We were super hosts until we had an unrealistic review from a newly joined Airbnb guest group.

[Jo_Ian0]

This was their first stay with Airbnb & they have killed our business with their unfair comments as we have had no further bookings through Airbnb since their stay three months ago. They arrived on Christmas Day & let themselves in as I had explained we would be away for the day & I met them the following afternoon when they returned from an outing & they were an Asian couple with two teenage boys. The weather during the day was very hot but by night it had cooled down so I had opened the windows on our side of the house (under the same roof) before going to bed about 10pm. At midnight I received a call on the landline from Canada to say our guests had an emergency which turned out to be that they said they could not lock the front door & they had bugs. I went around to their front door in my dressing gown & found that they had already locked the security door & were wanting to lock the main door as well, so I flicked the snib on the lock for them. Next I investigated their bug problem which turned out to be two flying insects that had come in through the flywire screens due to the lights being on for hours as they had not gone to bed & it was after midnight. I removed those as we were in the other half of the house & had no problems. I was then asked to turn on the airconditioning all night as they wanted to close the windows, which I did. Why did they not just knock on the adjoining door to tell me of their concerns instead of photographing & internationally phoning Airbnb for over an hour? I think their teenage boys were bored & looking for something to do. Their unkind review, in spite of my best efforts, dared anyone else to stay as they would be expecting to stay in a country house but it was more like camping! Is there anything I can do three months later or do we have to leave Airbnb due to their damaging review?

[Jo_Ian0]

Hello Mark

Thanks for your great advice & support -  greatly appreciated - I will try to review our site as best I can. Jo.

[Clare-and-Coco0]

I had one really poor review that never bothered my bookings due to the rest of mine being positive! Coupled with the fact that it was so terrible on their first stay they came back twice more! People see through that.

 On looking at your profile and reviews he has responded to your review on his page. To me his response to you on his own page shows the measure of him and will be to his detriment I believe when he tries to book elsewhere. Very few will have the time or energy to go back and forth seeing reviews from both sides and will just look at what they see on your profile. I saw no issue with what he wrote on your actual page and agree with others that no bookings may be just bad timing so have a refurb, change around and I'm sure it will improve.

P.S, How did this stop you becoming a superhost, my bad review directly on my profile never affected me?

C & C

[Sarah977]

@Clare-and-Coco0  It isn't a bad written review that affects Superhost status, it's the overall star rating, and when guests write a bad review, you can bet they also gave low stars. If a host has high occupancy rates and quick turnovers, i.e. takes a lot of one night bookings, etc, they might have hundreds of reviews in a year, so one bad star rating won't affect them that much. But for those who host longer stays, or have definite off-seasons, or have lots of guests who don't bother to leave reviews, one bad star rating can tank the host's ratings.