Charge per person?

[David-and-Annie0]

We are new to this and are not charging by person because my thinking is that people will not be honest about how many guests will be in the house if they have to pay more after a certain number of guests. What do you guys think? I’ve already had several people who “request to book” only check off 1 adult, then when I ask how many in their party, it’s like 6. I imagine it’s because people don’t want to pay extra. I message them explaining that we don’t charge per guest.

I guess I just want to throw it out there and see if you guys think my instincts are right? —that people will not state how many people they are REALLY bringing if they think there’s a fee. 

[Trevor243]

@David-and-Annie0I have self-contained, self-catering properties. We set a price-per-property. When the property is booked, it is booked, whether that's 1 guest or 8, and it's the same price regardless.

I see a lot of complaints / issues in this community and on the Booking.com community where guests try to avoid "extra person" fees by booking for 1 and arriving as 2 or 3. We occasionally get some guests book for 1 and arrive with a family, but not a problem to us as the cost is the same. So yes, I think you're doing the right thing.

[Mark116]

@@David-and-Annie0 Your listing is really lovely, so I would recommend you get some type of ring doorbell security camera so you can monitor how many people are at the listing.  It's fine to charge by the place, vs. an extra guest fee, we only started charging an extra guest fee this year, which previously we almost always had 4 guests, our max, and since charging extra after 2 guests, the majority of our bookings were 2 or 3 guests.  But, people will still want to bring extra people beyond your max, so if you aren't meeting them in person or have a co host, you will want a way to verify how many are at the cabin.

[David-and-Annie0]

Thanks for responding to my post, and for the compliment on our place.

We spent tons of time putting work and love into it, and it’s hard watching people rent it now. I pray they treat it respectfully. We do have a nest camera at the front door—that’s how we discovered our first guests brought an extra guest (even though we don’t charge extra), and our second set of guests brought a dog after I had a messaging conversation with him that “sorry, we can’t allow pets” (it’s also in our listing, but he was asking anyway.)

It seems true that people are lazy about reading through whole listings, as neither of these guests noted that we say we have surveillance cameras on the premises. 
It’s a bit heartbreaking to see people violating our trust from our cameras. 

Very disappointing. So far, we’re 0-2, and I’m not feeling great about this hosting business. 

[Emilia42]

@David-and-Annie0 

My experience is that people are usually honest but for some reason the Airbnb prompt to select how many guests during the booking process is not user friendly. I would say 30% of my reservations come through with the incorrect guest count and 100% of the time it is a oversight on the guests part. I think a perfect solution to this would be for Airbnb to have the guest count default to zero. That way hosts would know if there was some sort of error and confirm the correct number. 

I think it is important to consider an extra guest fee when thinking about who would be attracted to your listing. For instance, your house is a steal for 8 college roommates having a reunion ($45 per person per night) but might be less feasible for a family of 4.

[Michelle53]

I charge a per-guest fee.   I feel my base price for one person is very reasonable, and the additional -per-head charge covers the extra costs associated with that - utilities, laundry, wear and tear, supplies etc.   It also discourages groups that might be higher-risk.  I get very mixed group size. 

It is more to manage, though. It's one of the reasons I do not use Instant Book. I have to check every reservation to make sure they are booking for the correct number of guests. But I'd rather do that ahead of time, than be trying to pursue people for money after the fact. 

Mostly, I have been successful is getting people to adjust for the extra fee. There are always the people who ignore the rules completely, and sneak more in.  If I find out, I aways file a claim for the money. Even if not successful (and I usually am)  it makes them aware. 

One time I had someone tell me they were "only going to use one bed".  I told him I would never ask guests their intentions around that, and that it was a charge to cover the costs mentioned above. He opted to choose somewhere else "within his budget".   One could also, under those circumstances, make a decision to offer a lower price, if one wanted the reservation.

[Juan63]

Sorry for the late reply but we charge per guest and yes, people do lie and do so also by mistake because, as others as mentioned, the mechanism the platform uses isn't user friendly sometimes. Unlike many hosts we only allow a max of 2 per bedroom, no couch surfing. The more guests amounts to more wear and tear. We also like charging per guest because it opens up our bookings for smaller groups who use less utilities, cleaning etc. We have exterior cameras and kindly request in many places that guests should not try to sneak people in because they will get caught. And they do get caught and are charged accordingly.