Additional guest fee case

[Murat52]

Hi everyone, this my first topic here and would like to mention a weakness on Airbnb's system: "Additional guest fee"

İ've made quick search in community center but couldnt see a similar topic that's why i wanted to start a discussion to see if there are other hosts who think like me.

Since i've started my bussiness on Airbnb i'm using additional guest fee. What i call weakness is system let us designate a fixed price. I rent my houses in Eagean region of Turkey where rates are much higher during summer season. So when i add an additional guest fee according to summer rates it becomes too much expensive for guests who want to book for winter and if i do according to winter rates it becomes too low for summer rates.

Besides, when i update my prices for new season, if i forget to update additional guest fee, it becomes out of date.

Solution is very easy but i dont understand why Airbnb doesnt proceed on this matter. Additional guest fee should be a percentage of daily rate. This is used in all major OTA's and works perfectly. I belive thet Airbnb has to take necessary steps asap.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Murat52 I suspect most people are trying to cover their extra costs with the extra guest fee hence a fixed amount makes sense for them.

[Murat52]

Hi there, as mentioned i also use this fee to cover my extra costs but daily rate is not same all year long so a fixed fee is not useful. A flexibe fee related to daily rate can be used by all the hosts bu vice versa is not possible.

[Gordon0]

How/why are your extra costs (for the additional guest) more in the summer season, @Murat52? Surely washing/water/towels etc. are the same year-round?

[Murat52]

well, it's not about my expenses related to extra person @Gordon0, it's about value of extra sleeping space.

i can explain this better with an example:

i'm renting 2 bedroom+living room condos, in the bedrooms there are space for 4 guests, this's included listed price.

there's also 1 sofa-bed in living room so if they want to book 5 guests, 5th one is an extra

rates for 4 people are

around 100usd/day during summer season

around 40usd/day during low season

so extra person fee has to be 20% of daily rate which should be 20usd during summer and 8usd during low season. But it's not possible because of fixed price so if i designate it according to summer season as 20usd, it's too expensive for someone who wants to book for low season.

all major OTA's are using a percentage system linked to daily rate but not Airbnb unfortunetaly.