superhost

[Luan14]

Hi there, please could you look into my account and give me a reason why we have had our superhost taken off us?  I believe this is totally unfair as we have never had a bad review and we have only cancelled bookings when there has been an automatic booking.  Telling us that we are no longer superhosts is not good enough - I would like a reason asap please.  We are keen to book our house out next week and won't attract as much attention if we don't have superhost status.

[Luan14]

Yep - and this exactly what I did!  I selected the reason that I was uncomfortable!  I didn't choose any other reason - and I read the link that you posted above before I decided to do instant book!  

[Helen3]

Being able to cancel penalty free has conditions attached to it, for example it is a third party booking or the guest wants to book for more people than your listing allows for, or they want to bring a pet if you are a non pet listing.

I don't believe you can use it to exclude sets of guests you would prefer not to host, that meet your critieria for your listing @Luan14  or else hosts who discriminate could use that to filter guests they don't find acceptable.

But yes do talk to Airbnb and see what they say.

[Rachel177]

@Luan14 have you cancelled more than 3 instant bookings in the last 12 months? That could be the issue. Or it might be that you had IB turned on, turned it off and the Airbnb system now doesn't recognise that the cancellation was an instant booking.

I always contact customer service to cancel any dodgy instant bookings that I get. It means that the cancellation doesn't show up on my listing & possibly deter guests from booking with me.

[Anna2453]

I cancelled when I did NOT have the automatic booking on and still I got a warning!!

I cancelled because the person didnt have a photo and I want to know who is living in my home.

Airbnb seems to forget who is the real costumer and who is making the money for them.

After 4 years I dont think I will use Airbnb again (also because the tools doesnt work properly as in the beginning). 

[Sandra856]

Hi @Anna2453 🙂

You could have asked the guest to upload a photo or asked airbnb to do so. If the guest then wouldn't do it airbnb would cancel from there side and you wouldn't get penalized. There is a lot of newbies who may not think about the importance of uploading a photo etc. I see it as part of the job as a host to guide them. And yes, if every host could cancel with no warnings or fees airbnb would become a very unreliable place for guests to book. 

[Anna2453]

Hi Sandra, of course I didnt cancel!

I got a question from someone that didnt fill my specifications (no photo). I sent 3 mails (asking for photo) whithout getting any answer, therfore I said NO to the booking. STILL I got a threth from Airbnb that I could be punished, wich cannot be according to any laws. 

After 4 years (former Superhost) I will not use Airbnb again (if I dont recieve an apology). I am so upset!! 

[Sandra856]

Hi @Anna2453 🙂

New rules were made not that long ago that means that we as hosts won't be able to see a profile picture of a guest before a booking is confirmed. That is because there was a lot of discrimination happening. So you won't be able to see if a guest actually has uploade a photo as it won't show. We are rated in how many requests we accept /decline. We have to have at least 88%.

It is totally unfair. I had an elderly man from Norway booking. I specifically ask my guest to shortly introduce themselves and to ALWAYS tell if they arrive by car. I got a request from him saying "tourist" meaning I knew he had not really read anything on my listing. He didn't answer any of my messages as he is not using his computer/the internet that often. But I only got 24 hours to accept or decline and if I decline Airbnb's sees it as I didn't got an updated calender so I'm punished. Luckily it doesn't happen that often. But totally unfair that I'm punished because he didn't respond. 

Could it be it is because you are under the 88% you got the threath from Airbnb? You can see it under your progress page. They rate us in two different areas.  Press the superhost box and also the other box for all host. You can find it under progress when using a computer 🙂 

[Anna2453]

Thanks, now I got the answer! So that is why I didnt see the picture.

These new rules should automatically be presented to us hosts. As I all summer had automatic booking on, I imediately got the guests photo presented to me. When taking away automatically booking the pictures no longer is shown.

Do you know what penalty will be? Will they shoot or hang me or how much money will it cost?

This is why I will not use Airbnb anymore. It is not safe för me as a host. They can do whatever they want, change rules, give penalty, take away Superhost status. It is like a huge dragon that you cannot understand or control.

[Sandra856]

Hi @Anna2453 🙂

It is only if you cancel an already confirmed booking you will get penalized. When a host gets under the numbers that are expected to have (see under your progress page) we are getting warnings. Also if you get a request to book from a guest and you decide it is a bad match ask the guest to withdraw the request. That way you don't have to press decline and it won't hurt your acceptancerate. If a guest sends you a message "en henvendelse" an inquiry in english you just need to answer the question from the guest. Just ignore the accept and decline button. There is a big difference between the two. Just so you know 🙂 

The 88 % acceptance rate that we all need to have is there because otherwise hosts probably wouldn't be so interested in making sure their calender is always updated. Meaning guests would use lots and lots and lots of time looking for a place to stay and then getting turned down because the host didn't update his availibility or maybe he didn't make sure the prices was correct.

It is a huge problem for Airbnb because it makes Airbnb annoying and unreliable for guests to use.

And I aggree with you that it is so weird that Airbnb doesn't update us when changes are made like the profile picture thing. I only know about it because I host a lot and use this community. So I need to be updated.

[Anna2453]

Thanks again!

It is not exactly as you say. The booking was not yet made but still I got the warning from Airbnb. And my rate is 100 procent.

I cancelled a booking only four years ago (when I was a Superhost). At that time I tried to get some communication with Airbnb about that, but they did never answer.

When I was a guest in Marrakesh though and arrived to the place and spent three hours trying to find the accomodation and the lady didnt answer because she had forgot that I had made the booking, that lady did not loose her Superhost status. Obviously it depends of who you are or maybe what contacts you have.

It wont be a problem though because I will not use Airbnb anymore. Unless the would give me an enormously overwelming excuse for all theese three incidents, but I am totally covinced that they will never do that! A little ”**bleep**-appartment” in Stockholm doesnt have a high priority for them.

Thanks for all your help and good luck with Airbnb in the future. 😊

[Sandra856]

@Anna2453 It is exactly unconfirmed bookings that are rated. So if you decline a request someone sends you it will hurt your acceptancerate which has to be at least 88%. If it gets below 88 % you will get warnings. This has nothing to do with cancellations at all. 

If you cancel a booking and you can't document to airbnb that your house burnt down or something else (serious) happend you will loose your superhost status. It is not who you are or what kind of contract you got that matters. It happens for everyone. As I wrote one of the biggest problems Airbnb got is that host cancels bookings. It makes the whole booking system very unreliable to guests. That is why you are penalized when you cancel on a guest. But cancellations and acceptancerate is 2 different things. 

[Erika-And-Albert0]

It seems that the cancellation policy that is used for superhost status is very punitive for hosts and profit centered. It was appreciated during covid that this was suspended but there are circumstances out of our control that allow guests to cancel. Life is complex and we can't begin to know all the reasons why people may cancel, this does not reflect on us as hosts and does not seem a fair assessment of our hosting abilities. 

[Sarah977]

@Erika-And-Albert0  Your Superhost status is not affected by guest cancellations, only by host cancellations.

[Catherine2267]

It is when the guest cancels at the last minute and then asks for their money back, but because of your cancellation policy they leave you a 2* review which you can not do anything about. I had two guest do this over the last quarter and it wiped out my superhost status 

[Glenda142]

Is that why we are losing superhost is due to guests cancelling. That’s crazy. Did you get this clarified?