I will no longer post a bad review about a guest

Answered!
Megan160
Level 9
Tucson, AZ

I will no longer post a bad review about a guest

I had an awful guest experience and tried to settle it with the guest personally. She stayed at a reduced rate and then needed to extend her stay. We gave her an even bigger rate discount. When she left, she left the place a mess. Dirty, greasy dishes, pots and pans. All the furniture was in dissaray, both sets of blankets/quilts had spots and stains on them, there were crumbs in all the beds on the mattress pads (which had to be hand picked off), and she ruined a set of sheets.

 

I took 3 days to cool off before I texted her because we really went out of our way to help this guest and she took advantage of us. I told her I was unhappy about the state of the place and asked her to pay $50 to replace the sheets. Prior to this text, she had nothing but glowing reviews and thanks for me in all her texts. She did not understand why she should have to pay for her sheets because I was a woman and the damaged sheets were a result of a "woman thing" and thus I should understand. I said I shouldn't have to pay for her "woman thing".

 

After much internal debate, I decided to warn other hosts and gave her an appropriate but still not brutal review, even leaving out the refusal to pay for damages and passing on her lame excuse for the mess. She then gave me a bad review, lying about my place and me. Prior to this review, I had 5 star reviews. Now people think my place is noisy and I am rude. My bookings have almost stoped dead in their tracks after her review. Plus, my 3 month pre-book for Jan-March canceled right after the review. I have contacted Airbnb twice about this to no avail. I had responded to her bad review, but not in much detail because I assumed that if I could prove it was a retaliatory review, it would be removed. THIS IS NOT THE CASE! Not only will they not remove it, they won't even let me expound on my explanation to her bad review.

 

So frustrated! I am knee deep in the process of spending a lot of money to make my other 2 rentals Airbnb rentals and now I can't even get bookings in prime season. Airbnb penalizes us for trying to warn other hosts about bad guests.

1 Best Answer
John915
Level 3
New York, United States

@Megan160

 

Unfortunately there is probably nothing you can do about it. Things like this happen to all of us (guests, especially newer ones have wildly different expectations) and I hate the fact that one bad review plants a seed in future guests' minds (for example, I had one who stayed for nearly a month and I left town for nearly a week - I live in the part of the home - I came back and she had left an old pizza box, empty bottles,etc....her review dinged me for cleanliness?!)

 

Some guests are just horrible and/or petty (and I'm sure a handful of hosts are not so great either) but the best thing to do is learn from it.

 

I never leave a review for a guest unless I've personally interacted with him/her. I do this because if you are the first to leave a review, your guest sees that you left one and if they felt their stay was unpleasant, they have nothing to lose by leaving you a nasty review. A host may rely on sharing their home to cover a significant portion of housing costs, extra income, etc. but a guest may book an Airbnb once or twice a year. And even if guests get not so great reviews, in many cities there are plenty of hosts who would just be happy for the income.

 

I've been fortunate to have not yet had many "nightmare" guests but I would learn from this experience - do not be the first to review a guest! If they feel strongly about your space (negative or positive) they will usually leave a review. If I've had a weird situation/neutral, I don't bother. If my interaction was positive, I ask them to send me private feedback as to what I can do better. If someone leaves a review, you can comment on it but if you think someone had a less than stellar experience, you as a host leaving a review only prompts a guest to leave one as well (which may be unfair, misleading, etc.)

 

Saw your listing and I really don't think your guest's review was that bad. If anything it was probably prompted by your interaction with her following her stay. You have 5 stars and it was overall a positive review! I have no plans to go to Tucson but I'd stay in your place! In the future, I'd just let small inconveniences like that go. Don't be a pushover but understand accidents happen and sometimes minor things occur with otherwise well-meaning guests:

 

-No smoking but someone opens a window thinking they can get away with it

-Someone breaks a glass

-Uses toilet and "forgets" to flush (nasty but happens)

 

My advice:

1.) Do not post a review first - Regardless of what you do, you get sometimes get less than 5-stars! If you've had a less than fantastic dialogue with a guest, posting a review prompts them to do the same - in your case, she knew you were upset about the sheets & was probably defensive about being asked to pay $50 for an accident - If she thought you were upset with her as a host, I am not suprised that she didn't give you a fantastic, glowing review in response to the notification that you had left her a review.  

2.) Don't sweat the small stuff

3.) Just buy a $10 set of sheets from Wal-Mart and consider it a "cost of doing business" if they are ruined at some point

View Best Answer in original post

232 Replies 232

but if you have to do it - I think the star rating may seem harsh - I didnt know that a 3 star would mean it automatically bars a guest but that is actually appropriate but I think that my passive aggressive non checkin was designed expecting that I would not write a negative review - in effect, he would get away with giving me a hard time because I would be lenient.   But i felt it was so mean spirited that I a review had to be put down on the record because he and his friends would bother me again in the future otherwise even if they are going to bother me now.    That review was my only opportunity to respond.  Which is why I find it very strange that a concurrent guest's review is now denied me from viewing and responding to and perhaps it has damaging inaccuracies that will be a part of the permanent record on my profile.  I hope airbnb is not discriminatory as you suggest but we shall see.   It has already been  a week and I am still denied seeing his review and therefore cannot respond to it. 

Hmmm... I have left bad reviews for guests before and have not seen it influence my listing or bookings at all.

Annette308
Level 1
Scotland, United Kingdom

i think you are wrong there.I was treated like rubbish,by airbnb,had a guest rude messed my furniture,dirty,and i did not agree with his review,so put my reply.was banned from airbnb for 7 days.  and downed to 2 stars from 5.so not fair, so have now went elsewhere,and getting more bookings.

What platform did you switch to?

Did you get an answer to this

Isabel is there any way that our guests can know if we are leaving a bad review? 

@Michael4416 None. Unless you tell them.

The review you leave about the guest will appear on the guest's profile. So of course they'll see it. I don't understand this answer.

 

@Emilia42 I can't let this go. They booked for two people and showed up with two more. I then contacted airbnb and they assigned a case manager. The same day they checked in I submitted a payment request for the two additional people. On the 3rd day I myself contacted the guest and said that he needed to pay me for the two extra people or else airbnb would file a case against him. He finally paid so that was taken care of. We have self check-in and he calls me 3am saying I never send him code to door when I had sent it 4 days before and he agreed I did and apologized. I made no bones about it they probably had a long flight and weren't thinking properly. When they left my fridge settings were changed and all the ice melted and flowed out of the fridge into the hardwood floor. The studio was a mess, after checking my cameras they smoked on the property and we are strict about no smoking on property and only outside on the street. They also threw out their cigarette butts inside the studio garbage so the place was stinking like cigarettes. They went into the dressers and closets and used brand new pillows when I already had 4 pillows out. The new pillows had to be thrown out because they didnt have covers and they smelled really bad from cigarettes and they were all stained. I'm I being too strict if I am please let me know. I'm new to this. 

Some of your experiences are just the hazards of the business.

 

I learned about leaving new sheets, pillows, anything in closets accessible to guests. I store them elsewhere now.


some guests just have entitled attitudes and are difficult. AirBNB review system seems to penalize hosts for letting future hosts know what kind of guests are coming. This renders their host feedback channels useless.  

@Michael4416 I would definitely write them a bad review. Keep it short and factual. Something like "XX came with 2 more guests than originally booked. Unfortunately, the studio was left in a very untidy state and extra cleaning, surpassing the $50 cleaning fee, was required. House rules were not followed and therefore, I cannot recommend XX to other hosts." Stick to the facts and do not mention any involvement from Airbnb (or they can pull your review down.) Give the guest low stars in all categories and click no you would not host them again. I would leave your review on the 14th day of the review period as close to the final hour of when you received the notification to review as you possibly can. This way it will not trigger them to write a review for you and hopefully the window will run out.

but it is different a guest and a house, we always read the review before renting a house, researched, looked at all the photos of the house and read the reviews of the house, now when we rent to a person we do not always read, (alias we don't have much time to read)

Marit-Anne0
Level 10
Bergen, Norway

@Megan160

Retaliatory in what way ? The only thing that could have triggered this bad review would be you asking for compensation for the "woman thing" damaged sheets.  Reviews are "blind", the guest does not see your review until both are posted, so to stop giving negative reviews when deserved will not help anybody at all.  

Your story only underlines what has been stated on the forum time and time again; those asking for discounts are bad news and claiming against the security deposit or asking for compensation will often trigger bad reviews.  

I have a lot of people who offer to deal outside of the portal - that is so strange.     One of them is bad news. 

Yep, if you do this you won't be covered by Airbnb's insurance and these folks try to this for many reasons, none of them are good!