To Rebate or Not to Rebate?

[Paul154]

Every now and then mistakes are made, either through my fault or out of my control.

Room not ready, something doesn't work or smoke smell left by previous guests.

In these situations, I like to offer a chance to cancel and/or a  goodwill rebate of $10 - $25 or a Starbucks card.

Goodwill in the sense that I give them freely and with no strings attached.

I am now considering changing my policy.

Guests will still complain about the error and mark me down.

In essence, I'm getting nothing for something - I may even be telegraphing that an issue is a bigger problem than it really is.

Should I stop offering rebates? 

What do others do in these situations? Just smile and say sorry, have a pleasant day?

I do not wish criticisms of how I run my business, just pragmatic solutions from fallible hosts who have run into occasional snags.

Thanks

[Allison2]

I just smile and apologize most of the time 🙂

Lord knows how many things I've put up with without charging people, so I think there should be a bit of grace for human error on both sides. That said, a bottle of wine seems to cause enough short-term memory loss that the issue doesn't make it to review.

A major inconvenience or discomfort should receive a some kind of refund, but for little stuff I just fix and apologize.

[Lawrene0]

My only gift to a guest for putting up with something was for extreme weather before an arrival and her cheerful, no-fuss decision to change the reservation for a later date. No extenuating circumstances, no trying to work outside the system. It was inconvenient to her, in that the anniversary (I think it was) being celebrated with a trip happened the day of the blizzard, so a gift seemed appropriate. Otherwise I'm with you, @Paul154, in that I think giving a gift spotlights the problem. I smile and apologize like @Allison2 🙂