Pre approving without seeing guest profiles

[Eamon-and-Tomás0]

I think it is unsafe and unreasonable for Airbnb to expect hosts to give preapprovals to guests without having seen their profile.  We have stopped giving preapprovals and not grant any unless the profile becomes visible. As superhosts, we will lose our status if we refuse a booking if we grant a preapproval and then subsequently decide we do not wish to welcome these particular guests into our home.

Come on Airbnb, play fair with hosts.  You are giving an unfair advantage to commercial organisations who are not inviting guests into their homes, but into  purposemade rental accommodation. 

[Susan17]

@Helen3 

The profile pic wasn't actually my guest- it was posted by a host in another group, and the scenario I was suggesting here was merely hypothetical. (But I definitely would have been hitting the "cancel" button, had it been an Instant Booking I received - regardless of the consequences! My neighbours ain't ready for no  Lady Boss' "adult birthday" shenanigans!! 😉)

I have seen a lot of posts in other groups though, from hosts who have been falsely accused of - and penalised for - discriminatory or biased behaviour, when they've tried to cancel a confirmed booking - for one (perfectly valid) reason or another - after having seen the guest's profile pic. A whole other can of worms, for sure. 

[Eamon-and-Tomás0]

Hi Susan,

but (if you cancelled after accepting)  you would have lost your superhost status for a year, and possibly be fined by airbnb. If guests can have a "cooling off" period (without penalty) then so should hosts. I was perfectly happy with the previous arrangement, and like Gordon & Jorge, we have never rejected guests based on their photo. Our accommodation is not suitable for more than two adults. Occasionally people enquire if it is ok for someone to sleep on the sofe bed, and on a case by case basis, we say yes or no.  For families with young children (so far) we have said yes., and given a pre-approval. But we would probably say no to three adults, or two couples. We have been caught out when we were asked if a friend could stay for one night, and we said yes, only to find they stayed for the duration of the booking.  Unless we can read reviews and/or a profile, we will no longer grant pre-approvals to enquiries. We are the only ones who will suffer from this policy, as guests seem to like pre-approvals, but we need to have some idea who we are letting into our home. 

[Sarah977]

@Eamon-and-Tomás0  Although I do get many guests sending their first communication as an Inquiry, all I've gotten in the last couple months came in the form of Requests. So you're saying that on an Inquiry, when you click on that circle with the letter in it, that now takes the place of the guest photo, it doesn't take you to the written profile info and reviews? It doesn't go anywhere?

[Eamon-and-Tomás0]

Hi Sarah,

the enquiry i received this week had no information about the possible guest.  She had a question about the sofabed, and i replied as best i could.  But had i seen a profile or seen reviews (this person has been a member of Airbnb for over a year), i would probably have pre-approved them. She has not replied to my answer or to my follow up message. so i guess she has booked elsewhere. 

[Sarah977]

@Eamon-and-Tomás0  Thanks for response. But what I am specifically asking is, when you clicked on the circle with the letter in it, to the left of the message stream with the guest, it didn't take you to a profile page? It didn't do anything?

[Eamon-and-Tomás0]

Hi Sarah,

apologies. Yes it took me to the profile page. But it had no information other than the city where the enquirer may live.  As she has been a member for more than i year i would have expected to see reviews from her trips. So either the reviews are hidden from me, or she received no reviews, or she has made no trips. All are possibilities. In fact i seem to recollect that the profile page for people who had not yet taken trips said something like: this member has yet to book airbnb accommodation. But i could be mistaken. 

[Beth80]

The trend seems to be to provide as little as possible to get approved by Airbnb. Just went back over my last 10 guests/ inquiries. Of those 10 only 2 filled in the part that says "tell a bit about yourself" .

So here I am with an inquiry to stay in my home from someone new to the site, no reviews, no details and it says this person provided a telephone number for verification.  The idea that Airbnb says they care about our security is a joke. It is left to the host to ask the right questions and proof of documents when they arrive and pray hard that the person isn't lying. 

[Carl160]

I totally agree with you.  We do not accept automatic reservations and require a phone number from the guest, which naturally I can call to verify.  Then program the electronic lock to their phone number.  If we don't get the number, they don't get to book.   If I have a phone number they can't get away with murder because I can run them down with a court order and seek damages without suing Air BnB.

[Gordon0]

How many times have you had to 'run them down with a court order and seek damages' before, @Carl160? Assuming it isn't those types who often use a burner?

[Carl160]

Hi Gordon,

I've only had two incidents where I considered legal action.  The first one I did not realize AirBnB wouldn't provide contact information to serve legal notice without suing AirBnB.  So we ended up being stung.  With most people, we've found infractions are minor and not worth being terribly upset.

You are correct though about people.  There are those out there that are going to burn us.  It's part of doing business.  We have to build it into our cost of operation and move on.  Time is worth money too and the amounts involved here often are not worth what it requires to collect even if collectable.  The best thing we can do is to be careful and screen the best we can, and when possible be present and visible.  That too discourages undesired conduct. 

[Ting-and-Ning0]

We usually do not give pre-approvals when people are not ready to book. Pre-approval presses people to book within 24 hours. It may add frustration to a large group who are at the preliminary stage of deciding where to stay, before they collect the fund from the group, which takes time to do. People can book via instant booking. They can book anytime when they are ready if they meet your basic requirements such as government ID or good standing from previous stay, etc.

[Josiah0]

Do none of you use Instant Booking?  I guestimate about 75% of our bookings are IB.

Not seeing a profile picture isn't such a big deal for me anymore.  It's more of a curiosity thing than anything else.  However, the number of people without biographies, even something simple, is a lot more telling.  If a guest is going to be staying in someone else's home, the least a guest can do is tell you a little bit about themselves.  I could care less what they look like.

[Gordon0]

We're on IB too, @Josiah0, and I'm probably up there in the 90% of bookings coming that way.  I never cancelled a booking after seeing a photo before so it's no skin off my nose either way.