It would also protect us from scammers. I had a woman book 4 nights about 6 months in advance. She kept shifting the days around--first earlier then later, etc, but always 4 days. Then she started saying that I owed her for one night given that Airbnb had somehow dropped a night. She said she would pick it up in cash after she arrived.
I told her I didn't do cash paybacks and to sort out the over-payment with Airbnb. (Not that there was one that I could see.) She ignored my messages--several of them stating I owed her nothing.
When she ignored my final message, I contacted Airbnb and asked them to cancel the booking. I told them about the requests for cash and said I suspected a scam. So it was cancelled. In the meantime, this woman started contacting me periodically asking for her money back via the resolution centre! It just happened again this past week, 6 months after her first message to me. I wrote to Airbnb again and reiterated my belief the woman was a scammer and asked them to please block her.
The thing is, a really busy host might just pay the woman (she's always asking for reasonable sounding amounts) because they're too busy to be keeping track. The switching around of the bookings WAS confusing ultimately. Those with multiple units would be most at risk.