Discontinue lowest review

Discontinue lowest review

This new feature is unnecessary and doesnt add value for guests and further punishes hosts in an already flawed star system. 



Response from Airbnb

Based on feedback from the host community, we decided to terminate the Lowest Review feature. The intention of this feature was to help set guest expectations for a stay by highlighting aspects of past experiences that did not go well. However, your feedback helped us understand how sometimes a review can unfairly represent the experience that you will provide future guests. Though this feature was not the best approach, it’s still a priority of ours to ensure travelers see the reviews that accurately capture what it’s like to stay in your place.

 

48 Comments
Elenor0
Level 3

I was searching for an Airbnb to stay at next weekend and out of curiosity I clicked on "lowest review" of the places I was considering. After reading the worst reviews of about a dozen places I started to get a bad feeling about Airbnb and ended up booking alternative accommodation.

Normally I love staying at Airbnbs.  Previously, I would read the most recent reviews to make my decision about where to stay and always had a great time.  But in this recent search, each place had at least one complaining review and reading them made me not want to stay in any of them.  The bad reviews could have been years old, there was no way to tell, but they had the effect of me searching elsewhere for accommodation.

I suggest Airbnb show reviews chronologically which will make them more accurate.

Crystal4
Level 2

I agree that there seems to be a feature that bumps up a bad review upfront and center, despite in the same time period you had 30 perfect 5 star reviews. Why? There is always going to be that person that finds fault with everything. Who expects a Luxury hotel experience with breakfast in bed and and and for $50/per night. They walk in the door looking for problem. You are too friendly on not friendly enough, too far to the beach or too close to the beach. Those people should not be taken seriously and hopefully guests can see through them. Some can, some have laughed at the ludicrous comments that type of person has made, but others might not book for that reason. It is frustrating. I think that airbnb should purge older reviews (because maybe you have upgraded your space in the last year or two) or reduced your price or added something so the old reviews are no longer relevant. Also, They should knock off the three worst reviews in the last year.. Thanks! Charleston Southern Belle

 

Wendy117
Level 10

Shades of eBay here - changing the system to unfairly penalising host (sellers) based on flawed feedback from guests (buyers).  Like many, I stopped importing goods and closed my eBay shop.  But unlike eBay which still has huge sellers so the little ones don't matter, I would think happy hosts should be critical to Airbnb success.  Ah well, at least my reviews on the other hosting site are fairly displayed latest first.

Oscar39
Level 2

I have been Superhost for two years and now instead of getting a reward for doing a great job, Aibnb is punishing me adding a new tab "LowestReviews" to my listing that HIGHLIGHT one unfair review published many months ago by a difficult guest that together with her husband destroyed some items at my home during their stay at my place.  

 

This "LowetReviews" new tab is terrible, unfair and also a bad marketing strategy.  Everybody knows that people remember negative events more than positive ones.  

 

I do not understand why Airbnb is doing this, since I already have 5 star rating for Accuracy, Communication, Cleanliness, Location, Check In and Value.  

 

 

Lois-and-Darryl0
Level 10

I am alarmed that a company that I've admired for a while, Airbnb, would arrive at such a derogatory, and inflammatory system of rating hosts.  We all know that this is encouraging our Guests to come up with something negative to say.  The Lowest ratings have no current relevance, when anyone searching for the right Airbnb rental has the ability to scroll through all of the reviews and read them, other than for those people who WANT to find that information.  I can say that most all of us here spend a lot of time reviewing our own and others' reviews, and constantly seek to improve our properties and our hosting experiences THROUGH the reviews, not as a punishment, but as a desire to improve what is already a positive experience.  Let's seek to keep those experiences positive.  A "low rating" that occurred a year ago is almost certainly no longer relevant and shouldn't be highlighted.

it seems that they finally removed this lowest review tab - i am not seeing it

I hope AirBnB learns to consult with hosts

NB just now all my reviews are randomly sorted in no particular order - this is also not correct

Sorry to seem silly, where is the tab on our listing that shows the lowests reviews? Just previewed my listing and I can workout where the guest see this. Mine just shows all my lastest reviews?

Elenor0
Level 3

It seems Airbnb have discontinued it, which is a sensible decision on their part.

Julie459
Level 2

Totally agree. Reviews should be in chronological order, so that the guest can see the most recent reviews.

It is bad enough to recieve a bad review about one's own home, but when you have then worked hard to recitfy an issue it is terrible to see the old bad review at the top of your page.

 

How can we communicate as a group to Airbnb?