Retaliatory review - Guest furious because I would not give 5-hour extension to checkout

[Colette203]

I've had my first retaliatory review - because I could not give a late checkout due to enhanced Covid cleaning measures - and Airbnb has not got back to me in a week now since I started a case file. I had to wait one hour and 16 minutes to talk to somebody and then when I did, they just passed it up the ladder to some unidentified person in an unidentified department that will look at it at some unidentified time in as yet identified future.

Since that review I have not had one inquiry on that listing. I rent the property as a one and two bedroom option. Usually the one bedroom gets four times the action, but now I'm getting couples spending $30 more a night for the two bedroom. ONE BAD REVIEW CAN SINK YOU.

The guest - Cheryl Lee from North Vancouver - came to my house with her husband in May to see a relative in a care home and loved the place so much they booked for 6 weeks later for a holiday. Five star review. During that visit, she broke my house rules by bringing guests onto the property and told me that I should stay away from the house because she wanted privacy.

But I'm broke and desperate and stupid, so I let them come back. With their dog which rarely happens. This time, once again, she send me a message telling me to stay away from the property and that she is inviting guests over. I try to dissuade her. She insists. Do I call the police? Do I tell her flat out "what about the word no don't you understand" and risk a bad review. Finally, she asks me to block off an extra day on my calendar in case they want to stay. I do so and ask if they will  let me know asap what they want to do as I would like to be able to rent the house to other guests if they don't take it. Finally at 5:30 pm the night before their check out she lets me know they aren't going to stay an extra night but would instead just like a late check out at  3pm - 5 hours after my normal time. Good way to save money for them.

Anyway, she gave herself an hour late checkout anyways and wouldn't wave good-bye or even look at me when I went by to see them off - being the better person. 

Obviously, I'm furious. Airbnb has, once again, ignored a successful, long-term host's concerns by siding with a vindictive guest. I'm feeling less and less comfortable trusting my very expensive asset - my house - with this company.  Moreover I let myself get bullied by this guest. I was afraid of a bad review so I let her do things against my house rules, against my Covid rules. The moral of this story is to stand up for yourself with ** because they are likely going to give you a poor review no matter how you try to placate them.

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[Colette203]

The review was changed. It happened between when I wrote this and today. Perhaps Airbnb does watch. I did give her a good review because she was in town dealing with a dying relative and I did not feel like I wanted to add to her distress. My plan was to contact her later and discuss how to be a better guest in person. 

[Colette203]

The review was changed between when I wrote this and today. Perhaps Airbnb does watch. I did give her a good review because she was in town dealing with a dying relative and I did not feel like I wanted to add to her distress. My plan was to contact her later and discuss how to be a better guest in person. 

[Mark116]

@Colette203  I'll be honest, since you gave her a positive review after you list several things she did that were 'bad guest' material, I'm not that sympathetic.  While we have found that sometimes its best to  not review a poor guest, because it will trigger them to leave a negative review, so we leave well enough alone....I would never give a bad guest a glowing review like you did. 

[Sarah977]

@Colette203  I'm also unsympathetic to leaving what would sound to any host like a good review just because the guest had a dying relative. You didn't have to go into the details, but something like "XX stayed 5 days" lets other hosts know that you had nothing good to say about this guest. To leave what sounds like a review of a good guest is dishonest and disrespectful to other hosts who rely on the reviews.

 Contacting a guest like this, who thought it perfectly okay to tell the host to stay away from the property, among other things, to explain how to be a better guest is pointless- people are either respectful or they aren't. It's one thing to give some 18 year old kid, on his first Airbnb booking, a pass for leaving his room a disaster,  as long as he was otherwise a good guest, and explain to him privately that he needs to clean up after himself or he'll get really bad reviews, but in the case of your guest, she knew exactly what she was doing.

[Anonymous]

@Colette203   Airbnb does not remove reviews solely on the basis of being retaliatory, if they don't break the rules of the Content Policy. And it is truly unheard of for them to just let a guest rewrite an entire review because the host asked them to. They may delete a review, but unless there's been a very recent protocol change they don't tend to let someone just up and rewrite it.

But if they actually did so in this situation, I guess you'll have to retract the statement that Airbnb ignored your concerns and sided with the guests.

Unfortunately, we are still stuck with the fact that this awful guest is still on the loose and likely to terrorize another host because you wrote a dishonest review. If the only thing you feel comfortable saying is a lie, why say anything at all?

And why should we believe your story here is any less fictitious than your review?

[Colette203]

To all the ** on here accusing me of lying. Perhaps you should check to see that Airbnb did actually remove her review - at both our requests. Reign in the vitriol. I know that living in the US must be rather challenging right now, but keep it civil ** How's that?

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[Sarah977]

@Colette203  Now you tell a completely different story. Yes, Airbnb will remove a guest review if the guest requests it, just as they will remove a host review if the host requests it. You kept insisting that they let the guest change the review, which we told you Airbnb won't do, and which, in fact, they didn't. You've now made it clear that the guest requested that her own review be removed.

So don't try to put it on other hosts who replied that we were all somehow wrong and you were right.

Vitriol? The hosts who responded simply don't think that a host should write a good review for a guest they wouldn't want to host again- that's dishonest and pointless. No one called you any names, yet you call us ** And what that has to do with masks and coronavirus cases is quite strange. No one wasn't civil to you. If you can't handle anyone disagreeing with you, don't post on a public forum.

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[Colette203]

To all the ** on here accusing me of lying. Perhaps you should check to see that Airbnb did actually remove her review - at both our requests. Reign in the vitriol. I know that living in the US must be rather challenging right now, but keep it civil ** How's that?

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[Emilia42]

Speak for yourself @Colette203 , the US is a VERY large country. Everyone on the tread has completely kept their cool. 

Airbnb does not allow guests or hosts to change the text (or star ratings) of a review after it has been publicly published. Deleting a review altogether is completely different and would not affect your listing or ratings at all. If the guest did ask Airbnb to delete to the review in question, then I'm happy for you, since you dodged a bullet and don't have to deal with the stress of a bad review forever lurking on your profile.

But com'on this does look a little hypocritical. Don't you think? 

P.S. I am glad to see that your listing didn't sink after one bad review since you've had a few more reviews since Cheryl's. Good luck with the rest of the summer. You have a beautiful place.

[Ian-And-Anne-Marie0]

@Colette203 

British Columbia, Canada, are doing a fantastic job keeping infections down to 15. Loving the joke about the level 10 badges and pyjamas btw !!

And @Ute42 's post is even funnier now its been deleted too. In fact, I prefer this - the badly edited version if you care to read it. 😂😂 The mods were probably having a laugh too.

I agree entirely about the way strangers are treated on the internet, but with the way this thread has been massacred in the edit, it is difficult to see the full story and I might be being a little unfair, as this is not quite a typical one, but there is a common theme running throughout many new member postings who - for safety's sake are only provided single digit safety pins. Easy to see, but not so easy to be accommodated.

The full information would have been a great help, but I don't know how you would have known quite what the full information was if you were asking for advice?

Good outcome, well done.

[Mark-and-Nicola0]

I’m having same issues

[Ute42]

.

@Colette203 

Are You sure the hospitality business is the right place for You to be? **

@Sarah977@Anonymous@Lisa723@Mark116@Mike-And-Jane0@Helen350@Emilia42 

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[Katie]

Hi everyone,

We've just had to edit some very inflammatory comments from this thread - please ensure you are sticking to the community guidelines, and refrain from letting things get personal. 

The CC is a place for hosts to come together to help each other, and whilst we welcome differing viewpoints, this must not come at the expense of respectful, constructive interactions.