Keeping up your ratings

[Kath9]

Hi fellow hosts!

Well, after seeing my overall star ratings start to slip recently due to the ridiculous changes to the review system, my ratings have just gone back up from near to the point of losing Superhost status (4.8* overall) to 4.9*! I think my strategy may be working and just want to share it with you (I have done so before on other posts but that was the 'trial' stage - I am now seeing results!). Thanks to those other hosts who have shared similar ideas to this.

Firstly, I have put the following blurb on the first page of my guest manual - it is just underneath the house guidelines and Wifi password and I ask all my guests to spend a moment reading this page when they arrive (I'm hoping that the Wifi password prompts them to actually do so!)

Secondly, I now send the following message to all my guests once I have reviewed them:

Dear xxx, thank you so much for booking with me - you were wonderful guests and I hope you enjoyed your stay as much as I enjoyed hosting you. I have left you a 5-star review and hope you can find the time to write a review for me so I can continue to offer my home as a budget-friendly, safe and comfortable place for other guests. Thanks again - it was really lovely meeting you both! Best wishes, Kath 🙂

This message hopefully prompts them to leave a review (in order to keep up the minimum 50% review rate) as well as letting them know I have given them 5 stars in the hope they reciprocate. (Of course, this is only for guests who I have actually left a 5-star review for - I won't be sending this message to guests who have received less than 5 stars). While it does feel a bit like emotional blackmail, I think we do need to educate our guests as most of them don't realise that the overall star rating is based on the 'expectations' question and many guests will just say 'as expected', which only gives you 3 stars overall (even if they have given you 5 stars for everything else). 

Please feel free to do something similar with your guests in order to keep up your ratings. Happy hosting 2019!

[Cathie19]

Hi @Kath9. I send a thank you message as well, but have not been proactive with the review system explanation, as I haven’t wanted to appear pushy. When chatting, some have seemed shocked by the statistical requirements of Airbnb.

Some guests just haven’t been interested, but the new lengthy review system is a downer, and very offputting to guests. Some have stated they’ll definitely leave a review (unprompted) then the “thesis like - carry on” essay required, called a review system, has abruptly ended that thought- for them and us! 

I may have to be creative and proactive this year. Thanks for the info!

[Phil2]

Be warned that 5 star ratings don't always qualify you for Superhost status anymore.

I've been hosting for 3 years now and have gotten nothing but 5 star ratings and great reviews. I was a Superhost beginning a few months after my first guest in January 2016 until September 2018 when the badge suddenly disappeared. I contacted AirBnB and they told me that they decided to change the criteria for Superhost to require a minimum of 10 reviews/ratings in a year to qualify.

This is a baseless standard because not only can a host not control if a guest leaves a review but the duration of the guest stay is chosen by the guest. If one or more guests stay for several months then it's not always possible to get 10 reviews/ratings in a year. I require a 7-day minimum but only 2 guests actually stayed the 7-day minimum and the majority of my guests reserve or extend their stays for a month or longer. In the past 3 years I've had 20 completed reservations from guests from all over the world. One guest who initially booked a 3 week stay ended up extending to over 4 months and another guest extended their stay to over 100 days. I have one repeat guest who has returned here over 7 times for a cumulative stay of 298 days.

It’s mathematically impossible for me to meet this new randomly chosen standard so after 3 years on AirBnB I am moving this property to another online short-term rental platform. This is an example of a company with humble beginnings that fell into the Ivory Tower Complex trap and their judgment is no longer based on real world hosting scenarios.

I recommend that hosts who are struggling to keep up with the increasingly unreachable AirBnB standards look at other online short-term rental platforms. 3 years ago AirBnB was the reasonable choice but now competition has leveled the field and there are many other choices.

[Cor3]

Hi @Phil2,

Well the good news for you is: Airbnb has recently somewhat changed the rules around becoming Superhost (in case you are not aware of this yet).

Nowadays it is either:

minimum hosted: 10 stays in the last year.

or

minimum hosted: 3 stays in the last year with at least 100 nights or more.

Just have a look at your progress page.

Happy?

[Phil2]

If AirBnB updated the number-of-reviews standard to account for days hosted it must have been recently because I still don’t see the return of the Superhost badge and I have never failed at getting 5-star reviews. 

I looked at my progress page and saw a criteria called “Accepted reservations” which has a target of 88%. The “Targets represent the average level of performance for all hosts on Airbnb. They help us ensure a standard level of quality for every guest stay. Your listing could be removed if you consistently fall below the targets.”  I have a rating of 70% which is probably correct because a significant number of my reservations requests are inquiries stating they want different dates, lower price, or can’t agree to the House Rules. I have to turn down 3-4 requests for every one I accept because of these non-conforming requests.

I called AirBnB right after I got a recent non-conforming reservation request and had them on the phone so they could see the message. Basically the request stated they want to check in immediately even though the calendar was greyed out due to an existing reservation, wanted to stay longer into the next month that was grey out because of existing reservations, and said they could only pay 1/2 of what the posted rate was. I asked AirBnB customer service if I could ignore the message and the answer was you would be penalized if you don’t respond, I asked if I decline would it go against my percentage and the answer was yes, so what I can I do to not be penalized - the customer service agent didn’t have an answer for me.

I just don’t see a reason to stay on AirBnB if every couple of months someone sitting at a desk in San Francisco comes up with some new “idea” and hosts have to be burdened with trying to find a solution to make up for AirBnB’s lack of real world common sense. 

[Sarah977]

@Phil2 If it's a Booking Request, you do have to either accept or decline it within 24 hours. So if a guest asks for dates which are blocked, which they shouldn't be able to do on a Booking Request, if they are able to, that's a platform glitch and you need to contact Airbnb to get them to cancel the request with no penalties to you. As well as getting them to look into how someone is able to send a request for blocked dates, that shouldn't happen.

If it's an Inquiry, you don't need to pre-approve or decline it- just message back the guests and tell them those dates are already booked, as is visible on your calendar, of if you need to not accept for some other reason, just let the guest know why it's not suitable (they want to bring more guests than you are set up for, want to bring their dog, etc). A simple reply to an Inquiry is not counted as a non-response and won't be counted against you.

Guests have to enter dates to send an Inquiry. So even if their travel dates aren't set yet, or they just have questions about your place, they may put in whatever dates, as they can't communicate with you without doing so. 

[Phil2]

Sarah - it’s not a glitch, the request comes in using valid available dates on the calendar with a message stating they don’t really want those dates, can’t pay that price, don’t agree to the rules, or all of the above.

I have no control on what method a guest uses to initiate contact. Once the guest creates a reservation request if I don’t accept or decline the request within 24 hours I'll get a message from AirBnB stating “Guests need to hear from you so they can finalize their plans. That’s why we expect hosts to accept or decline requests within 24 hours. Allowing requests to expire negatively affects your response rate and your listing’s placement in search.” AirBnB has set up a scenario in which hosts are penalized based on guests actions and customer service just tells you sorry but there’s nothing we can do about it. 

I have over 700 messages in my AirBnB inbox from the past 3 years for only 20 accepted valid reservation requests and that doesn’t count my responses to those messages or messages from AirBnB stating there were updates to my listing or other reminders which I delete. 

It's becoming increasing impractical to host on the AirBnB platform because of their absurd policies. They have been morphing from a host centric platform to a guest centric platform but it's the hosts who are risking millions of dollars in property and liability losses and the guests are risking nothing.

[Sarah977]

@Phil2  So what happens when you respond by message to an inappropriate guest booking request? Have you asked a guest to please withdraw the request so your calendar is opened for those dates and you don't need to decline? "Hi XXX, thanks for your request, but the dates you requested are already booked, as you can see on my calendar (or whatever the issue is). Very much appreciate it if you could cancel the request, as the dates you attached to the request are not the actual dates you want, so my calendar remains blocked for those dates, preventing anyone else from booking. Thanks."

I know many guests would ignore this (especially the types who are trying to get you to bend your rules, give them a discount, or couldn't be bothered to look at your calendar to see that the dates they wanted aren't available), but might be worth a try.

Don't get me wrong, I totally agree with you that many Airbnb policies aren't at all fair to hosts, just trying to help you out with some suggestions so you can get your ratings back up. Unfortunately, the other platforms don't allow you to list a private room in the host's home, only entire places, so I don't have the option to list on other platforms.

[Natalie41]

I get weekly "requests" from potential guests who end up asking for days that are obviously not available because they can't actually request them. Then I am having to decline their request for their listed dates and look like I'm not wanting them to stay here when they didn't want those dates in the first place. Is there some way around this other than trying to contact an unreachable Airbnb employee?

[Kath9]

@Natalie41, it's frustrating for hosts when this happens. You can ask them to cancel their request to avoid you having to decline - just explain to your guest that you are penalised for declining guests.

[Suzanne302]

@Natalie41

If you're talking about an actual booking request and the request is for dates they don't really want, just accept it and the burden will be on them to cancel it.

If it's just an inquiry, respond with a special offer for the same dates. Again, if they didn't really want those dates, it's now their responsibility/penalty to cancel.

[Natalie41]

It's always is a full request for dates that are open and then in their message to me they are requesting dates that are unavailable. So you're saying if I just pre-approve them, then it is up to them to cancel. I won't get penalized at all for so many "cancellations"?

[Suzanne302]

@Natalie41

That is exactly what I'm saying. 🙂

Approve away!

[Sarah977]

@Natalie41  Hosts only get punished for cancellations they initiate. We don't get punished for cancellations from the guest's side.

Guests who do this- ask for dates that they could easily see are unavailable if they bothered themselves to actually look at your calendar, or somehow think they can talk you into letting them stay when in fact you're already booked for those dates, will get a rude shock when they find that you've approved their booking request for dates they entered but didn't actually want, and their credit card has been docked for those dates, requiring them to cancel within 48 hours if they want to receive a full refund. Maybe it will cure them of such faulty communication in the future.

[Kath9]

@Jared-And-Natalie0, a booking request is different to a booking enquiry:

A booking request prompts you to 'accept' or 'decline'. If you accept, the booking is immediately confirmed and the onus will be on the guest to cancel it. Try to avoid declining guests unless you really have to because you will eventually be penalised for too many declines. I usually ask guests to cancel the request their end if they have asked to book unavailable dates, asked to bring children, extra guests, etc.

A booking enquiry prompts you to 'preapprove' or 'decline'. If you preapprove, the booking isn't automatically confirmed - the guest still has 24 hours to proceed with the booking. So, in these cases, just click preapprove and it is up to the guest to decide whether they want to go ahead and book for the nights they selected. They do not need to 'cancel' as such, because the booking won't have been confirmed, they can just let it go. In these cases, you can select to leave the dates available so that other people can book in the meantime.