Hosting a guest who just earned a bad review

Gábor5
Level 2
Budapest, Hungary

Hosting a guest who just earned a bad review

Dear All!

 

Couple of weeks ago I have got a booking from a guest who seemed OK to me athough he did not have any reviews that time. He arrives Friday this week so I just wanted to check whether everything goes accordingly to the plan - he did not share his arrival details, I was about to contact him first. I also checked back his profile to see if he earned any reviews since then. Unfortunately he did - a very bad review written by an experienced host stating that he left her apartment in such dirty condition even cleaners did not believe that filth. My soon-to-be-hosted guest just became non-recommended! Given the fact that I am facing a risky situation if I accept this guest I am thinking about cancelling the reservation. I have not ever done a cancellation before, and considering this situation I think it would be unfair to my Superhost privileges and get the penalties although the risks are evident. Naturally, it is not guaranteed, that the guest messes up my flat as well but I really do not wish to wait for it!

Do you have any experiences, recommendations what to do now to avoid as much of the conflict and the penalties as possible?

 

Thank you very much in advance!

8 Replies 8
Sarah977
Level 10
Sayulita, Mexico

@Gábor5  No experience in this regard, but I'd contact airbnb and tell them you are definitely not comfortable with this booking because of the past review, which wasn't there when you accepted the booking (make sure they read it before trying to tell you to give him a chance, it's not like the host said he was just dirty. it sounds pretty extreme) and insist that they cancel it for you without penalties.

Thank you Sarah! I did exactly the same thing, yet waiting for Airbnb's answer.

Gábor5
Level 2
Budapest, Hungary

I just received an answer from the Airbnb support and would like to share learnings for the future.

They completely understand my concern, and would not want that kind of guest in my property. The reservation was made under Instant Book, and they also saw that the review is concerning. Hosts never have to host a reservation they're uncomfortable with, so I was able to cancel this reservation without getting any penalties.


(Please refer to Penalty-free Cancellation article in the Help Center for more information.)

@Gábor5   Excellent! I'm so glad to hear they supported you. 

Alex939
Level 10
Plovdiv, Bulgaria

Congratulations @Gábor5! And thanks for sharing your experience. For us hosts is very important to know we are supported and there's a way to avoid such situations penalty free and without risking our rating/superhost status.

@Gábor5

 

Please, check in a few days if the guest still have the bad review...

 

In this post, there was a cheating guest.

He booked for 1 but they were 3 and the host mentionned it in his review and Airbnb removed the review of the host and left the bad review of the guest who put 1 star on the host profile !

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Hosting/To-Clara-Liang-Product-Director-Last-min-cancellation-be...

 

It's the world in reverse.

When the host complained about it, Airbnb "re appeared" his review on the guest profile.

It seems that when guest have a bad review and there is a complain about it, Airbnb remove the review of the poor cheating or dirty guest.

 

The cheating  guest was fully repaid him and Airbnb gave him a voucher.
As a thank you for cheating?

And obviously he did it again with the next host.

https://www.airbnb.fr/users/show/93960657

 

 

Do you have the link of the profile of your guest?

You were right to contact Airbnb about this guest. Let's check Airbnb does not remove the review.

Kath9
Level 10
Albany, Australia

Well done @Gábor5 and thanks for sharing. Make sure your Instant Book settings are set so that only guests with good reviews can instant book.

Gábor5
Level 2
Budapest, Hungary

@Nathalie-Et-Gilles0 @Alex939

 

It is sad to see something like this can actually happen. I still believe, Airbnb is in most cases supportive towards the hosts.

 

Luckily, I took a screenshot of the review as soon as I found it out, to have something I can refer to when contacting Airbnb support, and it helped!

In worst case scenario, they are still able to delete a review or make it re-appear, but they can't do anything with a screenshot. Therefore my advice is to capture the original state to secure yourselves in these kind of problematic situations.

 

As @Kath9 mentioned Instant Book, it is also good to keep in mind that this could prevent any cancellation related conflict!