I NEED TO BLOCK A GUEST

[Krys4]

I previously had a guest who physically threatened me when I filed a claim for destroyed furniture and linen. I called AIRBNB and they said they blocked her but they allowed her to leave a slandering one-star review. To add insult to injury, she said in the private comments, "I was going to give you a five star review before you decided to charge me for the furniture". AIRBNB did not find this "against policy" although the review was clearly biased. While I wasnt happy with the review, I felt comfortable because AIRBNB customer service said she would no longer see any of my listings or be able to communicate with me.

Last week, I had a couple stay in a room and the next morning the boyfriend and girlfriend got into a screaming match that ended with him phsyically assaulting her, breaking a chair leg in the living room during the rumble, terrifying the other guests and them running out the back door when the police arrived. I've reported the guest but could not seem to block this guest no matter how much I have tried. Then tonight (one week later), his girlfriend tried to book and we declined...telling her "sorry we are unable to accept your request" (she's not instant book eligible). Then 5 minutes later, HE WAS ABLE TO INSTANT BOOK  for immediate occupancy!! Can you believe this?? I let him know via message that we would not honor his reservation and called AIRBNB that very second.

I'm on hold for 45 minutes and still waiting while a manager's manager tries to figure out what to do in this situation. What is going on?!?! Finally, Roxanne (the AIRBNB rep) comes back from hold to tell me she will cancel the reservation. We hang up. Two minutes later, she calls  back and asking permission to give him a full refund - I gladly obliged. She said she was going to "give him a full refund and help him find another place to stay" ?!?!?! I asked if she were going to tell the next host what happened during his previous stay - she said no because "that's not policy". Can you imagine AIRBNB willingly putting a guest known for assault in your home? I am shocked. I'm not saying criminal checks should occur for guests, but when guests (or hosts) are on bad behavior, there should be a mechanism in place that triggers an alert to future guests & hosts. At minimum don't let them instant book! 

I am terrified to discover AIRBNB is not following up on reported users AND not allowing hosts to block guests such as this. AIRBNB, your policy is putting hosts and guests at risk by allowing guests such as this to continue using your platform. Furthermore, you completely strip a hosts ability to protect themselves by not allowing us to block!  We (hosts) need changes ASAP.

I would recommend AIRBNB put a big BLOCK button for guests such as this. AIRBNB should take these matter extremely serious and ban guests from the site. 

[Ben685]

I agree that there should be a "Block" button. I don't think any Host would want to block a guest without just cause and loose that income. Since I have been doing this, I've had 3 incidents where Guests misrepresented the number in their party- cheating both us and AirBnB. I currently have one now who paid for one guest, but showed up in the middle of the night with 6 people. We resolved it by her going to AirBnB and paying an additional amount, but I would still like to Block her because she fed me an obvious "**bleep** & Bull" story when I caught her.

I also had another recently who claimed that 2 people in her party were bitten by bed bugs. Although her story sounded fishy: She messaged me that something in my cabin had gotten broken, ....and oh yes BTW, you have bedbugs. Regardless, I interrupted my Easter dinner with my children and grand children and drove 130 mile round trip to take care of it. I called in my cleaning lady (on a weekend) and met her to do a complete inspection. We stripped every thing down.....no bug evidence of any kind- not even spider webs or dead bugs of any kind. (We don't use box springs so every potential hiding place is easily exposed for inspection.) We've never had bedbugs, so I then called and consulted with two pest control companies and they both determined that I didn't have bedbugs, ...because there would have been evidence of some kind. Regardless, I refunded $125.00 of her $250.00 rental fee just to accomodate her. The guest then continued threatening and told me that I'd better hope it wasn't a kissing bug and proceeded to give me a list of diseases they carry. Throughout this---not another mention was made by her of the broken household item.

It's very discouraging when so many people are willing to do and say anything for a few dollars.

Ben in Utopia

[Kay185]

This is truly appalling to me.. safety was my number 1 concern when deciding to host with Airbnb. I noticed for a short time, Airbnb changed the review process for guests to ask “would you host this guest again?” Instead of “would you recommend this guest?” Which I rly appreciated. Hosting should be a positive experience! When I have a negative experience w a guest, I do not want them being able to rebook my place! I’ve had several cancel early as well & then want to rebook for free! I would love a block feature for my own price of mind to not have to deal w these terrible guests!

[Richard529]

Airbnb is obvioulsy not interested in protecting hosts.  Just making that 20% off of each booking.  I am so angry after reading this!

[Edith197]

I agree. I have a guest who continuously contacting me to go out with him. I ended up ignoring all his text. I have initially gave him a good review and agreed to host him again. Now I am afraid that he might come back and be able to reserve since I have an instant reservation set.  We really need to have an option to block easily previous guest other that the review process.

[Sarah977]

@Edith197  Contact Airbnb, tell them you have a safety issue, tell them how this guest has been harrassing you and tell them you want to have him blocked from booking with you or contacting you ever again.

[Edith197]

Thanks Sarah. I think we need that block option for our convenience. Instead if contacting them just to block a guest.

[Sarah977]

@Edith197  There is a flag symbol on the guest's profile and also next to your message stream with them to report a guest. You can click on that and then on "guest is harrassing me", or whatever the exact wording is there.