House Rules need to be more prominent, not hidden in a drop-down menu.

Sean95
Level 10
Toronto, Canada

House Rules need to be more prominent, not hidden in a drop-down menu.

When guests are booking, they need to be highly observant to detail in order to find the House Rules they are supposedly accepting before booking. This means that most guests miss the rules entirely, which causes a lot of problems for listings that are more complex than the norm. The screenshot how NONE of my rules are actually visible during the booking process, unless you notice the "read more" dropdown menu, which needs to be clicked so that the rules are displayed.Screen Shot 2019-10-06 at 14.34.20.png

91 Replies 91

@Sean95 Is there any proof that AirBnb ever reacted on issues mentioned in the community or as hosts feedback. Or do we discuss and discuss and discuss... while they follow their own agenda? Out of curiosity.

@Denis-Mark0 nope, no proof and it does indeed seem that all our feedback falls on deaf ears

@Denis-Mark0  They have occasionally backtracked or changed things that had been groused about extensively here, but whether that was due to keeping tabs on what is discussed here or whether it was due to getting an avalanche of feedback forms on their website, we have no way of knowing.

Two instances of that come to mind. One was when they backtracked on requiring all hosts to provide linens. There was a huge outcry from hosts who have listings like remote and/or beachfront places where it has been traditional that guests bring their own. Those hosts would have had to stop listing their places, or increase their listing price by an unacceptable amount, as there is literally no way they can deal with providing bedding and towels for 10 guests when there is no laundry service anywhere in the area, nor enough water at the listing to be doing massive loads of laundry.

The other is the recent removal of the 50% review rate for Superhosts, which was absurd, as hosts have no control over whether guests leave reviews and how can you rate someone for other people's behavior?

But there are certainly far more issues that hosts have been railing about that are ignored than those that get changed.

I agree completly. This is an easy fix. The fact that it has not happened yet tells us a lot about how Airbnb cares about hosts.

Denis-Mark0
Level 10
Lahnstein, Germany

@Sean95 Apart from the fact that the house rules are not prominently highlighted, I need them to be linguistically separated from each other like the descriptions of my apartments. For now, I have packed the house rules in five different languages into this only free space available. It is not very hospitable for someone who has to confirm to me when booking that he has read my house rules to scroll through long passages of text because his language accidentally is at the end.

 

@Denis-Mark0 That's a really good idea! Mine are written in 3 languages so I have the same problem with having to make people scroll too far!

Rebecca181
Level 10
Florence, OR

I've gotten so weary of these little games Airbnb plays with our listings. Glitch, smitch. I think we all know what is going on here. I noticed this last year, and so I had to once again think of how to outwit Airbnb's deliberate attempts to bypass my 'due diligence' attempts as a home-sharing host / home-owner. I now have it in the opening statement that guests must message us to say that they read and agree to our house rules in order for me to confirm their booking - as required by our property insurer. When guests book and don't send me this message, I let them know that this is one of my rules and they need to read my rules and send me their statement that they agree. That usually does the trick. 

 

And while we are on the subject: Airbnb, please look at my listing. I am not a flop-house. I am not renting a futon on the floor of my kitchen. I am not letting people crash on my couch (a la your original roots). My listing is nicer than most resort and retreat offerings. So please, stop insulting my intelligence and let me manage my listing in the way that I see fit. Pricing, house rules, the works. If you look at my billings, you'll see that I have a history of being sold out every night I have made my listing available (including during the supposed 'off-season'), and I charge TWICE as much a night as your little non-helpful algorithms badger me to charge. Perhaps you can show us home-sharing hosts some respect? I highly doubt you hide the 'rules' of your commercial listers. Just sayin'. 

@Rebecca181  I've also read on the forum that commercial listers are allowed to charge a cash refundable security deposit. But not us, oh no. The little guys have to fight for weeks to get reimbursed the cost of a set of high quality sheets the guest used to dry their muddy wet dog and then stuffed in the garbage can with the banana peels (oh, and don't forget to take before-and-after photos and of course you saved those receipts for the original purchase, but you bought them new two weeks ago, so they've depreciated to almost nothing). 

Casita-By-The-Texas-Bay0
Level 10
Texas, United States

Yes, I wish there was a space for listing the house rules to which the guest had to visit and confirm they read and agree before booking...that would save a lot of headaches later on.

 

I have to send them a L O N G message with the information and still I am sure some people do not read the whole thing.

 

I have posted the house rules behind the main entrance door to the house so everybody coming or going can take a look.

Monika--Elisabeth0
Level 10
Vienna, Austria

@Denis-Mark0,  bei mir sind in der App die Hausregeln zur Gänze zu lesen.

Hi @Monika--Elisabeth0 🙂

I just took a look at your listing using the airbnb app and I can't unfold your houserules as a guest. Did you look at your listing via the app?

I just took a screenshot of what I'm talking about. The green link "læs mere" aka read more in english doesn't work.Screenshot_20191012_201936.jpg

 

@Sandra856  I'm running the public, not beta version, and it doesn't work.

The newest version that I got from google play store.

 

I'll ask family members or friends to try and to figure out on which circumstances this might occur. Checking app version and mobile ambience, android or  apple.

 

Screenshot_20191012_205928.jpg

 

@Denis-Mark0  I think you meant to tag Sandra rather than me on your response above.

No biggie- I've tagged the wrong poster by accident myself several times.

Thank you for the hint, @Sarah977  

@Denis-Mark0 I also deleted and re-installed the app. Unfortunately it still doesn't work. I got an answer from CS. The guy I wrote with said he would forward the case to the IT department. I don't know what else to do. I tried to tag Lizzie and Quinzy who are admins and they got access to the different departments but none of them has made a response.

Hopefully it will be fixed soon as I'm sure we are not the only one having those problems. I'm sure lots and lots of guests do to. Fingers crossed 🙂 

Best, Sandra