I have had a guest request a change to dates of booking - th...
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I have had a guest request a change to dates of booking - the first time less than 24 hours notice - however I accepted it du...
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I've been hosting since 2007, when VRBO was the only game in town. The last 6 months of hosting on Airbnb have been worse than ALL the previous years combined. I'm not sure if guest behavior is changing, but it appears that way. Entitlement and breaking basic rules are the norm. I've incrementally had to increase rules and be very specific, which was never needed before...people were respectful for the most part.
I'm not sure what to do other than sell all four of my properties and quit hosting. If things don't change soon, I can't imagine anyone will be hosting. I don't need this mess, but maybe you guys will have some ideas. For example, my last guest registered two people and showed up with a dog, who they claimed was a service animal, once Airbnb questioned them about another issue (Although it was left alone during the day in the home and not kept with its owner for the majority of the time) so suspicious, but whatever, I have no choice but to let it slide.
At 1:30 am on the first night on a weeknight, I'm woken up to a demand for my amazon purchase pin and to turn the AC WAY down (in the desert with 95+ temps outside, it's customary in the desert to keep the thermostat at 80 to avoid overloading the energy circuits preventing brown-outs). I was thinking, "Geez, this is going to be a great experience." Then the same guest brought over an unregistered guest AND another dog, an aggressive dog, to stay...and when the dog bit my husband and had to go to the hospital, we asked them to remove the extra guest with the extra dog, and were told flatly no by the guest.
When I reported this to Airbnb, along with the refusal to remove the aggressive dog, Airbnb canceled the original guest's reservation for breaking the rules (which was probably the right thing to do)...but the guest then harassed my husband and me to the point where we had to threaten to call the police to get them to go. The guest RIGHT before this one BROKE IN after checkout and tried to throw a party with 100 people.
Luckily my neighbours called us immediately, and the police were called. WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE?! I manage one home myself, but the other three are managed by regional vacation rental companies who are having the same kinds of issues.
What to do? We've always considered ourselves reasonable people and have made some great friends using Airbnb...but that seems to be the exception, not the rule. Is Airbnb over?
Are you sure about the 3 penalty free cancellations? I had covid last week and wanted to cancel a booked guest and air bnb told me it would cost me $100 to do so. This would have been my first cancellation.
I have been lucky and not had the problems you did but I only host a bed and breakfast and
I am here to see what is going on. There has been a problem with guests cancelling at the
last minute. Any person that brings a service dog has taken good care of the dog. I know
most of the time they are pets and not service dogs. Airbnb requires you to accept service dogs , no questions asked.
@Marie585 oh yes, guests are not the same as before, now they are complaing about the things they never mentioned before- internet is slow, noise from the street, not enough towels, etc etc... it seems each one of them finds something to complain about. I spoke with other hosts in Zagreb and they said the same. The worst guests are from Bookingcom though, they are late on arrivals for several hours, leave a mess, rate very low, cancel a lot...
ah, yes, i joined BDC in May when the Summer Rollout caused our views to disappear, and I thought it might be good as a back up. I quickly got 3 bookings and 1 was super entitled, and another has left me a nice-ish review but gave me 7.5 for "staff". self check-in and no interaction with guests is our gift to them! 😅. I didn't realise you could review guests on BDC, so of course you get worse behaviour. I have closed down my calendar (for now) over there.
@Branka-and-Silvia0 in ref. to booking - that is because they don't have Request Booking, people treat that site as cheap hostels of last resorts. For my entire travelling life (and I travelled a lot) I only booked with booking once and when I needed support - they left me hanging. Lesson learned. Guess who left to book with them? Rrright....
I've noticed this as well. Guests getting really bent out of shape over minor things.
One guest complained (privately, fortunately) my Welcome Manual wasn't welcoming enough because she resented my House Rules being mentioned in it and felt they were being shoved down her throat.
One guest wrote a 4 paragraph diatribe about my small sign on the bathroom mirror asking guests not to use Benzoyl Peroxide because it bleaches towels and sheets.
One guest complained (privately) that I didn't keep messaging her to confirm she'd received my check in directions, and should have.
And then there are guests who are just inconsiderate.
One guest removed my sign indicating the drapes only opened half way and not to force them futher. (A previous guest yanked them open hard and messed up the cordage and I didn't have time before the next guest to fix it), and proceeded to yank the drapes all the way open herself, then claimed she didn't see my note attached to the cord and on bright red paper literally in the only spot to pull the cord to open the drapes.
Another guest fried so much food in only 2 days there were puddles of grease in the stove burner debris collectors. My entire house reeked for 5 days. And she cooked those annoying tiny Pastini star things. I'm still finding them. [New House Rule: No Pastini!!! LOL ]
I have guests leaving my home unlocked.
I have guests leaving all the lights on when they leave.
I swear, it didn't used to be the "norm" that guests were whiny or this inconsiderate. It used to be the exception.
@Stephanie365 That peroxide review had much more to say about the bit in your welcome manual where you talk about 5-star reviews. It was a bit of a diatribe, but I can see his point. The things that bothered him would have felt off-putting to me too.
One popular trend in social media at the moment is guests piling on ridicule for the various ways Airbnb hosts try to micromanage the guests. Sometimes the real problem is that they've booked an unreviewed home with a host who hasn't figured out what they're doing yet, while I suspect others might be failing to realize how much all those little rules are the result of bad experiences with past guests.
Whatever the case, the prevailing mainstream view now seems to be that renting an Airbnb is just another expensive hassle of traveling, rather than a fun alternative to hotels.
@Anonymous any idea how to bring the fun back Andrew as we all need some Humas chalk board has added a bright spark to my listing for families anyway and I do think signs should go more to the humurous if possible because no one wants to know about the 'horrible things that happened before'. Choccies from the famous local factory are always appreciated . H
@Stephanie365 Gosh . I would get rid of those curtains . All of my curtains are on rings and poles. Those corded ones are a nightmare. Nevertheless people have trouble with curtains and blinds a lot. Make it easy for them .They are just not that bright . Sometimes I look at a wonky blind and just think, How ?People are very ordinairy out of their own space. Make it easy in the fitments , not the notes H.
@Helen744 (agreeing with you again today x3!) We had venetian blinds in one of our rooms, and I hate them but they were there when we bought the place and they survived a year of my 3 kids living in that room 7 years ago. But of course, once you put guests in.... they didn't last 3 months! I finally just ripped them out and doubled up the curtains.
yes, reading that review reminds me of an airbnb i stayed in last year for a month, likewise I left a 5* review, but the whole time we were, as he wrote, "walking on eggshells".
@Gillian166 Why would you feel like walking on eggshells if a host leaves a note saying, "Please don't put food down the drain. There's no disposal."
"Please only flush TP down the toilet, we're on septic."
"Please don't use Benzoyl Peroxide. It bleaches towels and sheets"
These are the "numerous notes" with the "many dos and don'ts" that my guest complained about. All Three of them.
Well, ok, I do have a note instructing guests how to operate the DVD player because it's not intuitively obvious.
And I do have a note explaining the hot water system. Again, old farm house with quirks.
Oh, and the note on the washing machine telling people where to find the laundry pods.
None of these are telling guests what to do. They are explaining how things work.
How would this make you feel like walking on eggshells? Have you read some of the signs on the back of hotel room doors?
@Anonymous As for the information on reviews, it's an article published by Forbes Magazine that explains how the review system works. I figured having an unbiased 3rd party write up explain that the stars do not equate to Hotel Ratings would come across as informative vs if I personally wrote it, it would come across as begging for a 5* review. This article has been in my Welcome Manual for 5 years and this is the first complaint.
The WiFi situation is disclosed to guests prior to and during booking. In rural areas, WiFi options are limited. I make it very clear if you're expecting to stream movies or have Zoom meetings, my home won't work for you. When you have a WiFi hot spot, the more devices you connect, the slower it goes so yes, I ask guests to disconnect devices they're not using. I discovered this was a problem early on in my AirBNB hosting life when a truly lovely couple from great Britain came to stay and reached out to me that the internet was suddenly slow. I looked at my network and in addition to my computer and my BF's computer, there were three Apple Phones (for 2 people?), 3 iPads (for 2 people??), and 2 laptops all connected. 8 devices for TWO people. I asked if he and his wife were using all 8 devices and he said he was not. I asked him to disconnect the devices he wasn't using, and voila! we all had good internet speed. Silly me. I figured by pre-emptively explaining too many devices will slow down the internet, people would simply understand this is a "fix it" before things become a problem.
How should those of us with "quirky" properties deal with our quirks? Let the guests find out the hard way, or explain how things work ahead of time? People are literally resenting me telling them how to get the best use of an amenity.
After multiple towels and pillow cases have been ruined by Benzoyl Peroxide, I am going to ask people not to use it. At less than $100/night, I can't afford to replace complete sheet and towel sets for every guest. If this request gets a guest bent out of shape, so be it.
@Helen744 The drapes have been in my AirBNB for 5 years. And in my home for 10. They worked fine until one recent guest abused them and caused problems by yanking hard on them. The window is a custom, oversized window. I can't just order a new rod on Amazon. I am looking for someone to fabricate a new system for me. Until then, having a sign you literally cannot miss instructing guests not to force the drapes will have to do.
Most importantly, everything my 2022 guests are complaining about has been in my place since 2017. Same welcome manual. Same signage, Same internet. And while everyone has the occasional guest that just doesn't feel complete unless they find something to complain about, in 2022 this has become the norm instead of the exception.
@Stephanie365 We all have those guests Stephanie . There are probably a lot of times your blinds went haywire before now and the guest managed to right it . Just saying . All guests want to fiddle around with curtains and blinds . I put up my own and keep them as simple as possible but still it happens.I get around the notes by meeting the guests and giving them 'the chat'its quicker and only has to deal with whatever the current possibility to really snarl something up issue is. Still, fishermen make flies in bed . Who knew? If after the chat they have an issue they can call but some things they will never call about because they appear so simple . Just saying make it easy on yourself because if I started writing notes . Who knows where it could end . My life is stressful enough.H
@Helen744 we have one listing where we do a walk through (because the house is large and we need to show them the kitchen - until i have enough money to install a kitchenette and stop guests from sharing). We find guests don't really listen much, nor would I as a guest want to listen to a bunch of rules from the host, especially if i were on my way out to an event, or just arrived from a long trip. I show the guests their private door, give them the code, show them how to get back to their car from this spot, and then show them the guest manual saying to refer to that for any other concerns, or just message us. have a lovely stay, bye. 🙂
@Helen744 wrote:Just saying make it easy on yourself because if I started writing notes . Who knows where it could end . My life is stressful enough.H
haha, this is what has happened to my guest manual. every time a guest does something weird, I have to decide whether to make some note of it. I have wondered about doing a funny page of one liners for the back of the manual, but perhaps only I find it funny?
"our vintage coffee table has survived a long time, and was even brave enough to bear the weight of a wine-loving reveller, but she's trying to enjoy her twilight years now so please refrain from standing on her"
[Husband is today reinforcing the coffee table with 2 bolts and half a tube of Liquid Nails.]
@Gillian166 I love the funny signs and its a lot easier to get your point across with humour. I also agree that its a cumulative process of introducing the guest getting the rules across and settling them in . My little chat involves welcoming them in very basic stuff which winds around to the bathroom location ,and back out again handing them the keys letting them know about heating wi fi cooker and dishwasher and location of shops and other little peccadillos an invitation to enjoy a tea or coffee in the house and where to pick up a good one out of the house and the only relevant note ,on the fridge, my phone number . They are then on their own and hopefully will not need to see me again but people do ring me if they have an issue . I check via text next day and the day of departure . H