BEWARE! Loss of Superhost Status for being to popular....

[Duncan10]

I am (or was, up untill recently) a superhost in Sydney for over 3 years.

I take great pride in hosting guests and my guests have always loved staying at my place.

My current overall rating is 5.0 Stars, 5-Star reviews is 100%, Responce rate 100%, Zero Cancellations & 100% Trips reviewed.

In the past 12 months, I'd had 6 x bookings of various short lengths, 2 x bookings at roughly 2 months each, and 1 x 2.5 month long booking which extended a further 2 months in duration to make 4.5 months in total.

I called Airbnb regarding the extension and informed them that by accepting this extention to 4.5 months in duration, I'd only be hosting 9 bookings in total over the last 12 months and could possibly loose my superhost status.

They informed me that this was not possible as long as I maintained 100% ratings accross the board. They said that it was impressive that I'd recieved a 4.5 month long booking and I was just the type of host Airbnb were looking for.

I accepted the extension with my guests and life went on.....

Upon the following Superhost review date, I was stripped of my Airbnb Superhost status.

I contacted Airbnb and they apologiesed and said there was nothing they can do.

They said it was a computer generated thing and they had no control over it.

They said regardless of what I'd been previously told, because I didn't host 10 guest in the past 12 months, I wasn't eligible for superhost status.

I was dumbfounded and completly speachless.... A 4.5 month long booking is obviously a sign that I'm excelling beyond most hosts, BUT Airbnb has decided to punish me and strip me of my Superhost Status for being too popular.... Looking back, I should have just made them make a new booking for the extra 2 months, but I didn't due to ill advise from Airbnb.... BEWARE OF BEING TOO POPULAR!!!!.....

[Fred13]

@Duncan10 Your last paragraph did connect some dots that I wasn't able to quite follow, but moving on.

1) Airbnb uses and has to use a ~computer~ (which you already know) to handle the 700,000 hosts they have, and 4,000,000 listings they collectively offer. It is hard-coded how it handles the annual 100,000,000 bookings.

2) A Customer Service person that says, or claims any exceptions how that computer will handle any specific host is talking sheer nonsense, for they can't go into the computer program and change how it is already programmed, nor certainly how is going to handle host #546,887 (your hypothecal number) any differently than the norm.

   Moral of this mathematical story: do not always believe what those in CS tell you. 🙂

[Monica4]

It will happen to me this summer as well. But, it doesn't bother me, losing the Superhost status. I see no advantage in having it.