Super Host Assessment on NUMBER OF STAYS

[Digibed_London0]

Hello everybody,

We were thinking that Airbnb is not fair in his Super Host Assessment counting in STAYS and not in NIGHTS BOOKED.

For instance, ''host A'' is hosting 10 stays just one night each.

''Host B'' is hosting only one stay for 10 nights.

Host B is not worst than host A because in total there are 10 nights for both! They are both working hard and they deserve a much better way to calculate their Super Host Assessment. It seems Airbnb doing like this is preferring Hosts who are doing SHORT length of stay.

Calculating in NIGHT BOOKED could be pretty simple and equals for all the hosts

Calculating in Number of Stays is not accurate. As a stay can last 1 night for "Host A'' and 365 nights for "host B" and Host B will never become a Super Host... Why?

As it is an assessment, it shoul be EQUAL for all the hosts (short and long stays) but it seems this is NOT FAIR AT ALL...

Thank you for your thoughts and happy new year!

Cheers,

Denis & Giovanni 

[Gerry-And-Rashid0]

@Digibed_London0

You are right - it is easier to be a SuperHost with lots of short stays as opposed to someone who takes long  term bookings. It's not a fair system, but then in addition the rating system is flawed - so until they change that I am not  sure it makes a huge difference to guests. They look at the  number of reviews and what people  say, as opposed to whether you were a super host One guest told us they thought it  meant we had hundreds of properties - if only..

[Marzena4]

It's about the variety of opinions, @Digibed_London0 and @Gerry-And-Rashid0

[Digibed_London0]

@Marzena4 and @Gerry-And-Rashid0

You can decide that your assessment is based on STAYS instead of NIGHTS booked IF this system is equal for every hosts.

However, if during a year a host accepts 4 requests of 3 months each, this host can satisfy all the other qualifications (experience, response rate, five star review and commitment)

But as this host is accepting LONG length of stay he will NEVER be a Super Host. (You have to do 10 stays to be a Super Host).

The word STAY is vague.

The word NIGHT is countable. You can compare very easily a NIGHT to any other NIGHT booked everywhere in the world and doing a FAIR assessment between every host.

This is mathematics and not an opinion. 

An assessment has to be based on mathematics.

[Marzena4]

@Digibed_London0 Imho the word "stay" is also mathematically defined: it is a "unit" that is measured from check-in to check-out of a guest/booking party (one review per whole bunch of guests). The only feature of it yet to be defined is how to count it in a calendar year - based on the check-in or check-out. As an example: booking.com pays out based on the date of check-out of a particular booking (aka stay).

The only thing left in question as for those stays at Airbnb is that as far as I know they are counted for various guests, if a guest books and reviews the second time, their review doesn't count then.

[Digibed_London0]

@Marzena4 and @Fred13 and @Gerry-And-Rashid0

If we wrote that post, it is only to improve this site. If you don't talk about features who are not working, things will never change!

 
We know what is a night as a unit (sunrise / sunset).

We know what is a stay as a unit (date of check-in / date of check-out).

Again, you can compare a unit of night booked to another unit of night booked.

You CANNOT compare a unit of stay with another unit of stay as for instance a unit stay can last 1 night and could be compared to another unit of stay who could last 90 nights booked... 89 nights of difference between 2 units of stays. It is not a small difference between unit!

And to conclude, a little story. If someone is still not convinced about mathematics.

At ''AirB Academy", all the students can work when they want... Lovely academy, isn't it?

Some of the students decide to work everyday at "Airb Academy" (perhaps they need to work or they have no choice... they need to work more, to study more!).

Other students decide to go to "Airb Academy" when they want to work (perhaps because they have studied enough before).

At the end of the quadrimester, their teacher, Mr BandB, is awarding the best students of his class.

A half of the students are not so good and Mr BandB decide to not award them...

Never mind! They will study more next quadrimester!

The other half of the classroom, all the students have studied a lot and have excellent scores:

- a quarter has been at "Airb Academy", every day and even every night to study (They had no choice...).

- The other quarter has not been at school everyday, even if they studied a lot too!

However, Mr BandB decide to award only a quarter of the excellent students.

Those who have not been at school everyday.

Is the Assessment method of Mr BandB fair?

[Marzena4]

Wrong address with myself, @Digibed_London0, when accusing of not being willing to improve the site.

You said that the term "stay" is vague. I object. One stay means a different guest, which in turn means a different point of view. And Airbnb had that in mind. I wonder whether a certain host who doesn't like me will notice that I support at this point Airbnb's vision.

Also, what about various locations? You know, @Digibed_London0, that not all hosts are blessed with the location that will attract visitors all year round? What chances are you going to give them? They will not be able to compete either in the number of stays aka guests or days booked.

[Digibed_London0]

@Marzena4 we are not accusing anybody. We are just here to say that sometimes there are some problems and if we can improve that site, it will be a better place for everyone.

About your questions on hosts who are living in different countries, cities... Our thread is very precise. We are here to talk about SUPERHOST ON NOMBER OF STAYS. You should open another discussion on that thread if you are willing to talk about that as it is really complicated.

You are right when you say that a STAY is point of view.

Do you think this point of view has the same value if the guest lived at your home one night or a little more compared to live say 1 month, 2 months or 90 nights booked or more? The more you live in a place and the more you know it!

It can be surely more difficult to host and satisfy a guest on a much longer peridod. 

However, this Assessment System is preferring SHORT stays.

[Marzena4]

Airbnb is primarily dedicated to short stays, @Digibed_London0. Even the way long-term stays are handled in the regulations speaks for itself. Please, read more discussions in the forum here.

You didn't get my point at all, @Digibed_London0. So here it is explicitly: a host's location has a huge influence on the number of bookings they get as well as the type of bookings they get (short term vs long term). You can only see your own point of view "make them decrease the number of stays." Try to look at it more objectively.

[Digibed_London0]

@Marzena4 If you accept on your site every type of stay (short or long) you have to award your hosts in the same way. Pretty impossible to award host doing long length of stays. If you count on number of night for each stay you could do that... So as a booking site you are preferring short stays as you want from your guests 10 stays. 

[Marzena4]

So you must notice that whatever improvement you implement, the system of evaluation will not be universal, @Digibed_London0. And if you compare the (higher) number of nights evaluated by the same guest versus the number of different guests aka stays, which of them gives you a more objective assessment of the host?

And I almost forgot: some local authorities kindly offer limitations of days rented per year. London - 90? How about this? It is not a fair competition.

I can give you one more problematic factor: hosts using IB are far more likely to quickly increase the number of stays. But at the same time they are even more likely to be deprived of a chance to choose their guests and eliminate potential problems.

[Fred13]

I always thought to become a Superhost, one had to have had at least 10 separate guests and meet certain other criterias while doing so, so they are 'tested' 10 separate times by 10 separate people. 

Yes, those with few bookings per year are at a disadvantage, but since they only need to get but a few bookings a year, perhaps they will not derive much benefit from being Superhosts in the first place.

Personally, I would make the Superhost criteria to finish at least 20 (or even 25) separate bookings, achieve a minimum of 4.5 stars (based on a 10-star system, so the star system is not confused (and misused) with the  5-star 'hotel' system. In this way, it puts more emphasis on longetivity and consistency, both insinuating dependability, in the long run.

While dreaming up wild ideas, perhaps start a 'Mini-Host' program which only takes 10 bookings to achieve.

[Isabel203]

Although I was obviously not part of the planning around this at AIrBnB, I suspect the #Stays criterion was selected for statistical reasons. If a host has been rated by only a very few guests, the average ratings would have very little statistical reliability and would be easily manipulated.

For example, if I were a brand new host and was particualrly Machiavellian, with a 10-night criterion, I might arrange to have my cousin Geraldine be my first guest and stay for 10 nights. Since she loves me so much, she would no doubt be more than willing to post a rave review for me, setting me up for immediate SuperHost status 🙂 On the other hand, a single cranky guest early on could put a host at a real  DISadvantage compared to other hosts.

With 10 reviews, a single , whacky rating is less likely to unrealistically inflate or reduce the average rating.

[Digibed_London0]

@Isabel203 We are not saying that in the SuperHost Assessment instead of 10 stays we want 10 nights. No.

We think that it could be much clearer to count every stay in NUMBER OF NIGHTS BOOKED. 

[Isabel203]

Yes, I did understand that, @Digibed_London0. What I was saying is that the #Stays criterion is liekly not about trying to "reward" hosts who book more stays, but rather about ensuring that the %5StarReview criterion is measured in a valid and reliable way.

I'm curious about whether you have hosted both short- and long-term rentals and how you find they differ. I myself have only accepted short-term so far.