Do Your Airbnb Guests Often Respect and Follow Your House Rules?

[Jia-and-Herman0]

How’s everyone!!

I have been an Airbnb host for 3 years now. The guests I have met in the past 3 years, 80% of them are really pleased to work with. However, there is always that 10% -20% of guests who just don’t comply. They invite people over without consent. They play loud music and party until late night. They trash my house, and end up leaving a bad review T_T. When **bleep** happens like this, Airbnb gives so little support. Even more, they refuse to give out any of the guests’ information, so it leaves me no way to chase for reimbursement.

Earlier this year, my friend Juliana and I were chatting, and I was telling her how frustrating it is to be a host sometimes. I list my house rules on my Airbnb listing, I send them a check-in message with house rules, I also post house rules on the fridge, the kitchen countertop, the dinning table, all over the place. However, I still have no idea if the messages were heard or not. They don’t need to respond to me, and they simply do not need to say “yes and agree” to the rules I said. Juliana asked, “is there anyway you can “force” them to read the house rules and agree?” And that’s when this idea came up; we made a QR code prototype. My house rules and WiFi information are linked to this simple and neat QR code. What happens is when guests check in and want to have the WiFi information, I ask them to scan this QR code. They scan the QR code, they will first see a page of all the house rules I have listed. They will go over the house rules, hit the “agree to house rules” button, and access to the WiFi information. What we found out is people are more cautious and take it more serious of the things they “agree” on. By having them seamlessly go over the house rules, and hit that agree button, it adds a layer of security to strengthen the house rules.

I have since replaced my good old A4 paper with this simple QR code, and post it on my fridge. It looks a lot better aesthetically, and luckily, I haven’t had any issue with guests ever since. They check out on time at 11 am, they take out the trash to the trash bins outside as what the house rules say. I feel amazed haha. I also made a couple of the QR codes for my other host friends and neighbors, and they all started to use it. Now, I want to share this product to you, and want to hear what you think. Will you find it helpful to plant that extra seeds to your guests? Does it worth for me to monetize it? Please check out our page and let me know what you think. Any suggestion is valuable to us!

**

**[Link hidden in line with Community Center Guidelines]

[Sarah977]

@Jia-and-Herman0  I'm a homeshare host and my guests have all been respectful. Other than not inviting others over or bringing pets, I have no rules.

So wouldn't be of any use to me.

[Anonymous]

@Jia-and-Herman0   That's an inventive way to use QR codes - it's cool to see you've had some success with making the scan a condition of receiving the WiFi information. I hope you still have a workaround for guests who don't arrive with a device with scanning capability. 

I also wonder how this step would affect the strategy of a guest who had already planned an illicit party and invited others to join before they checked in. It's good to have several different tools in your box, but when you're a proactive host with monitoring devices such as CCTV already in place, presumably you already have the capacity to put a stop to unregistered guests before the situation escalates to an unneighborly nuisance.

There are lower-tech versions of your approach that I also find effective. Planting an Easter Egg in your listing's House Rules that must be mentioned in order to get a Request accepted is one that I like. Also, I've seen some hosts that make their WiFi password something like "N0-SMOKING_N0-PARTIES" to drive the point home.

I think the decent guests will appreciate your ingenuity and the dodgy guests will still try to weasel around it. The most important thing is that you don't inadvertently make your amenities less accessible to legit guests who happen to be low-tech.

[Jia-and-Herman0]

Awesome, thank you for your thoughtful reply! And yes, we have two cameras installed outside of the house. I have also started to see hosts install noise detector sensor, that seems interesting! I would also like to agree with what you said lastly. The intension of the QR code is to alert the troublesome guests, not to inconvenience the decent respectful guests. 

[Dale711]

Hi @Jia-and-Herman0 ,

I am totally agree with you!

                         ‘  The intension of the QR code is to alert the troublesome guests, not to inconvenience the decent respectful guests.“

QR codes are important and relevant in Airbnb.

QR codes may just provide a solution for that. Long story short, they allow you to inform guests, show them you care, and stay in touch with them while maintaining distance.

Happy Hosting!

[Elaine701]

Yeah, I like it! 

[Fred13]

One suggestion: stop trying to control people's behavior, aim for people who know how to act in the first place.

   You have a $245-a-night lovely  ~delicate~ place, BUT allowing 6 and even 8 people to stay there ($50-$60 a person) is appealing to >  $60-a-night persons. In all likelihood, they do not live in a nice place themselves, so how are they are going to appreciate your nice place? Of course, there are a million exception to this rule, but there are 7.5 billion other people in the same planet to worry about.

   So in essence, you are getting bookings by drawing guests via how cheap your per-person-price is;  this is such a common mistake in hosting, along with depending on Airbnb to solve the inevitable problems.

   Two better ways to go: rent to 4 max at $295, or 6-8 (if you must) for $495. That should cull the bargain hunters.

   I think I have written this same post 100x on this board over 5 years, so is a common mistake, I did it myself at first.

  Good luck. 

[Jia-and-Herman0]

Wow, that makes total sense! We are actually finishing up another short-term rental house, and hopefully it will go live in May. We spent a lot of efforts on this property, and we want to give it a right price that it deserves.  I will take your suggestion into consideration. I personally like to host smaller groups as well, ideally 4-6, for family or professionals. 

[Fred13]

Obviously you give a lot of effort, it is apparent. You deserve the best of guests as a reward. 🙂

[Ann72]

@Fred13  Exactly my philosophy!  Your prices need to attract people who know how to treat the place.

I went to a 1-night minimum one year.  I got a group of 10 grad students in the off-season.  They couldn't have been nicer, and left a lovely review, but they ruined the coffee table just because they didn't know how to act in the place.  I switched back to a 2-night minimum to weed out the groups who could just squeeze one night into their budgets but would never be able to get 2.

@Jia-and-Herman0  I like your idea!  Mine has been to simply sprinkle my rules into the house manual.  They will read the house manual to find out where the coffee is or how to work the TV.  In doing so they inevitably read the rules.  As a result I've had very few problems over the years.  But I'll definitely check out your QR code!

[Laura2592]

I like this idea. I would be curious to see how it affects your guests over time. Do you have the same 10-20% who don't care? Or is the proportion lower?

We have about 10% of guests who are issues. I have heard from other hosts that this is about the average. That means that the VAST majority are fine to great. Those 10% though-- lots of time spent on dealing with shenanigans for a small group.

[Michelle2586]

@Jia-and-Herman0  That is a great idea! So, when you create the QR code is it actually taking you to a website? If so, if I purchase your QR code set-up would we be able to make changes to our rules or Wi-Fi code, as needed?

[Jia-and-Herman0]

@Michelle2586 Yes, after scanning the QR code, it will take the guest to a web page that shows your house rules. They need to hit agree the house rules in order to access the WiFi information. And yes, you can change your rules and WiFi info anytime by emailing us. Just a quick survey, how often do you find yourself changing the house rules? We want to eventually implement with log in account for each user, so they can go on their individual account, design their own QR code page and change information whenever they need it. But of course, that requires a lot of upfront designs and coding. We want to make sure the demand is there before we making it happened haha. 

[Michelle2586]

Hi,

We don't change House Rules now, but have changed Check-Out instructions. We would want guests to agree to both. We are new hosts, so we made changes in the beginning. I don't anticipate many, if any changes going forward. 

Thank you for your response!

[Ann72]

@Jia-and-Herman0 @Michelle2586 Over the years I change and tweak the rules and the house manual.  So I would definitely want complete access to my own text with this app.  I would never trust anyone else to get it to look the way I want it to look.  Even the spacing I use between sentences and between paragraphs is extremely important to me.  Not to mention the spelling and grammar.