Review Loophole

[Maria13248]

A recent guest asked for a two day refund (12 day stay) claiming that his car had been damaged by a fallen branch in a windstorm. It was not. He backed into one of our trees; the tree is scraped up and there’s red plastic from his tail light on the ground. (Real CSI sleuthing).

i politely refused to take responsibility. He filed a claim against me with airbnb with several unsubstantiated complaints. One example, he complained about there being a doorbell camera. It’s on my listing. 
I wrote an honest review that other hosts will not be able to see, because unless the guest posts a review, it will never go public. 
Has this ever happened to you?

[Lawrene0]

The good news here is that you are confused about how the review system works, @Maria13248 . The review will be posted on the guest's profile as soon as he writes his own review -- you are right about that. But if he doesn't write a review, it will be posted anyway 14 days after his checkout day. 

Take a look at the Help Centre for things like how reviews work. That's a big one, and there may be other things that you find are good to know.

I remember not knowing, back when I was new, that I could snooze my listing and head off-grid without worrying about missing requests. Reading through the Help Centre topics really helped.

Good job with that tail light sleuthing you did! 🙂 

[Maria13248]

That is not what Airbnb support is telling me:

“Unfortunately when it comes to reviews they can only be public if both parties place a review, however a guest have 14 days to leave a review so it is still possible that the guest leave a review.”

[Sarah977]

Then you got a clueless Airbnb rep (outrageous that they get paid to give out inaccurate info). Be aware that what an Airbnb rep tells you may be totally false. You actually get much more accurate info from hosts on this forum. What Lawrene told you is correct. All reviews are published regardless of whether both parties leave a review or not.

@Maria13248

[Anonymous]

@Maria13248   https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/13/how-do-reviews-work-for-stays