COMPULSORY enhanced cleaning protocol unrealistic for many

[Belinda55]

Dear Airbnb,

Please quit your paternalistic and bullying ‘one size fits all’ policies. There are many locations in the world with little or no community COVID infections, so to coerce hosts (by threatening blocking of calendar and bookings) into complying with a global policy is both unrealistic and unfair.
There are no other booking platforms doing this! Hosts are able to comply with local regulations and requirements and do not need this heavy-handedness from you. I have been a Superhost, with a perfect record on cleanliness, for 7 years straight, and am insulted and offended by your approach. Talk about ‘biting the hand‘ ... we are now planning to prioritise other booking platforms.

[Helen427]

Hey @Steven973 & welcome to ABB CC from over the miles in New Zealand

 If Handy is unable to do it, have you tried  Andy??

 I'm not sure if you have a cleaning product called "Handy Andy" but it's been in existence a long time, guaranteed disinfectant 😉 

[Katie1000]

I have not seen anything yet on these conversations as to what Airbnb has said to GUESTS, and WHEN they are going to say it to them.  Are guests going to have to sign a similar contract that they will wear a mask if they are in any common areas?  Starting November 20?

I rent two bedrooms out of my house as Airbnb rooms.  I have been a Superhost for more than 2 years, and most of my guests are long term, such as 2 weeks to 2 months or more.  I share the living room and kitchen with these guests, and the guests also share two bathrooms together.  (How is a guest going to wear a mask in the shower?!) 

From the US booklet regarding private rooms or shared spaces:  “As part of our COVID-19 safety practices, guest and hosts are required to wear a face mask or face covering when interacting with each other. You should also wear a mask in common areas AT ALL TIMES.” (emphasis mine)  So we will all be required to wear a mask constantly in our own home. 

This says guests are REQUIRED to wear masks.  Have they told all the thousands of guests across the world this yet?  The deadline is less than a month away.  And are thousands of guests who are signed up to stay in a private room (instead of an entire house) going to begin canceling right and left as a result of this new rule?!

To make things worse, I JUST made the decision a month ago to change my third bedroom into an Airbnb room (from a roommate) for next month.  I bought the furniture, the linens, decorations, etc.  And now I'm not sure that running it as an Airbnb room is going to even be profitable at this point.

I’m not going to feel like I’m living in my own home.  I’ll feel like I’m running a hospital, with the cleaning protocols and masks.  But without a comparable salary...

This is the worst possible timing and has hit me really hard. This is my main source of income, and I’m going to have to start investigating other platforms.  I like Airbnb because they take out the local TOTs (Transient Occupancy Taxes) and I don’t have to deal with that.  Does anyone have any recommendations for other platforms, and are there any that pay the TOTs for you?

I think Airbnb is going to be pretty shocked at how many people are going to leave – both hosts AND guests....

Please, Airbnb, let the hosts and guests CHOOSE what rules they want to follow in their own homes.  People at high risk can choose an Airbnb that has signed this type of contract for extreme cleaning and wearing masks.  Other people at low risk can choose a less stringent place to stay and save money.  You can even have them sign a waiver that they accept all risks, if liability is what you’re worried about. 

[Aidan65]

Excellent point @Katie1000   . It's clear to me that the only replies from Airbnb to hosts have simply been to restate the rules. Not even a suggestion of how we can challenge feedback.

We had a webinar for the UK and Ireland a couple of days ago for them to discuss travel tips, trends etc. They  said that more than 80% of recent bookings were for entire home stays (up from about 60%).  They was a big push on recommending hosts make booking as easy as possible including things like allowing instant booking, larger families, pets, infants etc. This is not reasonable for me - I have a solitary cat, my house is not infant friendly etc.

I am fortunate in that Airbnb is more a hobby than a source of income for me - I like to host 1-3 guests for breaks of typically 2-3 days at a time and enjoy chatting with them about themselves, the area I live, where to go, eat etc. Looking at my data for 2019 I had 40 stays over 94 nights - that's fine with me.

In the past I've had a very positive experience with Airbnb support about some booking complications but I feel they have now forgotten about those of us who host spare rooms. Airbnb's recent behaviour suggests they are becoming little more than a global booking agency benefiting professional hosts rather than those of us in the sharing economy.

I will not be signing up to the protocols as a matter of principle. I will wait and see what they decide to do our listings after 20th Nov.

[Katie1000]

That’s interesting about 80% being entire home stays.  Good to know.  Do you know if they were talking about just the UK, or worldwide?  I traveled recently and stayed at 3 Airbnbs in private rooms in homes, just to compare them to mine and to understand better what it’s like to be a guest.  I know those people won’t be able to afford to stay in business or just won’t want to wear a mask in their own home all the time.

This is really bad for the guests, too, because many people rent private rooms because it’s so much cheaper than an entire space.  I have people who stay here for a month because they’ve moved to San Diego and need time to find a place to live. I also have medical students who are doing a medical rotation at a hospital for a month, or people who come here for work.  These people can’t afford a motel/hotel, and they definitely can’t afford an entire home.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback!

[Belinda55]

@Aidan65 @Katie1000 If enough hosts DON’T sign up, they will surely have to rethink the policy ... will be cutting their own throat to block everyone’s bookings ...

[Jill958]

I totally see your point but as a professional B&B owner I don't think they've got it right for us either. I still see it aimed at the small scale one room type operator rather than a B&B with a few rooms. Also, if we use a channel manager (to make it easier to list in other booking sites) they are about to start charging us 15% commission and charging the guest nothing! Not exatly making it easy to compete with those being charged 3%! I just think they are trying to be too many things to too many people. Should have stuck to their roots in my opinion. I won;t be here after Nov 20th anyway as I'm not signing up to their global mask mandate !

[Leyla13]

@Katie1000 @Aidan65

A agree with you. Airbnb is ignoring these comments having to do with spare rooms. Airbnb is ignoring the fact that the local provisions allow for medical waivers on wearing masks.

It's been helpful to have the extra income from our shared space, but I am not signing this either. 

I hope Airbnb is significantly affected by guest cancellations or fewer bookings so that they might hear different and possible ways to deal with the issue.

I believe that a pre-booking agreement can be easily established between guests and hosts so that we can deal with this on a particular basis. NO ONE SIZE FITS ALL!!!

[Helen350]

@Katie1000  - 6 days ago I hosted guests from Colorado (!) - already quarantined 2 weeks in UK -  in my private room in my own home in the UK. They arrived maskless. - On the doorstep, I said light-heartedly, "I see you're not wearing masks, neither am I, is that OK with you? Airbnb rules re wearing  masks begin 20 Nov, so I'm not wearing one yet!" The Colorado guests replied "We know, we've signed the protocol!" (But they were not wearing masks yet!) - The subject was never mentioned again!!! - Tho the wife did say she'd had Covid in March when chatting over breakfast!

[Helen427]

 I've just had a guest who said she's agreed to it alas she's not going to comply with wearing a mask/ face covering and ticked it simply to keep using ABB.

 Great, well traveled guest I might ad.

@Helen350 @Belinda55 @Aidan65 @Peter818 

@Katie1000and others.

Be mindful The Equality Act 2010 exists and Official Government Guidance is that masks/ facecoverings offer NO protection and are pointless.

 It's no good to say that " Every other jurisdiction in the world is following basically the same policy" as that would strike me as Herd Stupidity...

@Katie 

@Airbnb 

@Catherine-Powell 

@Francesca @Anna @Noriko @Sergi 

@Liv 

@Quincy 

@Lizzie

@Stephanie 

[Katie1000]

So what do we do when one guest wears a mask everywhere in the house and another one refuses to do so?!  And then the mask-wearer will contact Airbnb if we don't force the non-mask wearer to wear a mask. So is Airbnb going to allow us to kick someone out who isn't wearing a mask, and then do they get a refund or not?  This is very complicated, and I don't think Airbnb has really thought this through.  Again, guests who share a bathroom can't wear a mask in the shower.  Are they supposed to put a mask on as soon as they step out of the shower?  Or are they allowed to wait until they dry off?  It would be laughable if it wasn't so frustrating.....

[Helen350]

Quite @Katie1000 ! - And I may host an Airbnb guest at the same time as hosting one of my on/off lodgers, who are outside the auspices of Airbnb, so I can't tell them to wear a mask! - As you say, this has not been thought through!

But then it's all for show anyway, Airbnb being seen to be doing, so they wouldn't feel the need to think it through... 

[Cave0]

It's not difficult Katie, Airbnb has confirmed in writing that the host can cancel the reservation if the guest violates the policy and there will be no refund.

[Fred13]

My immediate first thought on this whole affair was of  the social & legal ramifications in which this meddling by Airbnb can be used and abused by unscrupulous guests.  I could just 'see' the potential excuses in the future for a full refund (or worse), even well after the fact - "I didn't feel save", or "Mandatory Covid-19 protocol wasn't followed", "I contracted Covid 19 while staying in 'X' place", etc etc. It could make all hosts more vulnerable. Oh boy.

[Cassandra191]

Wholeheartedly agree with Belinda55 the requirement for hosts and guests to wear masks in countries such as our that are Covid free, with no community transmission and closed borders to any International visitors is complete and utter overkill. As a “team of 5 million” at the beginning of the year New Zealanders all worked hard to eliminate Covid from our country enduring a six week total stay at home lockdown across the whole of our country. During this time our businesses suffered and there was no hosting as all accommodation and travel was not permitted. Having eradicated COVID-19 we have been able to go about our lives as normal. New Zealanders still unable to holiday overseas have been enjoying holiday in their own country and our accommodation businesses are booming. There is no social distancing or mask wearing required and to ask our guests (and ourselves) to do so is beyond ridiculous. And as for all the PPE and cleaning requirements I can understand this if there was Covid present or a risk of it but to expect this for those of us who are not in this position is crazy. There is no way I am going to insist our guests put on masks to be taken into our property, not only would this be embarrassing but it would totally put people off. Most New Zealanders don’t actually have masked having never had to wear them and I am not going to be purchasing them for our guests. Furthermore I can just envision the type of feedback we would get if we enforced this policy, “Hosts were completely over the top, paranoid and delusional. We’re wearing masks and insisted we did to and when we didn’t have any they told us we couldn’t stay. Like WTF!”

[Debra48]

Much more important to me than all these enhanced cleaning protocols is: 1) getting reviews that note my house is “sparkling clean,” whereupon I bonus my housekeepers $40 US 2) very carefully  vetting who stays at my property 3) severely reducing the number of guests accept and 4) encouraging self check-in.