Just got a 3 star review & 2 stars for cleanliness.

[Terr0]

I feel stumped and devastated.

They were only me second guests. A very young couple in their twenties who were not particularly clean themselves and left my room in a little mess when they left. I left them a glowing review nonetheless. Perhaps in my naivety thinking that they would pay me back in kind.

Turns out that they think my shower and bath are grimey and the room is a little dusty (both were cleaned 2 hours before their arrival). Their other complaint was that the milk in the tea making facilities had gone off (I think it actually did) but they didn't mention it during their stay and were free to use the kitchen to get fresh milk at any point should they have wished to.

I felt that the review was harsh and a little unfair and feel stupid for giving them a 5 star review. I later found out that the girl had thrown sanitary products into my laundry basket.

Is there anything that I can do? Can I alter my review or try to pursuade them to change theirs?

[Kris12 · Accepted solution]

Reviews cannot be altered. Neither yours or the guests.

I make the same mistake sometimes, giving guests better reviews than they deserve and then feel like an idiot, when they give me unfair reviews. Communication with the best way to solve things on Airbnb. Make sure they know as much as possible before they arrive, have plenty of information ready for them when they arrive and follow up during their stay, if there is anything they need og that you can improve on.

Of course you don't write them every day, but just follow up once, after they have checked in.

And ask them at check out of course, if there is anything you can improve, for the next guests. If they have any suggestions. You might not even care or do anything about it, but as long as they believe you care, will help the reviews 😉

[Terr0]

Thanks for your reply Kris. Well... that's a lesson learned. Better earlier than later I suppose.

It's left me feeling a little discouraged. Obviously this is my home and to invite strangers already somewhat undermines the 'spirit' of it but then to endure unfair criticism really makes the whole situation a hard pill to swallow.

How do reviews for guests work? I noticed that Airbnb says hosts can't see a review until we review back but is it the same for guests?

[Gerry-And-Rashid0]

It is the same for guests, but then you do also get the chance to make a public comment on their comments on your place once the reviews are published.

[Andrea9]

Hi @Terr,

if that was your guest Harriet, then I really don't advise leaving a public response addressing any complaints.

The public part of the guest review is positive. Admitedly not glowing enough, yet certainly good enough to make a positive impression to future guests. Her hurtful critique was probably in the review section that is only visible to the host - you, as well as in the star rating - which I'm surprised is at this point visible to you (but then maybe they've changed that in the stats to when I started out).

Sometimes one hits upon guests with a larger sense of entitlement than they themselves would even be able to fulfill.

Or a guest is having a personal problem and can't handle it better than kicking the dog, um host.

It's extremely hurtful as we do our utmost to let people feel welcome in our personal spaces. But best to just file it away in a mental 'f*ck off' folder, where it is forgotten, and enjoy the nice guests, which are happily out there and in the majority.

[Andrew138]

Hi Terr,

I feel the same way about my French farmhouse.

A Belgium family stayed twice and have written positive reviews both times. I noticed that after their second stay the star rating (for value for money) dropped from 5 to 3. The price was the same on both occasions. I suspect that they have marked my star rating because, when they offered to pay cash for an extra night I pointed out that this might not be appropriate! being new to this I wasn't sure and they had over 83 reviews and a five star rating. 

The disproportionate impact of an early poor star rating is devastating, especially when it is not justified.

I emailed Airbnb and asked them to review it but I haven't heard anything and it's been at least 3 weeks.

I hope you have better luck than me.

Kind regards,

Andrew

[Bairbre0]

Hi 

I too experienced the same. My own feeling on it was I didnt feel it would be a good match from the start and I made the mistake of taking the booking as I didnt want to refuse it when really I didnt feel it would have worked out given the time available and some of the conversations we had. 

I felt it was last minute and that this is why they booked it not that they wanted to stay here.

It is an old country cottage renovated

However when they came here one of them dragged mud into the nice clean floor from his boots and didnt say anything or acknowledge it. 

Then towels were put on the bathroom floors and also rubbish put in the wrong bins and seemed to be all of their rubbish from the car journey.

They wanted to dry wet boots and clothes by the fire and on heaters which was fine but took issue when the fire went out as they do at night time. 
Little things like saying the hot water wasnt working and I had explained to them that you push the button and wait for it to heat up.

I admit I did leave it a little tight between bookings and it was my second ever so I have now been very nitpicky with myself and tried to pick on the tiniest thing re cleanliness to get it up to scratch and leave a night before and after booking booked so I can have the place as ready as possible.

I did leave  a public response as the other issue was I was not certain if they were definitely following through with the bookking as I sent them three messages two of which confirming the time and I didnt get a reply from them until the actual meeting time.

I hope I can recover from this,with my current guests and more guests although it has been super quiet since that

[JoAnne28]

I've only had two guests so far.  I made a point of telling them that their reviews were very important to my business and that they would have one opportunity to tell the world and a second one to tell me privately.  Maybe if you had advised them that they could impact you in a negative way, they would have been more thoughtful.  Sorry to hear that.  My last guests were 1.5 hours late for check out, with new guests coming in.  It was aquard cleaning around them while they packed their car.  I guess I just need to communicate and instill the rules better.  Not sure if it would have helped in your situation.  Everything in all was in great shape, so I gave them a 5 star all the same.  J.

[Leslie47]

I was given 3 stars for cleanliness. I, too am stumped. 

I don't know which guest gave me the 3-star review, but I believe it was early on in my hosting experience. Two of my guests have mentioned they didn't completely feel "safe" in the neighborhood/it was loud (REMIND ME AGAIN WHY YOU ARE TRAVELING TO NEW YORK CITY?) but not one of them ever mentioned an issue with the cleanliness of my home. 

My apartment is brand new. It is spotless. I have super high standards and intend to keep things that way. I have two professional cleaners who come into my home and *scour* it clean after every guests leave. One guest broke a door and left urine on the floor but never left me a review, so I know it certainly wasn't her.

I have received 5 stars from each guest since. 

I'll eventually get over the 3-star review. At the end of the day, I know how clean I am. People are weird. And I'm a lot more selective with whom I allow to stay in my home.

[Mandi-S-Just-Business-Ro0]

Thanks for this, Leslie.

I've had 12 reviews including 1 -four star, and the rest are 5 star.

Then Lucky 13 - my  guest demanded that I cancel his reservation. When I didn't, gave me two stars! Stated he wasted his money, etc. publicly.

Obviously he's not a pleasant chap. Should I state something? I wrestled with this one for two weeks, I then decided to respond publicly, truthfully and succinctly in bullet points. I ended by acknowledging that I had not achieved his satisfaction, and wished him well, thanking my other guests and the ABB team.

Why respond? To let other Hosts know about him. And hopefully, to caution other potentially unscupulous guests that we have boundaries.

Pride also was a factor, and I own that. But I am also encouraged by your comment about the soothing effect of "the long run". Cheers!

[Greycel-Y-Pablo0]

We have the same problem, we have been working with Airbnb for almost 2 years and is the first time that we have this problem, we always give the best for our guests and is unfair that some of them give us less stars than we deserve. The last two references we had, guests gave us 4 stars in the final calification and in the specifcs item put 5 so is not coherent one thing to other, beside that all guests before them gave us 5 stars, so we decided to write them a message to ask them the reason why they gave us that calification, and the answer were poor and they never comunicated with us to explain the "issue" ( she wanted each morning a different sandwich because she didn't like ham, and we offer not just a sandwich we offer brownies, cookies, juice, coffee, fruits, serial, milk and more) so we think is not fair and we explain her how we work and she understood and wanted to change the calification but is not possible, so we would like that airbnb staff work on this problem because is something that happens pretty often to lot of people who works with airbnb and this harm us THE HOSTS  in our califications and we are who works for this company so  they have to listen to us as a memmers of this comunity. 

[Chantal41]

The one thing you can do is call airbnb and tell them to take the review you gave the guest down. You can not alter the review but you can remove yours so it is one less good review for them. I am a plus host and just got a two star from a man who did not read to understand that the house had two real beds and two floor fold out mattresses. Everything else was perfect apparently but 2 stars cause he did not read the fine print. I called airbnb livid but they would not delete it. I texted the guest himself and explained to him that we described in detail the house to the best of our ability and requested he contact airbnb to remove the review. He agreed to when he understood that his star rating was harsh. I also have a notebook for the house and on the cover explain how airbnb stars work to the guests.