The "new" host review form for guests to rate hosts

[Timothy19]

I just saw this on a FB hosting group and was shocked at how tedious this process has gotten for guests. I have several comments and questions.

1. Is this standard for ALL guests of ALL properties, or is this just aimed at select guests of select listings in order to verify the listing amenities, etc? This is literally 10 pages of questions (on mobile at least). 10 pages!

2. If this is standard practice now, well, wow. Does ABB expect guests to go through this whole thing every stay? ABB is pushing owners to get reviews get reviews get reviews....and then makes the get review process this cumbersome? I wouldn't be surprised if guests stop leaving reviews.

3. The entire "compares to your expectations" part seems like it will actually make the rating system WORSE than it was before. Guests already had trouble with ABB's interpretation of what 5 stars meant. We had owners pushing for 5* because ABB treated 4* like a bad rating. Now this new system looks even MORE geared to getting low ratings. Imagine you have a listing that just looks stunning....all the amenities in the world....picture perfect. The guest stays there with HIGH expectations and the owner delivers. "About the same as expected". That looks like a 3* rating equivalent. Even "better than expected" would only get this incredible listing a 4* equivalent rating.

----------- I think AirBnB just made their rating system WORSE!

[Rebecca181]

"Ah...ah....ah.....CHOO!!!!!"

[Letti0]

@Rebecca181  LOL...

[Eric-and-Peter0]

I always get white orchids, no one complained so far (almost 7 years hosting).

[Dee32]

Go figure!

[Susan990]

What a revelation! Now all that was confusing for me as a Super Host comes clean and clear~ the problem lies at the beginning. So lets start from the begining.  First question demand for our dear Guest ~ Describe your trip.  What ??? How about ~  Describe your stay. The review is a review of  the STAY.

  All the following questions about the stay should therefor be prefised with appropriate sentence structure to qualify the question.  Example: Cleanliness ~ was the Cleanliness  Satisfactory, not satisfactory. Then was the Cleanliness ~ as described or Not as described.

   Now comes the big one~~ the Kitchen section.  What defines KITCHEN.  I can tell you from the state of Oregon we have very definite code guidelines for the word Kitchen. For Oregon a kitchen is defined as the presence of an Oven/Range appliance.

  How use less is this term ~ Kitchen~ I say take it to the curb Now.  I suggest a substitution of verbage as follows:  Food Preparation Facilities: then you can list all that is on site for food preparations, i.e. appliances, utentils, dishes, sink, micro wave, toaster oven, etc.  Now you have a universally understood language about food and its availability in the space based upon abilities to prepare it there , or not.

  Fianlly, when will Airbnb fire the dude who uses conjunctions, coloquial slang, and non-gramatical expressions which I cannot imagine translate well with the language translatore function.  Host Susan

[Ange2]

Ha! "fire the dude who uses conjunctions, coloquial slang, and non-gramatical expressions which I cannot imagine translate well"

I will add nebulous word usage. I just spoke to Airbnb and said if they insisted on re-defining commonly understood definitions for words in the english language they should come out with a Airbnb reference manual or dictionary.

For example ID requirements for guests – copy and pasted from Airbnb article:

***When you’re [ you refers to the guest] is asked for an ID, you’ll [i.e. guest ] NEED TO:
ADD A PROFILE PICTURE (if you haven’t added one already)****

NEED Definition: a requirement, a necessary duty, an obligation.

Airbnb says I have to contact the guest and ask them for a profile image to go with their verified ID, despite it being written that it is a NEED. They also suggested that I send a feedback message with  'NEED' suggested as a future option!

I'm racking my brains as to what 'future option' means to Airbnb because it is definitely not the commonly understood meaning of it   –  "need" is already a stated requirement that was written  into their articles in the past and it still exists in the present.

[Lance-and-Christine0]

Good Lord, I had no idea! In the last few months we've suddenly noticed a dropoff of reviews from guests. Maybe, two of three will leave a review. They will always text, phone or message us to tell us how great things were and that they will be back, but time goes by and no review.  This has resulted in us no longer or rarely leaving our review first. 

I'm not sure why they keep updating the site and changing things around every few months and it's annoying to say the least. Please stop trying to reinvent the wheel folks. 

[Mark116]

Yes, airbnb should be spending it's time and money collecting data that refutes the idea that it is/has caused the affordable housing crisis, and showing how much economic benefit airbnbns bring to local communities instead of constantly tinkering with the site to general confusion and dismay.

They really don't get it.

[Tomaz5]

To bring some positivity into this complain thread. First of all, I agree with most comments here and I think the rating system is not the best and now they have made it even worse. The review process should be short and possibly fun.
I invite all my guests to kindly write a review about their experience. Most of the time I write the review first and in the private notes, I tell them to please take a moment to write a review which helps us a lot. And most of my guests do leave a nice review, I think from 50 trips so far 45 have left a review. So the point of the story here is that we have to encourage our guests to leave their feedback. Right now the review system is how it is and we only can do our best to make it benefit us.
I hope they change the star system to a different one in the future but I don't know how that would affect our older reviews. I certainly don't want to lose my 49 5 star reviews.

[Timothy19]

I don't think leaving notes in your review is worthwhile. Guests can't see Host reviews until either they submit their own, or the 14 day review window is closed. So you are writing a note asking guests to write a review....that guests can't see unless they already wrote a review OR they can no longer write a review. If you want to request a review, you shouldn't waste your time putting it in YOUR review. Send a message to the guest through the platform thanking them for their stay and asking them to write a review.

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@Tomaz5 wrote:

To bring some positivity into this complain thread. First of all, I agree with most comments here and I think the rating system is not the best and now they have made it even worse. The review process should be short and possibly fun.
I invite all my guests to kindly write a review about their experience. Most of the time I write the review first and in the private notes, I tell them to please take a moment to write a review which helps us a lot. And most of my guests do leave a nice review, I think from 50 trips so far 45 have left a review. So the point of the story here is that we have to encourage our guests to leave their feedback. Right now the review system is how it is and we only can do our best to make it benefit us.
I hope they change the star system to a different one in the future but I don't know how that would affect our older reviews. I certainly don't want to lose my 49 5 star reviews.

---

[Rebecca181]

@Tomaz0: I don't see this as a 'complaint' thread at all. I see it as a very informative thread. And a valuable thread, in that legitimate concerns are being articulated by hosts. If Airbnb is wise, they will listen to these concerns. But I doubt they will, because this new review system has obviously been designed as a tool to weed out listings that are no longer valued by Airbnb: Shared home listings, specifically, and especially. 

[Letti0]

@Rebecca181  For the first time on AirBnB we did not get a review from a guest. On HA/VRBO it's constantly not getting reviews. We texted the AIrBnB guest stating it effects our Superhost status to not be reviewed and would the consider reviewing us. They replied in a text back. I did try to review you, but it was taking too long so I just left it rather than complete it. Sorry if I get time to spend in the next few days I'll try to finish it. So sad...

[Rebecca181]

@Letti0 Well, there you have it. I hope you do a dedicated post on this. I mean, probably 99% of the hosts who do not lurk here on the CC have no idea why they are no longer getting reviews, and now you have irrefutable proof that those of us expressing concerns on this thread are not *complaining* - we are *asserting* that this review system is a disaster and is yet another nail being driven into our Super Host coffins.

[Letti0]

@Rebecca181  There were actually 2 families in this group, there are 2 replies in my guest book from this group. Could have easily been 5*'s. I got nothing because of this ridiculous review system now. 

[Rebecca181]

This is nearly tragic, @Letti0. I simply cannot believe that Airbnb Corporate is as stupid and ignorant as they have been acting lately. I can therefore only conclude that they are fine with the fact that many of our happy guests will no longer bother to review us, causing us to lose our Super Host status. The only question I have at this point is, "WHY?"