Guests who move furniture looking for issues

[Anthony608]

I am curious if anyone has ever experienced “that guest” who, upon arrival at the guest room or residence, began looking for problems by moving furniture away from walls, checking behind and underneath beds for dust or any other item which could be called trash, then requesting either a refund, discount, or leaving a bad review.

In my hosting now for over a year, I’ve had this happen four times.  Two of them were deliberate attempts to find issues with the rooms while the other two were just strange people.  One was a woman who actually bent a bed frame, pulling a very heavy frame away from the wall and the other was a Chinese couple who moved a very heavy bookcase, for some unknown reason, to see if there was anything behind it (there wasn’t).   The remaining two, as mentioned, were people deliberately looking for issues in order to ask for a discount.

I’ve only had a guest twice bring up in a review that the room was “dirty” because of this checking-behind-furniture issue and in both cases I was able to leave a civil reply.  And only one of those cases was the guest actually justified (a clump of dust underneath a bed), but they still had to get down on their hands and knees, crawling under the bed, to discover this.  Ever since then, by the way, I routinely check underneath and behind furniture items between guests.

Has anyone else had this happen?  How did you deal with it?

[Anonymous]

@Anthony608   This is an issue that seems to occur most in two scenarios:

a) The listing is the lowest-cost of its kind in the area

b) The guest has booked during a period of high demand and their preferred type of home isn't available

Of those, the former group is the easier one to weed out.  Pricing just a little more than your nearest competitors sends the discount-seekers rolling downhill. 

But there's also a more subtle strategy you can use if you're not concerned with maximizing occupancy. That would be to leave off Instant Book, and engage your request with dialogue to gauge their enthusiasm and suitability for your particular offering.  People who are happy with their choice of accommodation don't go around looking for flaws.  Hosts in towns that are suburbs of major tourist cities have the eternal problem with guests who wanted to stay in the town center but didn't have the budget, so it helps to have a special quirk or feature that makes the home a destination in its own right. 

[Nanxing0]

@Anthony608 I agree that premium pricing can filter out over 90% of those shady guests, and I'm practicing it as well, but not 100% most of time. I clearly remember I had a guest in late 2019 that he arrived and told me the front of the building makes him unfortable, which I never heard from other guests and our building is just a typical townhouse in west Philadelphia close to UPenn. He told me he immediately left without stepping in and demanded full refund. I told him as long as he can initiate the cancellation so my calendar can be freed up I will process the refund, but he never did, and ultimately left me a very nasty review.  I have priced my listing to be above average on the market but still there are some sxxtty guests coming over. 

[Nanxing0]

I've had a couple guests like this, but there are also a few cases that guest arrived and found some issue, like odor, bug, etc. Usually I respond differently depending on how guests communicate. Some guests are very nice and they are simply just telling me the issue but nothing else. For those guests I would usually give them a small partial refund (like 10%) so everyone would be happy. The 2nd type of guests are those telling me they can't stay here due to the issue so I'd ask them to contact Airbnb to find another property and refund them. 

The 3rd type of guests are the most problematic. They inform us the problem, and then state that they want to stay here (because they can't find anywhere else to stay blablabla) and demand for a partial or even full refund. To those guests, my response is simple: take it or get out. If they don't want to stay, leave and cancel the reservation I will fully refund. If they want to stay, I can at most give them a small discount (usually up to 10% most of time) that's it. Bottom line is that we don't offer "free stay" simply because they are not satisfied. Don't be hesitant about full refund. You will have more trouble hosting those guests. They are the most demanding guests. 

[Anthony608]

My most recent experience was a woman who put in private feedback "the rug was not vacuumed properly under the bed" along with a four star overall review. 

I inspected where she said the problem was and found tiny pieces of what looked like rubber just underneath the bed.  My theory is it was from the roller wheels of her bag and had flaked off onto the carpet.  She then (apparently) had gotten down on the floor and looked under the bed, thinking the rubber from her own bag was dirt. 

I in fact confronted her about this over the Airbnb message system after she left.  She apologized and I told her if she wished to stay with me again, to please let me know right away if there was an issue with the room rather than keeping quiet about it then placing it in the review as a surprise.  She stayed with a few times, but based on recent behavior, I don't think she will be back.