When guests lie and Review Guidelines

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Dan132
Level 3
Oakland, CA

When guests lie and Review Guidelines

I've been a host for about a year now and love Airbnb. I really like being a guest but hosting is another matter. I've had some strange reviews from guests who didn't respect the guidelines of the house and clearly didn't read the profile. They didn't have the experience they wanted to left reviews with outright lies in them. 

 

The last review was the worst I've gotten. I contacted customer service and they said that the review didn't violate the review guidelines so they would not remove it. I asked if lying was acceptable and they avoided the question....repeatedly! I asked how far within the guidelines a guest could lie and, again, the avoided the question. I gave a hypothetical scenario....a guest claims there is no Airbnb at all and had to pitch a tent! Again, customer service refused to answer the question. 

 

I can understand why they don't want to mediate reviews, but when someone leaves a review that's totally inaccurate and downright false I find it troubling that Airbnb is not more supportive. Again, I can understand why they don't want to get involved or hear from hosts who can take honest constructive feedback....if your place is a mess then it needs to be cleaned, etc. 

 

In the recent survey they sent out I addressed this issue. As of today, I am really distressed to find such a large loophole in their review policy. For example, I have two brand new air conditioners in the house that have worked fine for everyone, but the last guest claims they "did nothing." We had record hot temps, he had done a long-distance six hour bicycle ride in that heat, and he was clearly not doing well after the ride. I also checked in with him to see if everything was okay, which is my routine, and he said nothing about the house not being cool enough....frustrating because I have a third unit in my studio that I could have provided.

 

I wonder if Airbnb is addressing this issue. A lot of hosts find this frustrating! I've invested a lot into this space and more improvements are forthcoming, and yesterday I pulled my business permit as the county is now requiring it. It's frustrating to think we have no recourse to guests who lie!

 

Dan

1 Best Answer
Peta7
Level 10
Johannesburg, South Africa

As of recent the platform agents only consider the Content policy and no other long standing policy or guideline is taken into account to have a bogus review removed.

 

We have also been advised that only the review may be removed in extreme cases but that the more damaging star ratings will anyhow stick to a profile?

 

After foiling a recent guest's attempt to Blackmail and Extort from us by denying him a FREE sleepover visitor resulted in us recieving the promissed bogus review with all its intended damages and as always requested to have the provable lies removed, obviously this did not happen as the guest did not transgress the Content Policy that clearly advise on how to make a bogus review stick.

 

We were refered to the Terms of Service we entered into but could not find this doc on the platform, however we did find a copy of this legally binding document with the help of Google and find the following extraction on reviews facinating:

 

10. Ratings and Reviews

10.1 Within a certain timeframe after completing a booking, Guests and Hosts can leave a public review (“Review”) and submit a star rating (“Rating”) about each other. Ratings or Reviews reflect the opinions of individual Members and do not reflect the opinion of Airbnb. Ratings and Reviews are not verified by Airbnb for accuracy and may be incorrect or misleading.

10.2 Ratings and Reviews by Guests and Hosts must be accurate and may not contain any offensive or defamatory language. Ratings and Reviews are subject to Section 5 and must comply with Airbnb’s Content Policy and Extortion Policy.

 

So now we find ourselves completely confused, perhaps someone could enlighten us on "Reviews are not verified by Airbnb for accuracy and may be incorrect or misleading." We ask ourselves... 'So why do we then get penalized and our listings suspended, what for?'

 

Then in (10.2) we read: "Ratings and Reviews by Guests and Hosts must be accurate......" will this then equate in a breach of contract entered by Platform and Host for allowing provable lies to be posted on the platform? And are we now to believe that the Review and the Star rating systems are 2 different entities always believed to be part and parcell off the Review?

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43 Replies 43
Farah1
Level 10
Seattle, WA

@Dan132 I understand your concern and this has been discussed so many times here in the forum. The only suggestion I can give (which is something that I want to start doing as a habit) is to ask and check on the guest using the airbnb messaging system. I am not sure how well this will work, but what I am hoping is if there is a difficult guest who leave a false review, we have proof that the guest claimed that everything was great with their stay (for example). It happens so many times that we ask in person about how the stay is going and guest says it is good and smile, then BAM! the bad review come and it is a lie/false. So, I am still practicing to ask through the system instead of in person. Hopefully this will work/help.

Farah, that's a great idea....having a trail of communication that Airbnb admins can look at if there's a problem. The deeper problem, though, is that it seems that Airbnb won't do a thing about it even if someone is caught lying, etc. I'm really amazed at the fact that they would not answer my question about blatant, provable lying....all they did is deflect the question!

 

The company would really benefit from evolving this component of their service. 

 

I think I'm going to get in the habit of using the Air email!

 

Thanks again, 

Dan

seems air bnb has not changed their process since this thread was made, I have gone the email route, I dont think they even reviewed anything.

Hey Farah, I have had to be tough on lies guests write, and making sure you have written/text communication or collect all the voicemails or audio clips the guest sends you. You can send screen shots to AirBnB.

 

The sad thing is, a guest can leave a terrible review and terrible star rating, while mentioning a list of issues as negatives "There was no kids playground" (none was advertised). "There was no daily cleaning" there was none advertised. "We had to pay sales tax before arriving" that was mentioned clearly in house rules before booking on airbnb. In my opinion complaints that are unreasonable should give hosts the right to request removal. And any lies by the guests, that should also be reason for removal of the review if you can prove the lie. 

 

However the reality is. Air BnB allows for a lot of lies & bad vibes, and won't help you. But they will remove a review if you can prove there was blackmail/threats/manipulation in regard to getting a good review. For example, a guest might say before or during the stay.... do this for me or I will write a bad review. If you can prove it (in writing), that can be clear grounds for removal of the review.  We know for sure. We finally won a case!

we had the same experience, did anything help the situation

Robin-and-Mami0
Level 5
Honolulu, HI

Yeah, it seems 1 in 10 guests is bonkers and there is nothing you can do about it.  I just had another one.  A half dozen times I asked them to let me know if they had any questions or concerns.  Never did they mention anything.  On the review they gave me 4 stars  because the size of the space was "smaller than advertised", when in fact I supplied a floor plan with dimensions and square footage in the photos and the square footage in the text description.  The 4 star review broke my perfect 5 star record.  Dat make  a me aaangry but there's nothing I could have done to avoid it and nothing Airbnb will do to help me.  To rub salt in the wound, Airbnb will send me a message chastizing me for "over stating" the size of the place and if my average stars fall below 4.8 more chastising from Airbnb when in fact it's the crazy guests that need chastizing and the review needs fixing.

That really sucks. We're new to hosting and are learning a LOT from reading these forums. I had no idea that such a thing could happen. Hopefully it's just a one-off and you'll be back to hosting only good guests soon.

Thanks for the tip. I'm going to consider adding the room dimensions to my room info. 

Chris1537
Level 6
Nedlands, Australia

Guests are permitted to review the accuracy of our listings. I feel that hosts should be able to review the accuracy of the guests reviews.
I've taken to not only checking reviews that have been written for guests, but also the reviews they have written for other hosts.
When looking at their reviews, click on the hosts that wrote them, then look at their reviews and find the one written by that guest.

I've just had my first negative review and there are several things in it that are just not correct. I've discussed it with Airbnb and am waiting to hear back as to whether it can be removed.
I'm told that it will depend on whether the guest is in breach of Airbnb's content policy.
Looking at the content policy, it states that, among other things, the following is not permitted.

 

"Reviews that do not represent the author’s personal experience or that of their travel companions"

 

Now clearly any lie or false claim, does not 'represent the author's personal experience' and is grounds for having the review removed.

If you can prove any lie or false claim in a review, then this should be enough to have the review removed.

. . .and if this’s was only true then the whole lying issue would be manageable, but the fact is that Airbnb offers ZERO support to hosts, even their suupposedly extra valued Super Hosts. I have had MULTIPLE cases where I was able to prove the jest was lying, and Airbnb case managers even RECONIZED that this was clear from the mail in the Airbnb mail thread, yet the false review was NOT removed , just as I have had cases where it was BEYOND proof that the review was written by a third person and hence NOT based on a personal experience — the person ADMITTED openly in Airbnb mail that he/she was never around during the stay and had ZERO personal interaction — and again Airbnb just flat out DENIED to remove the review. I am hoping/waiting for someone in North America launching a class act suit over this issue with Airbnb to FORCE this company to take adequate responsibility.

Mohit14
Level 2
Gurugram, India

So I'm also another of the SuperHosts affected by the review which was a total lie. As a matter of fact, we accepted guest's alteration request since he cited his daughter's medical issue, and he returns the favour by giving us a 1 star.

 

Contacted Airbnb and quoted their policy where they should be removing reviews where "Reviews that do not represent the author’s personal experience or that of their travel companions"

 

All I got in return were two standard answers that everyone of you will have got -

a) Review does not violate our policy (you can try to prove it otherwise in any way but they will behave like bots and keep repeating the same line)

b) You can respond to the guest review with your viewpoint (load of crap since you will come out looking bad whatever you reply and most guests would rather trust the one bad review over tons of positive reviews)

And lastly when you tell them that your rating has also been screwed, they have no answer but to say it will get better after you get a couple of positive reviews.

The whole conversation will continue in this loop till either you give up and hang up, or they put you on Mute and do other things till you get tired and hang up.

 

I don't know who will read this rant of mine, but if you do, please pass on one suggestion to whoever at airbnb can listen -

Don't allow guests who have cancelled or altered their dates to write reviews because 99% of times they will screw over hosts by either giving a bad review or holding them at ransom with threats of negative reviews in return for waiving cancellation charges.

 

Their customer service are simply too vain to understand that their callous attitude to this issue can result in loss of jobs and livelihoods beings destroyed!

I'm thinking a lawsuit (possibly class action) against Airbnb for libel might do the trick. If they publish libelous information and refuse to remove it then they are just as liable.  Yes, an attorney speaking here...

can't undertake a class action, you accepted that in the terms. they envisaged dat! 🙂

Can we do that