Suspicious reservation enquiry

[Sue59]

I received a request from someone who lives four miles from me and says he is visiting a friend 'on Five oaks' which is actually very close to his location which I thought very odd. His profile picture did not inspire me with confidence either and the profile title is 'Hey, I'm Michael'.

I declined the request as I couldn't see how to contact Airbnb to get this account verified and would appreciate some advice please.

[Marcus0]

@Sue59 you get all different types of situations.  Maybe the person is meeting someone to hang out but their own place is not suitable to do so.  A romatic get together??  Maybe he has business in town and will be meeting several people at your place during the day??  Many different things can be happening.  Ideally just ask alot of questions.  Say things like, just out of interest, why are you wanting to book the place so close to your own?  You have a right to clarify everything with people before you let them into your own space.  When it comes to verifications, many do not like entering alot of personal information into corporate databases.  Not because they are suspicious...  And to give you a bit of peace, Airbnb automatically puts Hey, I´m XXXX into most peoples profile. 

You can always go back to the customer and ask questions and once satisfied, you can ask them to put the request back in and that you would accept it..

You have alot of control.

[Sue59]

Thank you Marcus for your response and helpful advice. I was actually going to ask some questions but it seemed that I needed to decline or accept before posting a message and I didn't particularly want to do either. Attempting to contact Airbnb directly didn't appear to be straightforward either and so, unsure of how to approach this and not wishing to wait too long before responding, I took the decision to decline. Maybe I need to familiarise myself more with the site...many thanks.

[Gerry-And-Rashid0]

While there is nothing really suspicious - go with your gut feeling. If it feels wrong then you will be uncomfortable in your own home.

There are lots of reasons people stay in their local area - 

[Annie50]

I recieved a reservation enquiry from a business, Clausky, promoting a key management service. Is there anything that can be done to prevent them doing this to others ?