Have any Superhosts received an invite to apply for the $5,000 grant scheme?

[Robin4]

It seems each time the CEO has a video session he has some grand offers he is so exited to share with his partners.

I believe some hosts who are active here on the CC have received the promised compensation for reservation cancellations from a $250 M  compensation fund.

I can understand that the $25-$50 offered here or there would not be too onerous for the company to honour baring in mind the claimable window was set to very narrow parameters.

What I would be interested to find out, has any Superhost received an invitation to apply for the (up to $5,000) compensation grant that the CEO went to great pains to promote back at the start of April. 

There is a certain psychology behinds words and statements and the way they are formed!

I smelled a rat when I read the first line of the eligibility criteria........

"There are hundreds of thousands of Superhosts around the world"........really!! All reliable estimates suggest their are between 650,000 and 700,000 Airbnb hosts around the world of which 10-15% are Superhosts.

Obviously an opening statement like that is designed to prime Superhosts up not to be too disappointed if that invite doesn't come.....there after all 'hundreds of thousands' of Superhosts in the mix here.

There may have been a dollar or two on offer here robbed from the employees incentive scheme but it would be really interesting to hear if any one of Superhosts who are active here on the CC have received that illusive invite! 

I am active on a couple of other sites so I will keep hosts here posted if I should actually come across anyone who has received one of these mysterious invites!

Cheers......Rob

[Helen3]

Hey @Robin4 

Hope life is going as well as it can under these difficult circumstances.

I saw a host on another forum post details of the invite they received. Apparently they are starting in the US first (why) and this was a US host.

My concern is that Airbnb will not properly vet hosts who receive this - so for example they could let a room in their home or have one listing but also have a partner who is a lawyer and multiple LTRs and still be given money.

My hope was that this money would go to hosts in poorer developing countries who have no access to the sort of welfare benefits, healthcare food banks, mortgage breaks that we have here in the West,

Sadly as always with Airbnb it seems the hosts who have the ability to complain the most (Western hosts) are the ones that get prioritised, not those who are in most need.

[Anonymous]

@Robin4  I haven't received the invite and don't expect to.  I'm fine with that - I've been lucky enough to receive generous invitations from Airbnb in the past, and there are many families in far more urgent need of help now than mine. 

@Helen3  I don't think the underlying intentions of this scheme are charitable. Airbnb needs a good marketing coup amidst a firestorm of bad press, so it's bound to target markets with high global visibility - all of which happen to be wealthy countries. I'd also expect them to single out hosts whose Instagram-ready listings they have the greatest interest in retaining for its brand image. So if you happen to have a luxury treehouse in Santa Cruz or a hipster yurt in Joshua Tree, your odds are pretty good. But if you're dependent on income from a homestay in Paraguay or a studio in Manila, don't hold your breath  (and anyway...the most "tenured" Superhosts are going to be the early adopters - the overwhelming majority of which are in western countries). 

[Susan17]

@Anonymous

Not surprisingly, one of the invitees I heard of is actually based close to one of those trendy US destinations you mentioned, and doesn't have a yurt or a tree house, but is the proud owner of a couple of very upscale, extremely Insta-worthy properties, in rather exclusive neighbourhoods. She was booked solid and did lose a ton of high-value bookings.

It's a bit too soon to speculate, as there's not enough evidence yet to get a clear picture, but it's certainly fuelling my nagging suspicions that Airbnb's assessment of "those most in need" may very well be based mainly (or possibly, entirely) on the total monetary value of bookings lost - ie those with more expensive properties, in more expensive cities. Which would be an absolute effing travesty, when there are so many in desperate need in poorer regions of the world (although Airbnb aren't completely stupid - they'd be savvy enough to include a smattering of hosts in developing countries too, so nobody could accuse them of not doing so)

But yes, my feelings remain that the bulk of the SH Relief Fund will go to those best placed (and most likely) to loudly and proudly spread the word of Airbnb’s awesome magnanimity far and wide, in order to reap maximum PR advantage for the company, and bang for their buck.

For the record, the invitee I mentioned above says herself she doesn't think for one minute she should be included in this "initiative", and told me she has no intentions of proceeding with any application process. 

[Anonymous]

@Susan17  Have you seen a copy of the questionnaire involved in the application process? I don't want to speculate too much without knowing what information they're collecting for means-testing and what documentation is required.  But if they're for real about assessing who's "most in need," that would mean that each invitation is also an opportunity for them to collect some very sensitive personal and financial data from both the winners and the losers. 

And for a company that is known to sell its vast troves of user data to third parties, that is some seriously profitable data.

I'm not even that much of a cynic, but if you come from Silicon Valley that's an easy spot. I hope I'm way off here...

[Robin4]

@Anonymous 

I don't know that the volume of business involved with this initiative would fall in the 'vast troves' category Andrew, but possibly it could be worth something.

As an aside the Australian federal government is at this moment promoting a phone app that will detect where covid-19 positive cases may be in the community, similar to a system that is currently running in Singapore. 

I was all set to download the app until it was revealed the contract for the storage of this phone data has been given to the American company Amazon where security of the data within Australia has been totally lost. All that is required by the app is a full name, a date of birth, a phone number and a postcode.......That is a **bleep** side more information that I feel comfortable with residing  in the hands of Amazon! 

Cheers......Rob

[Susan17]

@Anonymous

From what I could gather, I don't think there was really a questionnaire as such accompanying the initial email,  just a link for the host to send back a short summary about how they've been impacted by the crisis, and an assurance that they should hear back within a couple of weeks.

Perhaps they then send more in-depth questions if the summary is assessed as being heart-rending enough to merit further investigation or something, but it didn't really sound that way. The host in this instance chose not to proceed though, so unfortunately, I have no further information yet as to whether or not there are indeed any more steps to the process. I'm very curious to find out exactly what way the whole initiative is being implemented though, and wiill update when I know more.

Goes without saying that as with every other programme rolled out by the company, there'll definitely be a significant data mining/harvesting aspect to it, to the maximum possible extent. Data is the new oil, doncha know? 

[Sarah977]

@Susan17  I noticed recently a "unique" listing that is featured not once, but twice on the main Airbnb page. I looked at the listing- not only doesn't it have a 5*rating, the reviews, while many are good, mention the same complaints over and over again- a very steep path to the house, which it's difficult to carry things up, and which is treacherously icy during the winter, ineffective heating during the winter, so that one has to huddle around the heat source, as the rest of the place stays frigid, one thin towel per guest, not enough bedding. Yet this place gets top billing.

[Susan17]

Typical Airbnb, @Sarah977  - all fur coat and no knickers.. 😉

[Susan17]

@Robin4

II posted this on another thread yesterday Rob.. 

Actually, in the past 48hrs, I have heard of/from a very small number of superhosts receiving invitations to apply. It's too early to tell, as I don't have enough examples yet to establish any sort of pattern, but what I can say for sure is that the claims the SH fund will be disbursed amongst the "most needy" appear to be out the window already. At least two of those that I'm aware of who have received "invitations", most certainly wouldn't fit that category, and one has another thriving business that has benefitted, as opposed to suffered, from the COVID crisis (and has confirmed that herself) As always, go figure.. 

[Melodie-And-John0]

@Robin4 , no offers here yet and I doubt I will apply if asked, I @gree with @Helen3, the bulk should go to hosts in poorer nations, they need help far more than me.   @Anonymous 's insights about the why's of this are probably more correct than not but I do feel they are trying to be charitable at the same time as get good press not in spite or as an afterthought, that matters to me.  

Heres a bit of a concern I have with how that money came to be, a healthy chunk of this money came from workers that donated some type of credits they had accrued from the mothership (not sure exactly how).   Im not completely psyched about some of the source of this benevolence even if its well meaning.  Essentially, for a large chunk, they invested employee credits in a promotion.  Its really a bookkeeping transfer of numbers from one account to another that supported an employee benefit program.  I don't love to see employees lose benefits even if they are donating them, it just seems too big an ask when things are so tenuous already.  Just my thoughts, Stay well, JR

[Robin4]

@Melodie-And-John0 

Yeah, I am not after one of these invites John....the wheels of progress are rolling along quite okay here. I have managed to fill a few cracks and do a bit of painting to try and keep this old lady up to scratch. I have replaced the shower screen that a guest put a crack in two years ago when they dropped the shower head, and everything has had a monster of a clean! Even managed to finally replace the burnt out massage motor in the bed....the cottage just bristles, welcome! It is just about buried in end of summer garden. Even the mancave up the back of the block is disappearing under garden.......

In fact I am opening up for business again as from week after next for locals from this state.

As of tonight we are down to less than a dozen active covid-19 cases with only 4 in hospital, we have been 8 days without a new case and the dreaded bug is all but stamped out here. And apart from 2 hotspots.....a nursing home in Sydney and a hospital in northern Tasmania the rest of Oz is not far behind us!

I was simply puzzled to see if anything was going to come of this as nothing had popped up here on the CC. I am interested in the way this plays out, I just hope a few needy do actually get to benefit from this and to what extent that benefit might be!

Cheers......Rob.

@Helen3  @Anonymous  @Susan17 

[Melodie-And-John0]

Wow @Robin4 , I love the overgrown end of summer garden look, what a beautiful jungle.  I agree the pause has had lots of desirable effects even in all the bad.  Its been at least a month since Ive said, I would love to do _________ if I just had the time.  Life is moving on and so will our businesses if we let them.  Ive learned many new things that I will carry forward but made sure I kept the really important stuff like family, friends, our nation and planet alive and well in the wake of the 2020 Epidemic.  This will be a bit like a corporate cleaning service in the US, Serve Pro commercial, their catch phrase is "Like it never happened" before we know it.  Stay well Robin, JR

[Susan17]

@Robin4 

Great to hear you'll be back in business again soon, and that Australia is doing such a fantastic job of beating the bug!

Realistically, it will probably be 2021 before we even start to recover here, as we don't really have much of a domestic market to help us ride the storm, even when restrictions do eventually start to ease a bit. It's going to be a long year.. 

[Anonymous]

@Melodie-And-John0   I'm reminded of this recent incident:  https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/15/fashion/reese-witherspoon-draper-james-coronavirus.html

Reese Witherspoon's apparel label pulled a "charitable" stunt offering free dresses to teachers, getting priceless free advertising when the stunt went viral. But they failed to mention that they were only offering 500 dresses. So in the end, the number of lucky winners was vastly smaller than the number of people who felt disappointed and duped. 

The same thing is happening here, and Airbnb knows it. I do hope some people in genuine need benefit from the grants, but the messaging here is that their needs assessment has a lot more to do with value to the brand image than to actual financial need (surely nobody believes they'll be carefully examining thousands of hosts' financial records from 180 countries and dozens of languages to see where the most good can be done).

Like you, I also found it rather sleazy that they claimed employees were donating to this fund "out of pocket."  Perhaps it was supposed to contribute to the very corporate-Millennial idea that Airbnb is a big family that takes care of each other. Clearly that messaging is working, judging by how many dozens of posts every day come from hosts who are devastated to discover that their listing service was not going to come in like a helicopter parent and take care of them when the travel industry collapses.  I think it would be a much different discussion if Airbnb had treated hosts like independent business owners rather than like schoolchildren who need to be controlled, disciplined, and rewarded with orange stickers when they behave themselves.