Not sure of guest id

[Paul1432]

I am a new host to airb&b and have accepted a booking with good grace, though having looked at the profile of the guest I feel uneasy as thier picture is of a child and thier id dosn't appear to be goverment verified. I am happy to accept this guest but I am worried, any advice would be greatful

[Robin4]

@Paul1432

Hi Paul and welcome to the Airbnb community. 

Paul, I understand your concerns and you can always ask the guest for positive verified identification, but mate, I would not look for problems that may not exist! We all had to start from somewhere....we were all cleanskins once upon a time! We just had to hope that a host will give us a go!

Tell me Paul, how would you feel about accepting a guest inquiry that came to you with this profile....

Paul, I accepted that booking and this is the review I was able to give that guest.....

I was so pleased that I was able to get Sonya's Airbnb career of to a good start with a great review!

There are always going to be problem guests and Paul, I am not saying that this request of yours will be that first class guest....but the chances are vey high that it will be. Wery few hostings go off the rails and I would place more importance on the wording of this guests inquiry than on the government verifications. Was this inquiry passive and complimentary of you, or was it aggresive with questions to be answered?That is the best way of picking who will be a good guest and who will not!

Cheers......Rob

[Paul1432]

Yes that sounds right, thanks for your reply it has made me feel much better about my concern

[Paul1255]

Hey @Paul1432 I hope you are well!

For future bookings, I would adjust your settings to only accept guests with Government issued ID- you can adjust this in: booking settings>guest requirements.

This will give you peace of mind as a new host. Adjusting your other settings such as recommendations from other hosts may also be a good option whilst you're new to hosting- it won't prevent a bad experience but it certainly will help! You can always adjust back once you have built your confidence.

In terms of the profile picture, guests don't actually need to have a picture of themselves on their profile- though it does foster a sense of trust.

You can chat to  your guest, aske them to update their profile picture if you'd like to- just bear in mind it would be a request rather than something they have to do. I don't see there being an issue with this request from a genuine guest.

Paul 🙂

[Paul1432]

thank you for the info its very useful

[Paul1255]

You're welcome @Paul1432

If you need any help or support with your listing give me a shout- I'm not too far away from your place 🙂

[Paul1432]

Thanks your reply was v. Helpful 

[Rachel0]

Hi @Paul1432 I would be a little concerned if my potential guest posted a picture of a child although I notice that you don't have a house rule that excludes young children under 12 or babies.  As the other @Paul1255 mentions, you can update your requirements to only accept guests with verified Government ID which I think would be a good idea for you while you are just starting out, plus you can ask the guest to provide a current profile photo of themselves.  I've been hosting for a long time now and the most important thing is pre-arrival communication with the guest - make sure that you know as much about them as possible before they arrive on your doorstep which hopefully avoids any nasty surprises.  I do hope it goes well for you, you're in a great location.