I've just had a long encounter with Airbnb regarding who's allowed to be at a listing.
2.3 of the Terms of Service states:
"2.3 Accommodation Reservations. An Accommodation reservation is a limited license to enter, occupy and use the Accommodation. The Host retains the right to re-enter the Accommodation during your stay, to the extent: (i) it is reasonably necessary, (ii) permitted by your contract with the Host, and (iii) consistent with applicable law. If you stay past checkout, the Host has the right to make you leave in a manner consistent with applicable law, including by imposing reasonable overstay penalties. You may not exceed the maximum number of allowed Guests."
Airbnb, when asked for clarification of "allowed Guests" the following response was given:
"Allowed guests" means the number of guest registered in the reservation.
In case a guest books a reservation for 3 people. Only 3 people are allowed in the listing, unless the guest contacts you and ask if you would authorize an additional guest. If you authorize, in this case, it's OK to bring an additional guest."
In my particular situation, I had a Guest bringing extra people and I called Airbnb and asked for the reservation to be cancelled, which Airbnb did. However, Airbnb told the Guest that if the House Rules didn't forbid extra Guests then it was allowed.
Clearly the Guest latched onto this and the expected revenge review and a call to the Trust & Safety people at Airbnb followed, but that was to be expected.
However, the real concern is about why Airbnb told the Guest that under the Airbnb Terms of Service, the extra people were allowed yet the Terms of Service and Airbnb's own clarification thereof indicates otherwise. Airbnb made it clear to the Guest that it was only the breach of my House Rules which caused the cancellation of the reservation.
When pushing Airbnb about this matter, the following response was given:
"The issue is complicated because there's a difference between unauthorized guests, and unauthorized visitors.
Unauthorized guests are people that stay overnight. That is not allowed according to our terms.
Unauthorized visitors, are people that enters the listing for a certain period but don't stay overnight. They are not considered guests.
This is where things get confusing, because we don't have an specific rule for visitors on our terms, we only have for guests. However, since in your house rules it clearly stated that "Additional persons may not use the accommodation and/or its facilities unless agreed in Writing. " We considered it to be a confirmed house rule violation, and we had to cancel the reservation.
So when the agent informed the Guest that " “Contractually, if it is not prohibited in the internal regulations, you were entitled to do so. but on Airbnb, most hosts prefer to be informed of the arrival of additional people:"
the agent was takling about visitors and not guests.
If in your house rules there was nothing mentioning that additional people were not allowed, we would not be able to cancel that reservation, but since it was mentioned in your house rules, this reservation could be cancelled."
This is somewhat concerning since the Terms of Service provide only for "Hosts", "Guests" and "Members" nowhere are "Visitors" covered and it seems that Airbnb by its own admission is operating a policy outside of the Terms of Service which clearly has a direct impact upon Hosts.
Clearly there are all sorts of pitfalls with this, not least the distinction between staying overnight and not, does leaving before 4am, for example, mean the extras didn't stay overnight for one. Secondly, the Terms of Service allow a Host to charge an Extra Guest Fee which can be retrospectvely applied in those situations where a Guest bring additional people to the accommodation.
However, there is no provision for charging the newly invented Visitor category for the use of the services or facilitiles at the accomodation, according to the Terms of Service. How can a Host can make a charge against a Guest when it's not provided for in the Terms of Service?
Airbnb has the view that if a charge for Visitors is mentioned within the House Rules then that charge can be applied to Visitors and if the Guest doesn't pay then the reservation can be cancelled.
Aplogies for the ramble but out of this come a couple of points that should be concerning, namely, if the House Rules don't prohibit anyone not on the reservation from being at the accommodation, Airbnb will regard this as acceptable and only if they stay overnight will it be deemed a breach of the Terms of Service. If the House Rules don't make any mention that Visitors will be charged for (and 8 people turn up to your house for a reservation covering only 3 poeple and proceed to have a day in your pool), it seems that as far as Airbnb is concerned, it's allowed, you can't charge them and you can't kick them out.
It appears that great store is set on House Rules by the Airbnb support people, more so than the Terms of Service which is somewhat concerning if Hosts rely upon the latter in case of a problem.