Your listings are temporarily paused

Andy34
Level 3
Markham, Canada

Your listings are temporarily paused

I just got an email telling me that "Your listings are temporarily paused" after I ejected a guest due to complaints from another guest about late night and early morning partying, about having multiple visitors sleep over without discussion or permission, and about having a stream of different women who he guessed were prostitutes in the room. My housekeeper also expressed concern that she thought the guest was doing drugs in the room. I had politely requested the guest to refrain from these activities several times, but he insisted that he was on vacation and did not want to live under "strict rules". Finally I suggested that he might be better off in a hotel and I terminated his stay through the AirBnB dispute resolution process. He received a refund through AirBnB (which is being deducted from the payout for my next guest ... which I was not happy with since this person broke the contract and I was prevented from hosting others by the last minute cancellation). In any case I was not surprised that the guest gave me a review of "1 out of 5" afterwards. However it is ridiculous to say the least that although my only other two reviews have been 4, and 5 out of 5, and though I have at least 8 extremely positive comments, that this review was included in the average so that my average review then became 33%. There is no usefulness in including a review from a guest that has been ejected. Furthermore, since they have not completed their stay they really have no basis for making a review of how well the host delivered according to the terms of that stay. I'd like to learn more about what experiences others have had in this area.

29 Replies 29
Gyöngyi0
Level 2
Benalmádena, Spain

I am very surprised about what you are writing as this can happen to anybody and as I can see now there is no help from AirBNB for this kind of problems. There is no phone, no email, nobody to contact. I am really dispointed. Last year you still had a chance to contact somebody who was able so supervise you case and to give you a solution. 

So this is a pattern? The dispute resolution person took a day or two to get back to me, and when we spoke I learned that other hosts in this exact same situation had to deal with RAPID and sometimes POTENTIALLY SERIOUS escalation of conflict in the interim. The choices are unpleasant and difficult to negotiate alone without experience with these kinds of problems and without a history of what works, what doesn't work, and what the potential consequences are. On the one hand we are put in the position of having to either face complaints from neighbors, or even police, and at the very minimum feeling uncomfortable or even unsafe in our own homes. On the other hand we are put in the position of ejecting a guest who could then become confrontational, and if they were the kind of person who would be so poorly behaved as to be involved in such a dispute in the first place ... even violent.

 

What other issues do you have in this area? I think I'll write an article to airbnb about this. Spread this message to other people who've had similar issues with lack of customer support.

 

Hi, this happened to me recently and I was very surprised because two guests gave low ratings, I got my listing suspended. But I also have good ratings so there's no sense in doing that.

This particular guest didn't like my apartment and found it too old. She must have had the believe that it was all new, no idea, but the point is that airbnb gives too much power to the ratings instead of looking at the bigger picture.

I find that we are completely unprotected in that sense. My first thought was that I'd get out of this company. There are many others.

It may be an automated service which is not a good idea. We are as important as the guests!

Well put. Couldn’t agree more. 

Dino16
Level 2
London, United Kingdom

h aI am very upset too, they based on 2 low ratings with 6 good rating in between. I also called them and the customer services can barely communicate in English (I am based in London)

 

I am going to purposely offer cheaper rent on the rival websites as a counter punishment

 

we deserve to be treated better, the website is not our employer

Results for ‘‘“This was a one-time issue.” Suspensions are based on multiple occurrences of a problem or issue. In other words, one guest review alone wouldn’t have resulted in a suspension. So based in that why our both lists have been suspended? ’ We are really worried why we have been suspended not just for one listing but two of our listing can you please explain so we can understand the impact of this please ?’

So based in the above that Airbnb wrote  why our both lists have been suspended? ’ We are really worried why we have been suspended not just for one listing but two of our listing can you please explain so we can understand the impact of this please ?’

Completely disagree, I received 3 reviews on a new room.  2 at 5 stars and 1 at 0 stars from a very difficult guest.  They unactivated my listing

Allan55
Level 1
Peebles, United Kingdom

Very worrying that airbnb impose a 'pause' on a listing without conversation and only base this on a single review even if the guest is in the wrong. Reviews are highly subjective and if a guest is annoyed with something out of the host's control he/she can then create a poor review.

We had a single bad review for a listing, after several 5 star raves for the same property, because the guest complained that parking was 7 minutes walk from the property. Frankly this was ridiculous in an international city such as Glasgow - where can you expect this in an city centre?  However this review was even more annoying and more ridiculous as we actually have a private parking space behind the property which is part of the attraction. The guest in question failed to read the information sent to him, the information within the property, and the advert for it in the airbnb description and gave the review a 3 star. We try to make information 'idiot' proof but sometimes this isn't enough!!

Based on this nonsense airbnb suspended the listing for 5 days without warning which I found shocking and even after contacting them refused to resolve the situation. This was a supposedly a warning from airbnb to upgrade an already 5 star venue. I think airbnb should grow up and allow potential guests to make their own judgement based on a list of reviews from bona fide guests and not just the odd numpty believing he/she has a grievance. 

I tottaly agree with you. My first guest was horrible in a review of one house and my rates

dropped although the other reviews were great even worse than your was the fact we spoke with the Airbnb manager and yet we still got suspended 

@Allan55 Yes reviews can be subjective. I for instance can't sleep in spring mattress or foam but other people like it. Some people are expecting Hotel Boutique stay for low cost I believe. I write basic room and some still expect luxury living. 

Branka-and-Silvia0
Level 10
Zagreb, Croatia

@Andy34 @Allan55 @Martin-and-Lukie0 @Nieves8 @Gyöngyi0

 listings are automaticly suspended for some period of time when their average rating fall under 4 (I think)

@Branka-and-Silvia0 are correct.

 

Also, if you are managing several properties, then only the listing below 4 gets paused. 

My listing isn’t below 4 star rating and it has been paused for 5 days. I don’t understand why, because I recently got a bad review from some teenagers 

Younger people are the worse. In general though I get enough bad reviews were I get the beds in my hostel paused because of complaints from people who booked not knowing it was a hostel. Other times they will write a good review, then leave me lower stars because it’s a hostel. All because they didn’t read the listing and were expecting the grand Hyatt for 20-30 dollars a night. This is the first time I’ve been extremely annoyed with