Unreasonable Guest?

[Richard1070]

Hello Fellow Hosts and Guests, 

We recently had a guest in our apartment that found the oven unclean which then triggered what appears to be a bit of a witch hunt.  He made a list of all the imperfections in the apartment.  We of course were very apologetic, reacted quickly on the day, cleaned the oven at a time that was convenient for him, and rectified many of the other items he raised that could be sorted on the day (replaced chiped crockery, cleaned the range which was due, replaced stained chopping boards etc).  He conceded that things were much better but was very critical on the message thread saying that we should be inspecting things more often to ensure that these things don't happen.  We explained that we do inspect it quite regularly but guests aren't always as respectful as he is etc etc trying to be nice and explain how quickly things get damaged etc.  We certainly didn't get a thanks for jumping to and getting things straightenned out. He said he'd run hotels for 20 years and we should be more serious about our business, it was all our fault for not inspecting things often enough, he was expecting something special and felt he should have stayed at home in the UK where it was clean.  We did ask him if there were any other issues regarding cleanliness and he didn't come back to us on that.  For the rest of the stay he was quiet.  After he checked out he submitted a claim for money to get about a 50% refund.  He's currently not answering messages. 

His expectation of something special is interesting.  He paid less than AUD160 a night for his stay and got a beach front apartment, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, in room spa, resort facilities including hot tub, sauna, indoor pool, outdoor pool, gym, tennis courts etc.  Next door there is a hotel with inferiour facilities that costs $200 / night for a single king bed room.  So value wise we think it's pretty good, and so have our previous guests.  

Where it gets tricky is that we have great feedback generally.  Our rating got dragged down to 4.8 due to a rogue guest who somewhat trashed the apartment, broke into our cleaning supplies cupboard, used illegal drugs in the space, and stole our neighbors bike then left us a 3 star review, but apart from that it's been mostly 5 stars with the odd four star review.  This guest has said it was the "Worst place he's ever stayed in", which just doesn't in any way reflect how all our other guests see the place, we get a lot of wonderful comments which is warming.  Some of the possible scenario's I've thought may have provoked this are: 

1) He's extremely sensitive to hygiene and finding the dirty oven has psychologically affected him so that there's no way he could see anything else as clean

2) He's jaded from his 20 years of managing hotels and no doubt getting slammed by guests for petty things so is dealing it back out

3) He's simply gunning for a refund

AirBnB have suggested  we refund the cleaning fees after reviewing things.  I am concerned this will anger him as it's well short of what he has asked for (AUD130 verse AUD600). He hasn't reviewed us yet and we're pretty sure, given how rude and unreasonable this guest has been he'll blow up about not getting the refund he has asked for and give us a terrible review.  We raised this concenr with AirBnB are saying the two matters are separate (which is an extremely poor read of human psychology, but that's their view).  We're actually pretty sure the guy is going to slam us in the review anyway so it really feels like a lose lose situation.  We see our options as: 

1) Pay what he's asked now and hope he changes heart for the review

2) Pay a bit more and hope he changes heart for the review

3) Pay what AirBnB suggest and hope he doesn't hold that against us for the review

4) Wait until the review period has expired so our response to the refund request doesn't affect the review either way

5) Other?? 

We're not sure what to do and would like some advise from the AirBnB community.  Thanks in advance!  

Rich and Hayley

[Emiel1]

@@Richard1070 ,

II would refund what Airbnb suggest, to keep everybody satisfied (the cleaning fee).. Do not worry about the review, these kind of guest are unpredictable, whatever you offer them. If the review is really bad, write a proper comment and also contact Airbnb. You are a host with a a professional and business attitude, not bending to lunatics.

Hope this helps,

Emiel

[Richard1070]

Thanks Emiel, sounds like good advice. Great to get people's input on this.

[John2192]

Emiel  in Leeuwarden, Netherlands

Thank you for the comment

I am not a lunatic

[Philipp2058]

Was it you?

[Mark116]

He is almost certainly going to leave you a bad review no matter how much money you give back to him, since he already told you it was the 'worst place he ever stayed in'.   So, since you are going to take a serious star ratings hit, do you also want to take a serious $ hit?

PS...I don't even see your listing on your profile, did airbnb suspend you already?

[Richard1070]

We took it down.  We are re-assessing to be honest as this has caused a fair bit of stress.  I take a lot of pride in things that I do so for now have paused the listing (we have guests booked until March next year so have some time to consider things).

I've done some quick maths on the star rating hit and it will probably drop from 4.8 to 4.7 with a one star review.  So not too concerned but we are exploring other options for the apartment.  AirBnB don't seem to be in the host's corner, the only other bad review we got was 3 stars and that guest was a real rogue who strangely have been able to change their name twice on the AirBnB platform whilst still being listed as government ID checked.  Interestingly their credit card failed too and couple that with the fact they broke into our cleaning cupboard, stole our neighbors bike, had to be escourted out, we using illegal drugs etc etc I suspect some stolen cards / identity fraud there.  But despite all this AirBnB left their review up and the guest is still active on the platform.  I just can't image in what world a host would want somebody like that to stay. 

[Gin8]

I was just about to report an issue we are having with our guest, but  in comparison with urs he is almost an angel. 

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@Richard1070

Completely agree with what @Mark116 and @Emiel1 say.

I honestly am against refunding anything at all......even the cleaning fee. When the guest complained you immediately rectified the situation. That guest will not give you a good review no matter how much money you give him.

I hope you leave an honest review. Something like "Based on my experience, this guest is better suited to hotels."

[Mike1034]

I agree with you 100%. If a refund of cleaning fee were give to the guest, the guest would do it again to other hosts.

[Elena87 · Accepted solution]

@Richard1070

A self appointed hotel inspector, now that's bad luck.

Fifty percent refund is utterly disproportionate though, sounds more opportunistic.

If the guest was that unhappy, that should have been discussed on day one instead of being lobbed in after check-out. You can't negotiate with such an unreasonable request.

His expectations are self set, nothing you can do about that.

Certainly you can reflect on standards if valid, that's one thing you can learn from that (power) trip.

PS Don't let airb brainwash you with star ratings - 'dragged' down to just 96% ?

[Salem2]

Don't refund, I had a similar guest who photographed the smallest insignificant details and sent them to Airbnb as justification for a full refund. 

The dispute went on and on and finally Airbnb agreed that there was no claim but asked me to refund them 50$ to close the issue, I complied but it didn't stop them from writing a 1* review and I didn't even get half the original payout.

Its not worth the hassle, say no refund and let Airbnb deal with it. Ideally if there is no 'real' issue they should stick to your cancellation policy. The bad review is unavoidable and Airbnb can't support you when it comes to unfair ratings there are just to many grey zones.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Richard1070

this is catch 22 situation. Whatever you do you are sc*ewed. I hope Airbnb will introduce new system they are talking about (allow to remove 1 bad review per year)

[Cormac0]

@Richard1070

In my opinion this is just another example of how tyrannical the review system has become, where a malcontent can adversely affect your overall rating.

Did he come as a guest or an inspector? Was he going to use the oven? for me where you lose a little sympathy is the chipped cups there really no excuse for that, as it is probable one of the cheapest things to remedy.

This remind of a story my auntie told me about a lady who used to hold dinner parties for circa twenty guest and my auntie could not understand how under the circumstance she manager to keep her kitchen so clean and tidy, The lady in question showed my auntie her secret, she had two kitchens a show kitchen and a working kitchen! which as one would except was not so clean and tidy.

So, what I’d like all host on here to do is go to their working kitchen and mark their oven out of ten I gave my oven four out of ten, ostensibly because my house keeper uses the oven every day.

To conclude this rating system is losing all creditable in my eyes, no refund!

[Cormac0]

@Richard1070

@John2192

Now I've seen John's side of the story, I'm afraid Richard, I'll have to change my tune, you have a lot of work to do!

The problem as I see it is, Airbnb has no quality control in place so if you’re a regular Airbnb user and are used to the standard of cleanliness most hosts provide your listing would be found sadly wanting.

It has been my contention for quite some time one can’t be an absentee landlord when one is running an Airbnb et al listing if you want to maintain one’s standard.

Cheap and cheerful does not mean dirty.

On a more practical note, wooden chopping boards have found to be more hygienic then the plastic ones as timber contain antibacterial properties and would not show the obviously heavily indent marks as shown in the photographs  John has taken.

Sack your cleaner and do the job yourself.