What review to leave a recent guest

[Sara1585]

Hi everybody and thankyou in advance for your comments it’s much appreciated.

i ave had a guest, no problems what so ever, caravan could have been left a little cleaner but they were still leaving when my husband arrived 15mins after the checkout time, so they may have felt rushed.

Noticed straight away they had left 2 brand new little girls dresses they had clearly just bought, messaged them and didn’t get back for a few hours to say just keep them, I did offer to post them several times and had no response.

When cleaning my husband noticed a missing wine glass, missing oven gloves and a very broken toilet seat, both hinges were snapped (we have claimed a new toilet seat £24.99 back through air bnb).

The guest got back to me after I politely asked that we do ask if any damage or missing items please let’s us know so we can replace as we had another guest in after them., that I wasn’t bothered about a glass or oven gloves but I would need to bill her for a new toilet seat (we even said we would cover the cost to get someone on site to fit it as they hadn’t let us know anything about it so we didn’t have the toilets to change it).

They responded that she had asked her dad and he said yes he broke a glass last night, the oven gloves may have been packed with their stuff and the toilet seat, sorry if my boys broke it I did ask them and they said no, but I did noticed it was loose when we arrived? We were the last ones in before her and the toilet seat was not loose and if it was loose why didn’t she let us know?

She understood I would put in the claim for the £24.99 which I did and she has never responded since. Air bnb intervened after the 72 hours and gave me the refund.

I don’t know what to do about feedback, i will take advise from a previous bad guest and leave it till the last minute to leave feedback.

But if anyone could advise on wording that would be great.

I don’t want to leave feedback, brilliant guests which they were and then nothing about the poor communication after they left to find they have given me awful feedback

please help

[Sarah977 · Accepted solution]

@Sara1585  What you should keep in mind about reviews is just to make them honest. Saying you don't want to give her a brilliant review only to find out she gave you a bad one doesn't make sense. Why would you give her a "brilliant" review, anyway, when you don't consider her a stellar guest?

Just be factual.  If they communicated well pre-arrival and didn't present any problems during their stay, say that, but also mention that there was some not-too-expensive damage which the guest failed to mention when she left, then when you wrote her about it, agreed to pay for, however then completely ignored the request for reimbursement.

Don't mention that Airbnb paid you back- they can remove a review for mentioning Airbnb involvement in a case.

I wouldn't mention the wine glass or the missing oven mitt. Small things like that are part and parcel of hosting. I can't imagine anyone bothering to steal an oven mitt, so just an oversight. And sounds like she wasn't aware that her dad broke a wine glass and threw it in the trash until afterwards.

[Debra300]

@Sara1585,

Give a factual objective review without any personal blaming.

"The guests appear to have left in a hurry, because there were items laying about that should have been thrown in the bin.  After checkout we observed that a wine and oven mits were missing, and the toilet seat was completely broken off of the hinges.  The guest did not respond to our payment request for a new toilet seat. I (do/do not) recommend hosting them."

In the personal review areas also be truthful.  If the place was a bit untidy, but not horrendous, maybe they get a 3.  The same for their level of communication, and following house rules.  Then you make the decision whether you would host them again.

[Mark116]

@Sara1585  Would you host them again?  That should color how you do the review.  Maybe something like XX was [insert something good/friendly/easy to communicate with], but there were some items that were damaged during their stay and not all the house rules were followed.  

[Sara1585]

@Mark116 @Debra300 @Sarah977  Thank you all you’ve all been really helpful, I think I will take snippets from you all