Hi Julia,
In North America, as others have pointed out, they are use to seeing base prices; with the plus, plus, pluses... only added up when the final total is displayed. As you are no doubt aware, this pricing practice is illegal in Australia, and all prices (including taxes) must be displayed as the full and final "all inclusive" amount. Our local regulators took Airbnb to task over this, and Airbnb amended their system to comply with Australian regulations - so now, when a guest attempts to search online, Airbnb requests all relevant information from them, so it can display the price inclusive of all fees (including its own), for all options which it presents. http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/airbnb-to-improve-pricing-after-hidden-fee-crackdown/news-story...
So, again as others have pointed out, in most cases it doesn’t matter whether you are charging a cleaning fee or not, as guests are only presented with the final price when searching, and they don’t really look at the detail about how it was calculated.
In terms of managing my costs, I look at it from two angles; the costs I accumulate per booking (regardless of the number of nights stayed) and the costs I accumulate per night. I therefore recover all my fixed costs “per booking” using the “cleaning fee” which I refer to as a “set up” fee.
I feel this is the most equitable approach, as it doesn’t penalise guests on longer stays (in the way that it would if my cleaning cost recovery was built into the nightly price, as that would lead to them over-paying) and makes it economically viable for me to take shorter stays (as my high fixed costs are covered independently of the nightly rate).
It probably also comes down to who does the cleaning: The thing that might shock hosts in other parts of the world (who may be use to poorly paid migrant labour) is how much you need to pay a cleaner in Australia. The going rate for a professional service up in the tropics is about AUD$40 per hour, so it has a significant impact on my pricing strategy. (With more competition and a longer season on the Gold Coast, you might be lucky and have lower rates there.)
But, in the end, I think it’s great that Airbnb leaves the choice up to us, and as you see there is no consensus on the “cleaning fee”.