"Airbnb’s fee structure: The Advisory Board has been discussing how Airbnb can help Hosts set a fair, competitive rate that’s more transparent to guests."

[Michele511]

I received this announcement today for superheats in via email:  "Airbnb’s fee structure: The Advisory Board has been discussing how Airbnb can help Hosts set a fair, competitive rate that’s more transparent to guests."

Is there a problem? I've never had a problem setting rates.  And, What is the transparency problem?

Thank you.

[Michele511]

Certainly true of hotels. 

[Anonymous]

@Debra300  If only the nightly rate displayed to the viewer in Search was uniformly the average of all rates+taxes divided by the number of nights....or if search results were delivered with the total booking cost rather than the pre-fee nightly cost...you'd have a straightforward way to display the fee structure.

But this is not a case of hosts needing help displaying their rates better; it's a case of the listing service needing to streamline its presentation of total prices better. As a guest, you want to know quickly from your search results what the total cost of a prospective booking might be - it doesn't particularly matter how much of that cost goes to Cleaning Fee or taxes or corporate coffers, you just want to know what you'll be charged. 

I object to this being presented as a problem hosts need to solve, when it is actually not a problem created by hosts at all. 

[Debra300]

@Anonymous,

I agree with you that this is not a host problem, and that people just want to know the average nightly rate and the true total cost.  I like Vrbo's search filter option of total cost, because ultimately I need to find a space that fits my overall travel budget.  I think that nightly rates primarily help a person to assess if the space is an acceptable value for what's being offered.

Searching strictly on non-fee inclusive nightly rates results in the searcher missing listings that may be affordable.  In the graphic below, the lowest night rate is $34 -$45 less than the other two, but there is only a $10-$14 difference in the total price, excluding the 14% city tax.  Persons with a filter set at $75 would not see that the higher nightly rate listings have similar total costs.  

[Michele511]

This discussion could easily be shortened if @Airbnb would chime i here and explain the reason for this requested discussion. Would appreciate it @Airbnb   

Thank you. 

[Mike-And-Jane0]

The host only fee will make it much easier to dual list with booking.com as a host can just use the same price on both platforms rather than today where they would have to set a different price on each platform if they want to ensure the guest pays the same.

I believe that in Europe potential guests see all the costs so do not get shocked by taxes/charges that suddenly appear when clicking on a listing. If AIRBNB are taking this concept to the rest of the world then they should be applauded.

[Helen3]

Can you copy and paste this email @Michele511  . Not something I received 

[Paul1255]

I haven’t decided to pay the guest service fee, Airbnb didn’t give me a choice in the matter- the language used feels deceptive!

No doubt some lovely PR fluff to follow soon that the Host Advisory Board has been listening to hosts around the world, and hosts say they want a host-only service fee structure 🙂 

Some hosts will know that the host-only fee has been around for a couple of years, available if you use a channel manager to manage your listings (making listing across platforms easier) so it’s not something an advisory board will have created or implemented.

@Michele511  @Emilia42 

[Michele511]

@Paul1255  What is a host-only service fee? I don't understand. 

@Airbnb Will you kindly chime in on this? You are the ones who wanted our feedback, yet it is unclear what you want or intend? 

@Airbnb 

[Sarah977]

@Michele511  Host only service fee is what we've been talking about here. It means the guest pays no service fee and the host's service fee goes to about 15% in total. In which case the host has to up their nightly rate to ensure they are making as much as they were when they only paid 3%.

[Robin4]

@Michele511  @Sarah977  @Paul1255  @Helen3 

• Airbnb’s fee structure: The Advisory Board has been discussing how Airbnb can help Hosts set a fair, competitive rate that’s more transparent to guests.

Well, there you go, just as I suspected and brought up on threads when this 'Hosts Advisory Board' was set up late last year. 

Seriously, what host is going to let Airbnb  'help' talk them into setting up a 'fair, competitive rate'!

I am I missing something here? Isn't that just company spin telling us yet again to lower our rates.

*

I was really hoping that I would hear something like, 'After input from The host Advisory Board the host  message stream has been redesigned to once again incorporate the month's calendar page to help hosts quickly access individual booking information'.

or.....

'After discussions with the Host Advisory Board the company have agreed to set up a daily updated hosting bulletin board with current and imminent programming changes'!

I had at least hoped for something that indicated the Boards influence was having a positive effect on Airbnb in promoting initiatives trying to improve their relationship with their hosts, try to make their job just a bit easier.

But once again it is this fixation on the part of the company to secure reservations at any cost and good hosts have been sucked into this board to simply give Airbnb another avenue to hammer home their point.

Disappointing.....but not unexpected! I was hoping for something along the lines of a hosts union, not for yet another PR arm of the company.

Cheers.........Rob

[Sarah977]

@Robin4  Well, a lot of us called this one before it even got out of the gate, didn't we.

From the self-congratulatory announcement of the formation of the HAB, to "represent hosts", to Airbnb's hand-picking of the board, to the posts the HAB members started contributing, which read like they were written by the corporate body, complete with all the company buzz words and phrases, to the fact that the HAB members have told us they aren't at liberty to tell us what they are working on (since when are people who are supposedly representing your interests "not at liberty" to tell you what they are doing on your behalf???), that this is just another virtue-signaling PR exercise comes as no surprise.

You know what bothers me the most? That Airbnb takes full advantage of the fact that the majority of hosts are good, trusting people ( if we weren't basically trusting, we wouldn't let strangers in our homes) , who really want to believe that Airbnb cares about hosts. We want to believe that so badly that we are willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, over and over again, only to get sucker punched every time. It's despicable, really.

I'd like to see the company put out an honest, no BS announcement for once. It would read "Hosts- screw you. We just don't care."

[Fred13]

I am a fan of just showing the base price as it is now, then the guest easily gets to see what Airbnb (or another booking agency) is charging in fees and what is the cleaning fee when they hit 'Calculate Price'.  In this way the guests can make the decision whether to go with Airbnb, Vrbo, Expedia, etc (or Direct - usually no booking fee) based on the absolute price with each (aka the bottom line). 

Lumping it all together up front will inevitably lead to a lot of price 'games' by hosts.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Fred13 What 'price games' can be played if all the costs are lumped into the price? Surely only displaying the nightly rate leads to gaming of cleaning costs etc.

[Fred13]

   Not really, it is now pretty obvious as is, upon end calculation. As is how much Airbnb (or whatever booking agency) is charging for their service. Many travelers do not like the whole booking fee scene and oftentimes go another route when fully informed, I think Airbnb knows this.

   I vote let the buyer be the judge, they are not children that can't do simple math, but  do show them who is getting what and why.