Guest profile picture no longer visible until booking confirmed

Ramona79
Level 4
Waratah, Australia

Guest profile picture no longer visible until booking confirmed

Hello everyone, I am a single parent with a young child and I have been hosting for quite some time. 

 

I am selective as to who I host as I share the space. I am appalled that when a guest books I can no longer see their profile picture. 

 

I want a visual on who I am potentially hosting! 

 

They can see ours, so how is it fair we can not see them?

 

i understand this may be an attempt to prevent discrimination but we are the people opening our homes.

It’s a saftety issue that air bnb has over looked. I will now be asking for full names and further details, which will slow the approval process.

Anybody else feeling this way?

 

47 Replies 47

Showing profile pic allows for discrimination. You can’t  determine by one pic if someone is a good person or not.  What if a owner doesn’t like ugly people, or fat people. In America some people don’t like brown people. You can’t judge a book by its color. That is horribly wrong. Also Airbnb can be sued if discrimination is proven. 

Crazy not to be allowed to view a potential guest in your own home. After they’ve booked is not the same. 

Robin4
Level 10
Mount Barker, Australia

@Helen3 @Emilia42

Hi Helen, I am not getting 'upset' whether a guest photo is visible or not! What difference does it make? The guest is still the same guest no matter whether you can see them or see a goldfish! And if contributors here on the CC are to be seen as a random sample of users many of them don't have a useable photo. A lot of profile photos feature ducks in flight, or sand rolling in on a beach, or the favourite pooch!

I don't give a provberbial! I accept guest whether they have photos or not!

 

What I am concerned about is the fact that Airbnb would see this as a worthwhile initiative, something that would improve the running of the platform....lead to less issues. Each year the hosts job gets harder as Airbnb searches for that hosting utopia where complaints disappear and Airbnb are able increase their service fees to 50%.

Last year a report (according to Forbes) showed that 8% of Airbnb hosts are Superhosts. How do you go about lifting that percentage because, that is seen as a sales positive? You increase the statistical minimum requirement so that at least half that number will loose their status......Is that a good sales initiative? How did they ever think that was going to build business confidence, downrating your trusted star host base!

We are continually being bombarded with system tinkering, which it is left to us to find out by trial and error. Wouldn't a running hosting bulletin board showing proposed changes be a good idea. At least give us some idea of what is going on.

 

Photos.....Helen and Emilia, I couldn't care less about photos, it's the fact that Airbnb never thought it was important enough to be a hosting issue!

 

Cheers......Rob

@Helen3 and @Emilia42, personally I don't find the photos as important as the tone and substance of their initial request message and the subsequent discussion. That discussion along with verifications and/or prior reviews are what I consider most important.

 

However, I can understand how many people are upset over the issue and do want to see who is coming into their homes. The point is that Airbnb should not be controlling this issue as it has decided to do.

@John1080, I see what you’re saying. Perhaps Airbnb wants hosts to stop putting so much trust into one profile photo. You never really know who is showing up at your house. Whether they have a photo or not does not change what kind of guest they will be. My best guest was a cactus. And my worst guest was a well-dressed man with his arm around his son, standing in front of a lighthouse.

 

I see that you just changed your profile photo and it completely threw me off 🙂

@Emilia42, haha yeah all this photo talk inspired me ha! Yes, the photo is certainly not the determining factor in most cases, but I think those guests who do want to see a photo should have control over that and I don't think this change is going to do much to address the problem Airbnb says they're trying to stop.  We shall see! 

What exactly is the problem Airbandb think y]they are trying to control?

Richard272
Level 1
Brighton, United Kingdom

Im not sure whether I am making a general comment or replying to you 

 

However I am also shocked by this new rule - I want to see the faces of the people comig to my house before they arrive - they can see pictures of me on my profile s0 why not the other way around ?

NOT SAFE - Now profile photos aren't displayed until a booking is confirmed?? Why?! I welcome everyone to my house, I don’t discriminate anyone, everyone is welcome in my home, but my safety is priority. I’m a very busy host, I’m very thankful to Airbnb, I’ve been a Super Host since the beginning of time, I get inquiries all the time, some of them, often, are scams, nosy neighbors, shady people that ask you so much about you and your home and don’t even bother to respond to you. I already give up so much of my self to the public. Pictures of myself, my entire home is on the internet, my things. When I’m home and when I’m not. Asking a picture to people who are just enquiring is uncomfortable and inconvenient.  Airbnb is making things difficult and is getting harder and harder to be a host.

Rebecca181
Level 10
Florence, OR

If Airbnb put as much time, concern, and energy into discussions and policies focused around host's safety and comfort (particularly those of us who are sharing our homes) as they do implying that our automatic default as hosts and as human beings is to 'discriminate' (whether it be discriminating against an emotional support animal or a human being), many hosts would not be feeling so frustrated and fed up. Including me.  

Chris1537
Level 6
Nedlands, Australia

A few months back, I had a request from someone who wanted to book for the same day, basically she was going to be at my place in under an hour if I accepted. I looked at her profile picture which was nice enough, Then I looked at her second photo and is was basically a shot of her very low cropped top!!!

I checked her single previous review and she had been kicked out for hosting a party.
Needless to say, I declined the booking.
Unfotunately, another host in the area accepted here booking and this is his review.

 

"Do not accept these guests!- Annabel appears to be quite polite, and all seems fine with the booking. On departure, our cleaner discovered the smoke alarm was covered up with plastic bags, furniture moved around the apartment, including paintings and not put back. The apartment was missing the TV sound speaker remote, our black leather arm chair was left with a hole in it, and no further communication was heard from them. Luckily AirBnB stepped in to try and sort out the damages. Was not a pleasant experience."

 

Being able to see her profile photo, prior to accepting, saved me from this.

Helen3
Level 10
Bristol, United Kingdom

Hi @Chris0

 

True and you still would have had the photo to review under Airbnb's updated system along with as, if not much more importantly,  the guest review that said she had partied at a previous hosts once she had booked.

 

You would have been able to ask Airbnb  to cancel the booking once you had seen both and being saved from this awful guest.

Chris1537
Level 6
Nedlands, Australia

Last night I made my first ever booking as a guest with Airbnb for my family of 4. After I made payment, I was prompted to supply names and emails of the other guests travelling with me! Apparently this was so my host would know who was coming. I wasn't prepared to give this information so I submitted without doing so.

As a host, I have never had access to this information from my guests and suspect that Airbnb is just farming information.

So not only do they withhold information from hosts, they try to pull all that they can from their guests as well!

Emilia42
Level 10
Orono, ME

@Chris, you do have access to that information on the guest itinerary page. It will say 2 guests going on the trip then both names and profile pictures. But the reality is exactly what you mentioned above. Guests aren't prepared to give this information and aren't forced to, so they submit without doing so and never go back to it. 

Gordon0
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

I booked a stay for later this year in New York. There are three of us going: me, my husband, and a friend from Madrid. Entering their details meant they got a copy of the itinery. If you think you are going to save the world by witholding an email address, so be it. However, I don't see it as being Orwellian.