Racist Entitled Guest roaming **

[Anthony608]

I wouldn't normally call out a guest like this, but I wanted to sincerely warn hosts in the ** area about this account:

**

This guest stayed with me for about a week and was all smiles during her stay, every day saying the house was great and that everything was going fine.  When she left, she did not leave a review at first and, as the 14 day window was coming to a close, it looked like she wouldn't.  Then, with only 2 hours left to leave a review, she left a single one line public review, 3 stars overall, and *slammed* the house in private feedback.

The issue is that her feedback appeared to be retaliation and possibly racist.  She stated we didn't really have a housekeeper and that the entire house was filthy and covered in dust.  She also stated our bathroom was filthy and that our "woolwork" (I think she meant woodwork) was dirty and had never been cleaned.  The motivation for this seems to be that she wanted to check in early, was told we had a $15 dollar fee because we had to reschedule our housekeeper, and I think then she basically took a white glove to the house looking for problems acting like we had lied about our housekeeper.  She also at one point actually saw our housekeeper, who is Hispanic, and apparently made a racist remark overheard by another guest.

Most of what she said was also a lie.  We have never had a single guest say the house was dusty, our wood banisters are also clean, and the bathroom is cleaned with industrial chemicals for each guest and is always sparkling.  The woman herself also appeared to be someone who is living in AirBNBs (which is fine) possibly roaming the area looking for work.  In all she struck me as a very entitled "may I speak to your supervisor" type of person.  The fact that she acted friendly, then timed the review so that with only 2 hours I possibly wouldn't be able to leave one of my own, then trashed the house in her review, speaks volumes.

I didn't leave any feedback to her review and didn't contact her about her many issues.  But I did want to warn other hosts in the area.

**[Personal information hidden - Community Center Guidelines]

[Sarah977]

@Anthony608  If hosts got their listings suspended because of something they wrote here, I've certainly never heard of such a thing, and just because a host might think that's what caused the suspension, it's likely not true.

What the mods do here is delete things which are discriminatory, contain personal info like names, email addresses and phone numbers, posts which contain foul language, and which are advertising spam. In other words, violates forum policy.

Of course they don't read through every post- they are usually alerted to such by other posters flagging the post.

Nor do I believe they "tattletale" to Airbnb. They might pass on something highly concerning, like once when I alerted them to a guest post which said he was planning to go destroy a host's home because the host refused to refund the guest's cancellation. 

But they don't have any power to actually make decisions about how Airbnb deals with hosts or guests.

They actually work for another company, which contracts out moderating services. 

[Anonymous]

@Anthony608   It really doesn't matter how confident you are that your other guest heard what he thought he heard - it is still just hearsay, and it does not begin to justify trashing someone on a site that's visible to the whole internet. If you believe the housekeeper was treated poorly by one of your guests, you should privately apologize to the housekeeper, not publicly defame the guest. 

As for the "false front" thing, well, that's just another term for politeness. It's what most hosts of shared homes expect from their guests.

[Anthony608]

@Anonymous- I can certainly understand your viewpoint.  I was not trashing this guest, my intention was to warn other hosts, even if people on the thread don't believe that.  I had no reason to think she was a bad guest until after I read her private feedback.  Something is going on where someone compliments the residence every day, says how wonderful everything is, and then sends feedback like she did calling the host a liar, saying we didn't really have a housekeeper, our cleaning fee was a scam, and the entire house was filthy.  And it was not a nice message with the tone, etc.  I think she didn't put it publicly because she knew I would write a public reply or it might be reviewed by AirBNB and removed.  Anyway, this thread seems to have come to its natural conclusion, the guest's profile information has been removed, and the rating was changed by AirBNB from 3 stars to 4, so I guess I can take what I can get.

[Kia272]

@Anthony608 I agree with the majority of the others responding to your post. I found it weird and not very nice. Posting her profile does seem retaliatory. Also, the idea that you are warning other hosts? I'm not feeling it. 

If she is living in AirBnbs as you suggest, she's already with another host right now, and has likely booked several weeks ahead in this area. 

The timing of her review should have nothing to do with you leaving yours. 

I understand that it would be upsetting getting an overall 3* and having her comment on the perceived lack of cleanliness in your house, but perhaps you should take another look. I think many guests are willing to overlook minor imperfections if their stay was overall enjoyable, and they have a good rapport with the host. She was actually very kind, containing her comments to private feedback. I don't see this happening over $15 for early check-in.

As to the racist comment, you'll never really know what was actually said. I'd have a mod remove this post if I were you. 

I hope your current and upcoming guests are easygoing and nice!

[Anthony608]

@Kia272- I don't know how to contact mods to remove posts, have never done it before.  If they want to delete the link to her profile, that would be fine.  And yes, my motivation was warning other hosts.  The area I live in has seen a spike in AirBNB scams of people making up issues to complain and try and get refunds.  I'm not saying that is entirely what she did here, but I think it was caused by our early check-in fee and how she didn't want to pay it so looked for problems in the house..

[Anthony608]

@Sarah977- I think in your earlier comment you hit it spot on, that this guest might have been a bit OCD and was indeed checking the tops of doors for dust and I know for certain she was pulling out and checking behind and underneath furniture.  I also have learned since my original post, again based on what the other guest in the house told me, that she was probably expecting her room to be cleaned each day with the bed made.

Despite the pushback on this thread, and yes perhaps I was a bit vindictive here, this guest was not an innocent victim.  I think she kept her feedback in the private comments because she knew publicly I would probably have responded and possibly had the comment removed.  I also think the waiting until there was only 2 hours left to leave a review was for a strange reason, just not sure what that was.

The good thing here is that because of this incident we initiated a more highly aggressive dusting policy now when a new guest arrives.  I draw the line at pulling major appliances and heavy furniture away from walls though for each guest, although we do this during deep cleaning every few weeks.

[Russell49]

You haven't really given any proper or concrete examples of racism here, yet seem eager to call it out-a trend that seems to be taking the USA by storm.