Watched half of my house rules get broken already. Now What?

[David8051]

This is my second booking ever and it is not going well. The person asked to check in early and I replied I would let them know if they could the next day as it depended on the cleaners but stood firm on the checkin time overall. Guy somehow is at my door trying to punch in the code 3 minutes after my cleaners had left but I hadn’t contacted him. It doesn’t work because it’s all based on checkin time and then he decides to call and ask if he could get in early. I didn’t notice that he had tried to get into the house 3 hours early without even asking until I looked at my cameras later. 

Later tonight, I look at the cameras and 12 people come out of my house and you can hear them singing happy bday from outside. It’s a 2 bedroom 1000 sq ft place with a 4 person limit and no events or parties. No people allowed not on the reservation, etc. Multiple people also stepped in the mud to take a shortcut into our front sliding door and walked into the house. We have a no shoes in the house rule. They also left the whole place unlocked for 3 hours when they left. It looks like only 4 are sleeping over.

I am strongly considering kicking them out in the AM. I’m so irritated by this and having to just watch this go on virtually that I can’t sleep. The amount of disrespect for a place that we spent 30k furnishing blows my mind. What would you guys do?

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@David8051 Make sure you report the party to Airbnb asap. You then have a chance of getting a revenge review removed.

[Kia272]

@David8051 You've been targeted because you're a new host. Report to AirBnB first. Get an email address and provide your video evidence first thing. Make sure to mention that it was a party. Ask them to contact the guest and advise the guest of the rule violations and ask them to leave. You then also contact the guests and ask them to leave. Get everything on record with AirBnB first. 

"No shoes" rules are hard to enforce and not entirely practical. I looked at your listing and you don't seem to have a lot of carpet or flooring that would be damaged by shoes and dirt. Personally, I'm not going to book a place that requires me to take my shoes off, or it will be booked and the guests won't comply. You might want to rethink that. If there's a muddy area outside a door, you should mitigate that in some way with gravel, door mats, whatever works. 

Spending 30K on furnishing an AirBnB is a bit over the top. It's possible to start with less expensive but nice things, and upgrade as you gain an understanding of wear and tear and the respect (or not) with which guests will treat your property. 

Sorry this happened to you, and good luck moving forward. Kia

[David8051]

If some one showed up and just didn’t take their shoes off It would just be a slight irritation. This is just more compounded by everything else and video of them stepping in the mud instead of going around on the sidewalk, stepping onto the porch and then walking into the house while laughing about it.

I made it nice somewhat intentionally with a low guest count and a higher than market price to purposely weed people out. I’m ok with this even if I lose a lot of bookings. Unfortunately, this was my first booking and I was priced lower at the time as I was figuring out how much to charge. 

[Laura2592]

@David8051 how long is the reservation? 

I agree with gathering party evidence but as you are a brand new host, if it's a short stay, stick it out. Use the review appropriately.  

"So and so booked for 4 but had a birthday party with many additional guests in our absolutely no parties listing. We had concerns about thd security of our space including attempts to access earlier than permitted and periods where the door was left unlocked for several hours.  Not a guest we would have back."

Rate under 3 stars in every category and "would not host again." 

Many guests (and even a few hosts who have popped up on the forums recently) believe irs totally OK to invite extra people or throw a party that's not a raging substance filled blowout. It's not. ABB does very little to prevent this despite their claims of a party ban. In some cases you just have to review appropriately as you don't have other recourse. 

[David8051]

2 more nights. Being a new host doesn’t really concern me from a future demand or money standpoint.

[Laura2592]

@David8051 then by all means, ask them to leave. 

Call ABB with your photos. Say you want the guests removed before the reservation ends without penalty to you. But be aware, ABB may not see things this way and ask you to terminate the reservation on your own with a penalty. As you are a new host, it may be fine just to take the hit. You won't lose any Superhost status as you don't have it yet.  May just be a little longer to get to it. 

My concern would be the review. Guests kicked out for breaking rules don't have a history of being reasonable in rating the hosts that did it. So expect that you will get a scathing revenge review. If its removed great (but don't count on ABB doing that.) If not, be prepared to respond calmly and factually. Your score needs to stay at a 4 to stay listed so if they tank it, ensure that ABB is aware of what actually happened. But do not expect they will support you...they may not. 

We JUST had a similar situation a few weeks ago. Booked for 4, threw a bachelorette party. Ring doorbell showed multiple cars unloading booze and pink gifts promptly at noon. Neighbors called immediately, one even called ABB directly. I had images from the Ring. ABB did nothing except call the guests and make it awkward. I called the guests and confirmed again what our rules were, what our capacity was. We had neighbors drive by a few times and they reported at least 10 people but the guest swore up and down it wasn't happening. I did not mention cameras because the moment you do, the guests typically file a report of being spied on (though its legal and guests agree to disclosed cameras outside when they book.) ABB will shut your listing down and "investigate" these spurious claims. I sent images. ABB did nothing. The guest checked out as planned. They left the place clean and thought that would make the party okay. All I could do is leave a review that reflected the experience and score the guest appropriately. The guest left us a nice forward facing review (so it could not be removed) but lowered scores in pretty much every category. 

[Cave0]

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.