Should I Write a Bad Review for the guest?

[Jason565]

In my 7 years of hosting I have never written a bad review of a guest. But now I am seriously considering writing one and wondering if it's worth the trouble.

Here's what happened: the apartment I rent in NYC is kept extremely clean and well-maintained, and literally all of my past reviews have been positive. The guest that checked in last week said she found a dead mouse inside the entrance of the apartment. This shocked me since I have not seen a mouse in my apartment in the 5 years I've lived there, but it did not surprise me since this is NYC and a mouse entering your apartment is unfortunately typical.

The guest insisted that I return from my trip to personally remove the mouse for her or send over someone to remove it for her, since neither she nor her boyfriend would remove the mouse. She also suggested that I am attracting mice to my apartment because I have books and mice are attracted to paper and wax. (But thsi was the ONLY mouse that had ever been in the partment as far as I know...and it was dead.)

I told her that it was impossible for me to return to remove the mouse and that I could send over the superintendent but when/if he decides to come over it wouldn't be until the end of the day. The guest then agreed that her boyfriend would remove the mouse as long as I talk them through how to do it, which I did, expalining that they just needed to sweep in up and place it in the garbage just outside of the building. She then said she "understood" the situation and thanked me for being helpful.

I offered her a discount for that day and she said "no worries." She then went on to stay in the apartment another day and a half. She had already been there a day at this point.

On the third day I got a call from AirBnb telling me that the guest had spent 90 minutes on the phone with them complaining about the mouse and was demanding a FULL REFUND and an early check out (She was scheduled to be there two more days). In the end she was given a partial refund and an early check out without penalty. This all seems to me extremely over the top on here part and I could have worked to resolve the situation, but instead she blew up the minor incident into a 3 day headache for everyone involved.

My question is: is it worth reviewing her and her boyfriend negatively? Is tthis the sort of information about a potential guest that other hosts would like to know before booking them? Or should I just forget about it and hope she does not leave my listing a (overblown) negative review?

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

Kathie, as soon as she write a review they will know it is not a good one.

[Letti0]

As a high maintenance person who spent 90 mintues on the CS line with AirBnB it's a given she will write a crap review. Hopefully she'll make it personal and it can be removed, but I doubt it. If by some odd chance she doesn't write one, don't post your review until 4 or 5 hours before your check out time on day 14 after the stay which is the cut off to leave one. That way she will probably not have time to post one of her own.  

[Jason565]

That crossed my mind as well. However, since all my other reviews are uniformly spectacular (5 and 4 stars), and I have a solid history as a host for almost 7 years, I'm not worried about one bad review. Or should I be?

The way I see I, I host only part-time and have great review history, while this awful guest has only one rental to her name and only one review, but will soon have two reviews counting my negative one of her. It seems a negative review for her will much more impact on her AirBnb experience than it would mine.

[Jason565]

Thanks for the advice. I;m not suoer worried about one bad review, as ALL of my previous reviews are 5 and 4 stars. Also, this guest has no review history other one positive review from a previous host, and she will most likely have a negative review from me. So, the review system would seem to hurt her more than me.

[Deb125]

Hopefully you got a photo of the mouse?   I would not want to host these types of guests, and there are a lot of bad guests out there.. check in then want a refund.. ugh,  so hard to rate because you can't see their review until you write one.. does AIRBNB post the guests review if you don't write one on the guest?  Thats why I do not write reviews for bad guests... 

[Kathie21]

Hells teeth, we got burgled from an Airbnb rental and ended up over £2k out of pocket .  It never even occured to me to ask for a refund!  A dead mouse?!  Some people really shouldn't be allowed to travel.  Or even live without supervision.  Perhaps they might 'lack the resourcefulness  of the average Airbnb guest' - any host will understand what that means.

[Jason565]

Kahthie, thank you for the perspective

 Sorry to hear about the robbery. I always like to think that sort of thing doesn't happen,  but i guess it does. 

[Paul154]

Keep it short.

At a minimum,

"Best served by a hotel".

I like "Guests fabricated an incident to extract a discount", but Airbnb may pull that.

[Jason565]

Interesting. Do you know what types of statements AirBnb pull?

[Paul154]

Jason, I have no personal experience with airbnb pulling reviews. However, some hosts have claimed their unattractive guest review get censured. My guess is Airbnb does not want to upset guests, current and prospective.

"Best served by a hotel" is a safe complaint that Airbnb will maintain.

[Kathie21]

I would guess they pull anything that is more than 'opinion' that cannot be backed by evidence, ie anything that they could be sued for.  "Guest lied" - pull.  "I found it difficult to believe what the guest said" - probably OK.

[Deb125]

Boy does she deserve a bad review... that being said, I don't know if those bad reviews gets posted or not tho... (?) since you can't see their review until you rate her, you're at a stand off.... which sucks because  I understand that airbnb doesn't want to start "wars" but I would not want to host that person... EVER ... hopefully you got a photo of the mouse?? or was it "planted" for a refund? 

[Jason565]

That was my dilemma: should I bother writing abad review when the guest might not write any review of me?

The difference this time is that this guest really pushed me over the edge. The reason I was renting out my apartment is that I had to fly to the other side of the country to assist with a dying relative. Meanwhile here is this person freaking out because there was a dead mouse in an otherwise immaculate apartment in the a cool area of NYC rented at a reasonable price.

I'm totaly fine with the idea that mouse made it into my apartment---I live in NYC after all, and most buildings have all kinds of things running around them. My problem was that the guest blew up the incident into a 3 day nightmare and in the end cost me a  lot of money.

[Jackie237]

Was there actually a mouse, (right at the entrance of the apartment????) did they plant a mouse so they could get a refund, did they only plan on staying for 2 nights in the first place and thought up a cunning plan to even get that for nothing?  Do they have any reviews on their profile? I would wait to see if they leave you a review bearing in mind you only have 14 days and if they do you know it will be a bad review anyway because they left and complained and wanted a full refund but if they don't, leave a review for them so us other hosts can be made aware of what we might be dealing with. Actually I don't know if you can leave a review as they cancelled. I had a guest cancel by mistake 4 days in to a 5 day stay (he came back the next week for another 4 days) but neither of us were able to leave reviews for that first week.

[Kathy-And-Mark0]

Can you leave a review, even if the guest doesn't leave you a review? I'm waiting patiently to write a review of a bad guest who told me there were 7 guests, and then ended up with 14+ at times. Not cool! She paid for 7 not 14 people. Then on top of that took one of my blankets, but claims it was an accident, cause they have one just like it at home. She also told me I would be reimbursed for the extra people, but I have yet to see any extra money. Anyone got any tips? Thanks