Guest's profile picture is no longer visible + Instant book cancellation

[Farah1]

I found out that guest's profile picture is no longer visible until you have a confirmed reservation (yes, even if you go to their profile). I understand that Airbnb wants to promote the anti-discrimination policy. However, they need to realize that we are not hotels. We share our house and open our house for our guests and our safety is important. I want to make sure that the person who makes the reservation is actually the one who is showing up on check-in day, etc. Also, host's profile picture IS visible to future guests at all times! I just made a reservation for my next trip and I was able to see my host's profile picture even before I made any reservation request/book the place/have a confirmed reservation.

I am also taking off instant booking feature from my listings as it does not really seem to matter other than giving problem because people do not read the listing in full, have a bad review yet still able to book, etc and when I want to cancel *unlimited* penalty-free as they say... it is not true, I can only do it for 3 times and after that I need to contact the customer service. Then they said "we will do a one-time corteousy to waive the penalty for this cancellation." No, it is not a one-time corteousy. This is how it supposed to be. Why do I need *permission* to cancel a guest who has negative review from his previous host? Why do I need to be pressured to open my house to anybody without thinking about my own safety?

I have been with Airbnb for 4+ years and it seems like they might share a different value now than what they used to have.

[Crystal27]

Hi,  I had a question that brought me here, and as I read all the comments, I thought, 'Don't question your gut feeling on something'  My question was, 'How do I un-decline someone I declined?  I had a max of 7 day booking turned on, which I was unaware.  Potential guest sent me two messages 'that he cant book for a two week slot'. I told him the calendar is open to book, and then he sent his phone # to call him(which was hidden) Even so, I would not directly call someone, and would only book through airbnb.

After some communication, he had broken english, saying his mom was visiting from Puerto Rico, and he lives in Stokesdale(a town close by-which is what has caused me second guessing).  His profile photo was somewhat sad, of a boy holding up two peace sign's. 

I thought this guy is wasting my time, and may be spam, Who posts a photo of a child on their profile pic?  so I hit the 'decline' button. Then when I looked into it further, I saw that I had the 7 day maximum button turned on.  Once I realized, I sent a message, 'My apologies, and then expained, and then said, if you are still looking for a place, you are welcome to book.  I have not heard back. 

On a side note--I visited this forum when I first signed up for airbnb about a year ago, and scard me to silly---all the bad experiences, and stories.  So I have not been back for awhile.  I have had all good experieces with my guests.  It is not really a tourist area.  Most guests stay for weddings, family near by, basket weaving classes, passing through during travel, greenway bike riders, etc.  Hotels are about 20 minutes away, 

[Amy386]

I joined airbnb 2mo ago and have been booked solid with mainly 1 night stays. I have not experienced ths missing photo yet but the photos I do get are pixelated or of their dog, etc...I have a big problem with the no cancel feature on IB even though they say "you can cancel anytime if you don't feel comfortable without penalty". That is complete bs. I had to cancel 1 reservation. I did it less than 24hrs after it was made and the reservation was 2mo out. I went thru the threatening screens saying I would lose superhost status and all sorts of other things. Since then I have gotten emails threatening to kick me off the site if I cancel again. Mind you I have only 5 star ratings and I guess WAS a superhost. If you can't cancel and you get threatened to use IB or you won't show up in searches...how the hell are you supposed to do this and protect yourself without requiring a million rules to book that turn off customers? I complained to airbnb and its being "forwarded to a specialist". Also not happy at all about not receiving a last name. Zero way to see who is staying in your home. 90% have no reviews. They are NOT required to tell you why they are coming, as I had a guest this week who provided no communication. So far in 2mo I've had a sofa ruined, a brand new mattress ruined and on average every other guest permanently stains/ruins a comforter. I'm about done.

[Susie5]

@Amy386, I feel your pain!  I think the picture thing is crazy - I had a request to book yesterday, which I accepted despite them having no reviews, providing no information about where they are from, why they are coming to my town, etc., and yet asking lots of questions about the accommodation, whether it's shared etc.  I accepted the request and got a photo of a worn-out teddy bear!  They haven't replied yet (they have about 7 hours left to reply) but I think I'm going to decline their request.  I get a gut feeling and I'm going with my gut on this one!

[Kat17]

@Susie5  https://youtu.be/YWTJ8iZr7ro LOL

[Kat17]

@Amy386 First, your place is beautiful! What a great deal for anyone visiting your area. If I’m ever down that way, I will definitely book with you — if you’re still hosting. :-). Airbnb says you can cancel Instant Bookings up to 3 times, penalty-free. If they’re punishing you, definitely complain! You might want to start a new thread in the host circle forum on this subject, find out who else is having trouble with this. Strength in numbers! And by the way, congrats on making Superhost in only 2 months. Your reviews are great. Perhaps raising your rates and requiring a security deposit (to cover the cost of comforters, partial sofa, etc.) will help weed out the riff raff? Best of luck to you. Personally, I’m taking a break to sort out what to make of all these changes and decide if this is something I want to keep doing. If I had a way to separate the guest space from my home, it would certainly be better. 

Kat

P.S. What are these extra little touches you do that all your guests are raving about? Compare notes? 🙂

[Amy386]

Thank you for your comment. We don't feel comfortable raising our rate nor asking for a deposit but may have to if we want to continue. We had to live in airbnbs for almost 6 months last year after a contractor left our entire home toxic. That's why we decided to restore a home for this purpose. We are design consultants, we restore homes as well as furniture and I am a former HGTV employee. We set this home up in that manner so people would feel comfortable but we have also had problems with people not checking out on time as well. Idk I'm beginning to think most people are assholes as this point. Its been eye opening.

[Cate12]

OK Amy the best way to prevent the bad guest is to set your settings to a minimum of three nights. I always had issues with one and two night stay people booking on vrbo, and when I changed it the difference was night and day. The people are pleasant and effortless. I only had one really bad one as you can see from my reviews. Who turned out to be a sociopath. I googled him after the first four hours after he checked in. Oh and he was a two nighter.

[Maria1428]

Oi Aline

[Elizabeth495]

Absolutely, seems like only the guest experience matters and not so much for the host. 

[Louis98]

I totally agree. There is no law against posting pictures of guests ahead of time. This is just another absurd politically correct move by airbnb. The law is against  discrimination based on sex color or creed not on bad reviews etc.

[Lorena141]

Very interesting -- perhaps this instant book thing isn't so great -  now realizing this after a horrible experience - just what you said - they didn't read the entire profile - that had limits to the size of pets and type too - ... i will now turn off instant book too! Good observation....

[Charles-Gene0]

I am new to this and did receive pictures of both prospective occupants.    I will continue reading comments to get the proper fellings for this process.   gene

[Mark-and-Hope0]

This brings up something we've been having a problem with: guests that don't have a profile. We get lots of requests to share our home with people and many of them don;t have any information about who they are, what they do, or anything to base a decision on. Seems to me the if this is a "Community" everyone should have to share who they are up front. Our host profile is quite complete but many "guests" only have the usal Airbnb verified info on their profile page. I think hosts as a group should insist that certain basic info be available to them before we have to decide to accept a booking.

I'd like to have Airbnb require people to write a short essay about themselves in order to join the "community". Seems like a reasonable requirement. What do other hosts think?

Another thing: Just read the latest newsletter about search results on the Airbnb site. According to the article "Instan Book" is a top priority and helps your property appear in the search results. I can understand how that benefits Airbnb as they get revenue from any and all bookings but as a hosted rental proerty owner/host it certainly doesn't work for me. We enjoy hosting but its at our convenience and we decide if we want to accept or decline a guest based on many factors, not just their want a place to stay. Perhaps hosted rentals should be one of the search criteria to choose from. Hosted stays provide guests with not just a place to stay but an entire experience they cannot find at a hotel/motel/unhosted rental. We go out of our way to make sure our guests have a great experience in our home and area with local knowledge and expertise. 

[Lois-and-Darryl0]

Tonight I had a reservation request from a Guest and I couldn't access the profile picture.  I called Airbnb and learned that Airbnb has started a new policy of not sharing the profile picture until after the booking.  I am so upset.  This does NOT have to be like this! We've had 60 groups of Guests in the past 18 months and we just LOVE hosting visitors from all over the world.   Airbnb must have hundreds or even thousands of employees.  They have the ability to learn if Hosts are turning people down of color, or other nationalities.  They can do this in advance without punishing EVERYONE.  We've hosted Guests from Taiwan, Shanghai, Africa, Germany, Paris, even Seoul Korea, and I have purposely never ever declined anyone of color or another nationality.  I have no intention to discriminate.  People's profile picture can tell a thousand words.  You can see the smirk in the young men's faces - and I've learned when I accept their request and they tear up our house that takes days and hundreds of dollars to fix - that the smirk really did mean something.  It didn't matter how long I pleaded with tonight's Airbnb customer service rep, she said there's nothing she could do.  So tonight, I've blocked off the next three months, and I'll just have to wait and see if Airbnb changes its policy.  I think what makes me so mad is that we all know that they have the technology to avoid punishing everyone.  It doesn't have to be this way!  Our retirement business that we worked so hard to set up, and countless hours of time working and spent over $20K to remodel could be toast due to the laziness and short-sighted business plan of Airbnb.  I never did want to go with any other vacation rental platform; I liked the philosophy of Airbnb.  It has lost its way.

[Fred13]

@Lois-and-Darryl0I really can appreciate your heartful feelings that perhaps 'Paradise is Lost'. I am having a back and forth conversation with Kat in this same thread (Page 2) on my personal pragmatic expectations with Airbnb on hosting approach today. To the best of my 'amaterish research', Airbnb is now in 191 countries (which means dealing with 191 different cultures), and is approaching 100 million bookings a year throughout the world, and counting. It appears their approach may have to change, to successfully handle this phenomenon. Things usually are more personal when they are small.