Pointless leaving a bad guest a low star review

[Kate867]

So, we recently had our first bad guests.  We had accepted them as they had 8 reviews with a five star average.  All house rules were ignored, cottage left a mess etc etc.   They had requested an early check in, which I allowed, but stressed that they needed to check out promptly as we needed to sort out quickly for next guests.  Despite this they still checked out late.  It was a desperate rush to get things ready in time due to the mess and late checkout.  In addition, during their stay they struggled to understand the heating instructions (none of our other previous guests had this problem) and suggested that I could make things clearer.  Because I felt that perhaps I had failed in some way, I issued a partial refund, for which I received no thanks or acknowledgement.

After 13 days I left a review for them giving one star for for all categories with the exception of communication as they were very quick to call when they wanted something!  They did not leave a review for me.  However, their average star rating is still 5 stars!!  Wow!  Do Airbnb do this deliberately to con hosts into accepting bookings they would probably rather decline?  And thinking about it, all our guests have either had full 5 stars or if recently joined none....  clearly, hosts can be knocked down by one poor review and guests don’t.... biased or what?

[Huma0]

@Natalie725 

I know this is an old post but I just came across it and this question is something I've been asking a lot on the CC recently. What does Airbnb define as 'recommended by other hosts'? or 'good reviews' when it comes to a guest? When we click that filter on IB, we are taking Airbnb's word that they are filtering out bad guests, but no one seems to know what the definition of a bad guest is. Is it that a host/s clicked that 'would not host again' button or is it if they go below a certain star rating and, if so, what is the bar? Airbnb makes it crystal clear where they set the bar for hosts, but is deliberately vague about it when it comes to guests.

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@Natalie725 wrote:

According to an Airbnb rep, the star ratings don't make any difference whatsoever. The algorithm only picks up on negative things written in the review. 

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I really hope the rep you spoke to didn't know what he/she was talking abut, but it wouldn't surprise me if this is in fact true. So, we're relying on an algorithm to pick up on negative things? Mmm, that sounds highly unreliable. Also, a lot of hosts are afraid of leaving an honest public review and mark down in the stars instead. One host on the CC recently said she would hit the 'would not host' button but would never mention in the actual review that she would not host the guest again or not recommended them. 

Just goes to prove that it's really important to leave an honest and factual review, even if sometimes that's a really hard thing to do.