The guests asked Airbnb to delete their review on our place

[Bo24]

Hello everyone, 

As airbnb host, we just had this strange incident:

Our guests left us a really good review with comments and 5 star ratings and we reviewed them too. But several days after, I got this email from a case manager saying that she was requested by the guests to remove the review from my account becasue the guest thought the reviews are private and not public. The case manager deleted the review and then let me know.

I understand the guests are not aware that the review is public to everyone, but can the case manager really just go ahead and delete the review even the review is fully complied with the content policy? 

Airbnb hosts are evaulated and measured by the reviews and we constantly try to get guests to review us after their stay, so we can keep up with the requirement,  but the case manager just deleted the review and also the rating, that guests gave us. 

Do any of you have experince in how to handle this?

Cheers, 

Bo

[Costa2]

They may say about TRUST and SAFETY as as they wish.  Unfortunately every big bussiness based on corruption.

[Ian-And-Anne-Marie0]

@Ute42 

Not that straight forward, that would contravine the 'Extortion policy' 😉

@Bo24 @Branka-and-Silvia0 @Cathie19 

[Ute42]

.

@Ian-And-Anne-Marie0 

We have a saying in Germany:

"Wo kein Klaeger, da kein Richter" = "If there's no plaintiff, theres no judge"

[Cathie19]

@Bo24 

Hi @Ian-And-Anne-Marie0, as I get to “know” more about @Ute42, she’s very astute to terms of service requirements, and is being very tongue in cheek here! 

She’s just pointing out the farcical nature of the CS judicial /arbitrary, lopsided decision making processes at play here. 

[Costa2]

Sure it is extortion and coruption promoted by airbnb in here.

[Ben551]

@Bo24  I find this very interesting, because this week I find myself in a reverse situation...

Recently a guest 'accidentally' ticked 4 stars in some of the review categories, when they meant to tick 5 stars.  They wrote me a message on the Airbnb review system saying this was their mistake and that they utterly adored our place and felt terrible that they had made such a mistake.  They clearly felt terrible about this and were lovely people who told us almost every day how amazing our place was.

They said they found the Airbnb review system confusing and hard to understand.  Unlike other guests, they weren't very tech savvy and didn't realise their mistake until it was too late.

So I contacted Airbnb on the guests behalf to explain the sitaution.  I explained that the guest desperately wanted their review amended to correct their mistake.  The conversation I had been having with the guest was all accounted for within the Airbnb message system, so quite easy for the CS person to see and verify.

However, the Airbnb CS person we spoke to insisted that there was absolutely nothing they could do to help the guest correct their review.  I explained that the guest was very upset by this and that they would likely not want to use Aribnb again if they weren't able to help them.  Their confidence was shaken from the mistake and were unlikely to book again via the platform.  Still, the CS rep said "no" to any kind of help to fix the guest mistake.  The guest was not happy about any proposal to have no review at all, so the CS rep's offer to make it "vanish" wasn't satsifactory for the guest.

The guest has now said they will never be using Airbnb again.

It seems to me that your sitaution, and mine, are rather flawed... one situation resulted in a guest getting what they wanted, without question.  The other has resulted in Airbnb losing a customer entirely.

[Susan1028]

Airbnb shoots themselves in the foot yet again...

[Robin4]

@Bo24 

Bo, this highlights why we have to be so careful in the review process. We can't criticise in any personal way and we have to watch what we say. We have to be all the time conscious that whatever we say will be scrutinised not just by the guest we are talking about, but by others as well.

Gillian has put her finger on the issue here.

I have a policy, I will not mention participant guests in the review process unless I am specifically invited by the booking guest themselves to do so. You just don't know who that 'significant other' is, and by mentioning names you may well create an unwelcome sutuation for the guest.

There could be all sorts of reasons why a guest may want certain information private......The guest and his partner/wife/significant other, may not be where they are supposed to be for those dates....be it other family members, employers!

Tell the guest the review system is very important to hosts but always ask the booked guest how they feel about leaving and receiving a review! You have to do your homework Bo!

CX have acted entirely appropriately here, the guest has explained that for personal privacy reasons the review cannot remain and CX have respected that!

Cheers.......Rob. 

[Bo24]

@Robin4 

Thanks, Robin. I believe that I did enough homework and I can't agree with you on that CS acted appropriately here. 

During their stay, the guests said they chose our place based on the reviews, so they knew it was public.

And my review on them is still public on their profile, so their stay at my place is still public.

For whatever reason, they had a second thought and regreted, so could CS just go ahead and remove this without communicating with me first? Airbnb requires the hosts to maintain high review rate, and removing the whole review has an impact on our hosting performance. I can accept their reviews got removed from the public, but isn't there another way to let the rating and private review be? 

Cheers, Bo

[Robin4]

@Bo24 

Yeah I understand Bo, I am not saying you did anything wrong but generally throughout life people want to talk about nice experiences and they want others to know about them. They even want to talk about not so nice experiences. Dinner conversation revolves around them!

The only things people do not want known or talked about are things they are embarrassed by!

This guest obviously loved the stay, you did everything right Bo, they gave you a great review. But....... they didn't  just think they had been a tad generous, or said anything they didn't feel was true, or wanted to alter something. They wanted all traces of their review of you.....removed! The only reason that guest would request that is because he/she was embarrassed by it. No reflection on you Bo, it is a reflection on them. You said yourself, the guest thought the review would remain private and they wanted to thank you the host for what you did....they just didn't want to do it publicly!

What I feel has happened....and Bo, I might be entirely wrong but, this guest has said this review is causing serious issues and has explained to CX what those issues are, and has probably thought that by having his review of you removed, that would also remove yours of him/her as well!

CX have probably seen this guests concerns as serious and, as they were not directed at you in any way have chosen to remove the review without discussing it with you! If it had been a criticism of you CX would have involved you!

I might be wrong Bo, but I can see a logic here which is why I said what I did in my first post. My comments were addressing the situation and in no way a reflection on your hosting.

Cheers......Rob

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Robin4 

the guest X books my place and arrive with the guest Y .

For the reason you mentioned , my review is :  " Great guests.... " or " Guest X ..."  I never mention the names of people in his group, just the name of the person who booked. The review is on his profile so no harm could be done  if I mention his name.

[Bo24]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  @Robin4 This is also what I did in my review to them. I wrote ''the guests...'' , never mentioned their names.  I can see my review is still shown on one guest's profile. 

[Robin4]

@Bo24 

Well that rules my naming comments out!

It's a pity we can't still see the guests review, it may have given us an idea as to why they would want to get rid of it, and more importantly why CX would just delete it without consulting you.

I have posted logical scenarios, if the guests remained anonamous in the review and so did you I can only think they were not where they were supposed to be at that time.

Sorry, I can't put any other rationale to it Bo!

Cheers......Rob

[Bo24]

@Robin4 

The CS said the guest didn't want to  give out information that he was with his friend. 

Here you go, this is the review they are giving me ( I stil have it in my email record, and I put xxx instead of my partner's name because they mentioned it wrong) and you can tell that they knew this review would be read by others because they wrote in third person perspective and they just regreted. I had no problem that regreted and wanted to get the review removed, but it put me off the case was handled in this way.  

“Bo and XXX are really good hosts. My girlfriend and I were happy to stay at their place. Because They welcome us warmy and advised such nice places&restaurants in Copenhagen during our vacation for 2 days. Our room was clean and bright also it has a lot of possibilities including tv, free internet, Apple TV, towels, free drink, garden and welcome message like 5 stars hotel. We really enjoyed and had quality time at garden with lovely lights and wine. Thank for your kind hospitalty guys.”

[Robin4]

@Bo24 

"The CS said the guest didn't want to  give out information that he was with his friend"

I don't know, maybe I am getting old and cynical, I just can't help trying to find a bad element here Bo. Maybe the 'My Girlfriend' bit was the problem. They may have introduced themselves as that to you and continued that into the review thinking what was being said was private.

It might have been a work trip and he wasn't supposed to have company with him....employer could have been paying.

Maybe he was supposed to be there with soccer mate!

It all comes back to the fact that there is something about that stay that he wants kept private.

Bo this has absolutely no baring on the quality of you hosting mate.......your reviews are outstanding. The guest has screwed this up and now wants to distance himself from it!

Not fair on you, but I have worked in ABB support and it is the obligation of all support personnel to get both sides of the story. Some here will say they don't but, that is their obligation and they most often do try to get it right. CX in this instance felt whatever this personal business was, it did not involve you and so chose to leave it that way!

Cheers......Rob