When Oh When Will Airbnb Fix Their Rating System?? 3 Star Rating....

[Linnea-Or-David0]

As soon as the lockdown restrictions loosened here in Manitoba our listing has been booked solid... which is great.  They've for the most part been excellent guests, with just a couple less than tidy folks but nothing to drastic.

Then we get this last group.  They booked six people (where the cut off is before charging for extra guests) yet EVERY dish, EVERY towel in the house was used.  Pretty sure there was more than 6 people.  Someone put bacon grease in a mug and actually put it back in the cupboard!! Yet, they followed the house rules and washed the dishes, put the towels in the tub like they were supposed to etc.  I was willing to overlook the discrepancies and give them an okay review.

During their stay the messaged saying the house was so clean and even left a review saying they recommend the place and in the private notes said they loved the place and had a great stay.  THEN GAVE THE LISTING A 3??!!  Not only did they give the listing a 3 but they also gave cleanliness and 3 and value a 4!!! What the actual heck!!!

I just don't understand how people do that without thinking to themselves, "Hey look at all the 5s they've got.  Maybe I should re-evaluate whether this place is truly a 3... "

Should do I public reply at all? Or just ignore it?  I was thinking of replying  "Hey Love (that's her name), thanks for staying.  I'm going to assume your 3 star review was an accident since you recommend our place and messaged that you loved how clean it was and had a great time.  Thanks for staying!!"

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

@Linnea-Or-David0 if I ever received such a message as a guest - despite knowing well the circumstances that provoked it - I would feel rather squeamish. It sounds a bit like "if you don't give me 5 stars, God will kill a kitten."

The verbiage is perfectly polite, but I just feel like it degrades the quality of your hosting to so obviously seek to influence guests' ratings. But it does seem to be increasingly common in many types of businesses now. 

[David7059]

I’m relatively new and want to build a reputation for quality. So far so good, all 4* and 5 * ..... then one 2-night stay gives 3* but no obviously negative comments. So, I reply asking for constructive feedback so we can lean but nothing ..... oh, other than a snotty AbnB email telling me about the pitfalls of poor reviews. Personally I think any review of 3* or less and the guest should have to say why. D

[Anonymous]

@David7059  I would strongly suggest that you remove your public response to that review. You really shot yourself in the foot there, as the audience is people considering your listing - not the reviewer.

Why desecrate a positive review with the revelation that the guest rated you poorly? If you want detailed feedback, you ask for that in a private message. 

[Fred13]

   Oftentimes responses require some make believe as an actor in a play, meaning you do not have to swing to every pitch; oftentimes one is better off ignoring altogether silly, stupid statements some guests feel compelled to include in their 'supremely-important' review.

   As others have said, you are selling your place, but also yourself to future guests who are contemplating booking with you. To me most future guests like to be assured the host is indeed cool. These are informal private places they are booking, not formal hotels.

[Kathryn125]

Isn't it sad that Airbnb doesn't do something about their rating system. And our superhost status relies on it and therefore encourages us as hosts to explain it to our guests which is a bit like bribery. In every other rating system there is room for better than ok and excellent but with Airbnb there is 'ok' and then 4 degrees of worse than ok.!! I have spoken to guests who gave me a 3 star and they said they never give 5 as there is always room for improvement??? BAsically we have to get 5 all the time which puts a lot of pressure to explain to the guests not just provide a great stay.

[Helen427]

@Linnea-Or-David0 @Kathryn125 @Fred13 

@David7059and others

A recent well traveled long term Guest in advancing years & user of ABB who has glowing reviews advised me they NO longer write reviews for Hosts as they got fed up with the flowery riff raff they were expected to complete & having to provide an explanation to ABB if they gave a Host less than xyz stars.

There's now far too many steps to go through.

They preferred ABB when it was simple with a brief review, no stars etc.

It's a shame that ABB haven't asked a broader range of Guests in more countries than the approx 2,600 ones in the UK, USA and Australia that they did when they did a previous survey- that info is tucked away in an ABB official website page.

 It's unknown which research company they use, or what questions were asked.

[Linnea-Or-David0]

Hey everyone, thanks so much for the help with this.  I didn't realize the no one else could see what stars someone gave.  That's a relief!  I think they used to show stars individually.....

I did contact her privately and she said that she asked her friends to help her out with the review and she just put what they told her.

I kind of wish I'd stuck to my instincts of reviewing her.  I too often do 'oh, they weren't that bad' meanwhile I'd never host them again...

[Mary996]

Guests can't see the stars you get so no need to reply further. I really sympathise with your regret at not reviewing more critically … but what if we're too harsh??? That could put off other prospective Guests. Its tricky!! I'm sure there's a balance.

[Robin4]

@David7059  @Kathryn125 @Mary996 

You have to realize that it is no good criticizing the guest for a 3 star rating even though their review may have been good. This Airbnb's fault, not the guests.

First of all in the review process, the guest is asked to give the host an overall star rating.......

The guest thinks the stay was great so they are tempted to give it a 5, or some guests say a 5 is that perfection that is unattainable and give it a 4! 

Next the guest comes to step 3 and is faced with these 5 (five) options!

They see this and get to thinking...."Well, it wasn't perfect but it was okay, about what I hoped for and expected!

So the tick the 'About the same as I expected', relate that to a 3 out of 5, hit the back button and amend that 5 star they gave in step one to a three......they are simply doing as Airbnb tells them to do!

The only way around this is to do what I do in the house rules folder and explain to the guest the implications of Airbnb's star rating system.......

Cheers.........Rob

[Emilia42]

@Robin4 Do you really think that guests are clicking the back button (twice!) to change their rating from a 5 star to a 3 star after seeing step 3? I don't buy it. I think you are giving guests a little too much credit in their "logical" thinking. 

[Robin4]

@Emilia42  @Mary996 

I would have agreed with you  Emilia but, two events about 18 months ago brought this home to me! 

@Kath9 from Albany in WA brought to the Community Centre some oddities about the new guest review process and how it was misleading, and I took a bit of notice of that.

Also around the same time one evening I was having a talk with a guest in general about hosting.

I don't force myself on guests but, quite often during the summer months they will join us outdoors for drinks and a chat on the nice evenings.

At one point I mentioned how so much of the hosts business revolved around the review system. I said with Airbnb there is too much emphasis on the review........ compared to VRBO, Stayz. The guest then surprised me with what she said.  She said the review had become a bit drawn out in the last 6 months, but at least now with Airbnb's guidelines reviewing is a lot more accurate.

I asked her to elaborate on that. At that time it was about a year since I had been an Airbnb guest and had not seen the newer guest review format.

She walked me through a review on her tablet as she did it for her last stay the previous week, and the first thing she did in step 1 was to, without hesitation, tick the 3 stars for the overall rating!

I asked her why she gave it that rating and she said  ...."Well, it wasn't heaven and it wasn't hell, it was an okay place, matched the description and matches the options that Airbnb gives in the next bit"! 

She ticked a couple of the icons in step 2 for 'Stylish touches'....'Sparkling clean' and then she went to step 3, and there is was! She said this was where Airbnb had made it much easier, they gave a suitable framework that was expected of the guest!

I was so struck by this I showed her @Kath9 's graphic of just how Airbnb interprets these star ratings and she was shocked to realise that by doing the right thing and providing constructive comment she was actually hurting a host she had no intention of hurting!

She backtracked to step 1 and amended her overall star rating from 3 to 5!

Don't be too sure guests are not logical Emilia, all they are doing is what Airbnb tells them to do. 

For those who maybe don't know what the guest review procedure looks like, I have put the first 6 steps here into a screenshot.......

You will note in Step 4 'Value' does not show up as a rate-able option, however, 'location' does!

Cheers.......Rob  

[Emilia42]

@Robin4 I would understand your logic if the "better than expected" question came first. But the Overall star questions comes first, so right away guests have in their mind was the stay excellent, good, average . . . 

Airbnb is completely oversaturated with 5-star reviews. Even the low budget places near me which mention things like "dust," "noise," "unresponsive host" in the reviews have an overall rating of over 4.75. If guests were really equating "as expected" or "a bit better" with star ratings why would these hosts still be getting the vast majority of 5-star reviews? 

I have always rated hosts 5 stars because my stay was great and "as expected" because I never expected any more. And that has always translated to a 5-star review.

[Mary996]

Very helpful. Thanks for sharing. I'm not unhappy with the system but am completely willing to put my head together with other Hosts to recommend new models of operation to our Agents, Airbnb, whilst at the same time having some caution about the disruption caused by such changes. For example I really don't like the new picture presentation of Listings since the images are so much smaller and often fail to load. Do you have a point of view about the new layout? Very nice to be speaking to you by the way!  Best wishes from Mary

[Mary996]

@Robin4

On further consideration and looking at the way you've put this to us as phantom Guests, Rob, I really can see how a 3 star was offered. Thank you so much for pointing this out. So is this another recent change? We will need to provide Feedback to our Agent, Airbnb, to the effect that we have trialled the new layout but that it doesn't suit....!! Taking control you know!!  We'll be considering other alternatives or may request that you revert to the earlier model.... in due course. Haha. Next step... agreeing amongst ourselves on a better design or do we want to go back to how things were with some or all of the systems....????

[Sarah977]

@Robin4  The way you said that conversation with your guest went is exactly the way I discuss the Airbnb rating system with guests, because I also sit around and have a coffee or beer with them. It's discussed in general terms, not in a way where the guest would get the idea that I'm pressuring them for a 5* review.

Mostly I express how absurd I think the whole star rating game is. This is easy for me to do, because it's a pet peeve of mine- it's not about my star ratings from guests. In these days of social media, we are asked to star rate everything from the haircut you got, to the place that changed your tires, to the cafe we ate at. It's outta control. Used to be, if you got bad service somewhere, you just told your friends and family and never gave that place your business again. Now everyone with a smart phone or a computer can trash someone's business with a click on a star for whatever ridiculous reason they want to.

When guests understand that hosts aren't upset with less than 5* reviews because we think our places are so fantastic, or that we're such incredible hosts, but simply because of the way Airbnb applies the ratings to hosts and tells us we need to improve, they get it. I'm sure hosts wouldn't be wasting their time and mental energy fretting about 4* reviews if Airbnb didn't consider it "not good enough". And all guests I've spoken to are grateful for the info.