 

You say you had no choice in cancelling these bookings, but I don't understand why you had to cancel either of these, unless I'm not  understanding the circumstances correctly.

The first one was a request- why did you accept it if the guest had no reviews and you require that? You should have just explained that third party bookings are against Airbnb policy and asked for the guest to withdraw the request, or declined it if she didn't.

Also, declining or cancelling all requests from guests who have no reviews is not acceptable, IMO. The whole point of requests is that you have an opportunity to communicate with guests before deciding whether to accept or not. Everyone, including hosts, starts out with no reviews. So how are guests supposed to ever get their first review if hosts don't accept guests with no reviews? 

I've had several guests with no reviews and they were stellar guests. Nor can you believe all reviews- plenty of hosts don't leave honest reviews and there are lots of hosts who easily accepted guests because they had several 5* reviews, who turned out to be horrible guests.

And that second cancellation you made- it would have been unnecessary had you immediately blocked the dates the resident guest wanted to extend, or turned off instant book, either of which only takes a minute to do. Then you would have had the time to do the extension without anyone being able to book those dates. 

[Susan737]

Sarah977- I agree with most of what you had to say. This works with shorter stays. But I also think you have to evaluate what kind of Airbnb you have. Some are free standing spaces like cottages in backyard. Some of our Airbnb‘s are part of our home like the lower level of our home. Some of our host can be single women. So responding to guest with no reviews is going to feel different to some host.

I do not have instant booking and yes some people do not have a review which I do ask a lot of questions. How they respond to my questions will determine if I accept them.

I love opening my doors to the world and I met the most incredible people especially during this Covid time.

As a single person and my Airbnb is attached to my home with beautiful decorations I get to choose who stays here. It’s a business and a safety decision. 
I have been very thankful towards Airbnb customer service.  I’ve had 2 guest remove and shorten their stay. One was dealing hard drugs and the other one was trashing/damaging my Airbnb. Both occasions the support was quick and kindly helped me. This is one reason why I stay with Airbnb, customer service when you have a problem. 
there is no absolute for everything and it can be a hit and miss. 
i’m grateful for this conversation thank you.

what does IMO mean?

[Sarah977]

@Susan737  IMO means "in my opinion". 🙂

I think you misunderstood me. I am a home-share host myself. And a single woman.

I have never used Instant Book- I want to communicate with guests before deciding whether to accept them. I can't imagine having a guest in my private room and sharing my kitchen who I haven't had an opportunity to exchange some messages with before a booking is confirmed.

And my max stay is set at 2 weeks. I figured if I didn't particularly like or feel comfortable  with a guest, 2 weeks is plenty to have to put up with them. But in fact, I have never had an objectionable guest.

But I haven't found and don't agree with the idea that just because a guest has no reviews yet that they should be declined. That seems really unfair. Everyone starts out with no reviews, but you can tell a lot about someone, or at least I can, by the way they communicate, whether they answer in a timely way, how much info they give about themselves and their intentions, whether it's obviously that they have taken the time to read through all the listing info, etc.

I have accepted several guests with no reviews and they all turned out to be great guests. 

I certainly don't advocate not declining a guest you get a bad or iffy feeling about, but a lack of reviews isn't something that should do that if they otherwise don't elicit any red flags.

[Susan737]

@Sarah977  you have been a wealth of info. Thank you. I have to get better at interpreting text messages. It’s like mine reading. I might add I have this problem with my daughter too.😂

[Sarah977]

@Susan737  My daughter once got tiffed at me over a text msg. I sent her  because she thought I was being sarcastic about something she was being serious about. Definitely easy to misinterpret msgs when there are no facial expressions, body language or tone of voice to accompany it.