Airbnb moves to reduce rules/requests

[kookaburra75]

There's a good article in The Times by one of their writers who has let several properties through AirBnB over the years, and disagrees with hosts setting rules etc. My trials as an Airbnb host (and why I worry when guests strip the bed) You might be able to get a guest link to read it.

There are several classic quotes in it:

• "If anything, my place never looks so immaculate as when guests have just departed. My cleaner and I do our best to whip my ancient cottage into shape (catching spiders, bleaching loos, trying to find dog turds in the garden, using masking tape to get labrador hair off the sheets) but we can’t compete with a mother of three on holiday unable to resist running a vacuum cleaner over the place."
• "Some hosts are so finicky they complain about Airbnb guests leaving a TV remote out of place. I’m pretty laid-back, although I do get tested. Once an American woman complained the hedges leading up to the cottage made her feel “claustrophobic”. I’ve also had guests relocate my furniture. One group found my creative taste so “offensive” they removed my Charlie Hebdo print and a naked portrait from my bedroom wall."
• "Personally, I am far more wary of guests cleaning too much. Once I came home to find every glass in the house twinkling and all the beds remade, suggesting the couple who’d booked had invited over a few friends. The 15 empty bottles of wine in the recycling gave them away."
• "Sometimes, though, people leave good stuff behind. I’ve had guests leave Boden jumpers, bottles of cider and packets of biscuits (you’re grateful for anything when you’re this remote). My friend Guy, though, had an embarrassing misstep, and found wine and chocolates had been left for him. As he was carrying the loot to the car his guests returned and he realised they hadn’t actually checked out."

MrsK is a repeat offender for moving chairs and lamps in hotel rooms and AirBnBs, so I can identify with dot point 2.

 

[moa999]

Think it really depends on the property.

For a single AirBNB things like putting sheets in the wash and on, can really assist in being able to flip the property. It's not like a hotel where you've got a production line and another room that can be cleaned.

One particular property i know on the South Coast of NSW, about 1.5hrs from Sydney where the Sydney owners who mostly self-use or have return guests and just use AirBNB for the down times. Having been unable to find consistent local help they generally flip the property themselves.
If in a decent state a clean takes 2-3 hrs, so they would be waiting around if they had to wash and dry all the linens, which likely means upping their cleaning charge, which probably drives away guests.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Think it really depends on the property.

For a single AirBNB things like putting sheets in the wash and on, can really assist in being able to flip the property. It's not like a hotel where you've got a production line and another room that can be cleaned.

One particular property i know on the South Coast of NSW, about 1.5hrs from Sydney where the Sydney owners who mostly self-use or have return guests and just use AirBNB for the down times. Having been unable to find consistent local help they generally flip the property themselves.
If in a decent state a clean takes 2-3 hrs, so they would be waiting around if they had to wash and dry all the linens, which likely means upping their cleaning charge, which probably drives away guests.

Actually starting the laundry can be unhelpful.
The wash cycle could take longer than the cleaning.
And the sheets are unlikely to dry between checkout and check in.
So the wet, half washed sheets can actually become a problem the host has to manage.
I don't know anyone who only owns one set of sheets.
I can't imagine an AIrBNB host trying to get by with only one.
They would have fresh sheets: often there is a locked cupboard specifically for this purpose.
And many, if not most, hosts do their laundry off site.

 

[Jacques Vert]

Actually starting the laundry can be unhelpful.
The wash cycle could take longer than the cleaning.
And the sheets are unlikely to dry between checkout and check in.
So the wet, half washed sheets can actually become a problem the host has to manage.
I don't know anyone who only owns one set of sheets.
I can't imagine an AIrBNB host trying to get by with only one.
They would have fresh sheets: often there is a locked cupboard specifically for this purpose.
And many, if not most, hosts do their laundry off site.

For our BnB we have 5 sets of linen. Why five? We have lots of one-night stays due to our location half way between Sydney and Brisbane. During periods of wet weather washing, drying and ironing sheets in time for the next guests can become quite the challenge.

 

[bobbyjo]

Maybe part of the problem for some hosts is that they somehow believe the people staying in their home are ‘guests’… as per the nomenclature on the airbnb website?

Whereas in reality the people staying there are customers. Paying customers.

Totally agree, if people are going to compete in the hospitality market (sometimes at higher prices than a hotel or motel they need to provide a similar service & facilities. I have never had a hotel ask me to perform any of the tasks required by some Airbnb places.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Aren’t cleaning fees standard?

Not always and not any more, hence this thread.

 

[bobbyjo]

Things like the survey I got sent, wanting to know why I dint use airbnb and preferred hotels.

Some of the options for not using airbnb included cleaning fees, rules, etc.

Must have been some strong feedback, hence the changes.

Commercial decision here to favour customers for the benefit of the airbnb platform, over the hosts.

The hotel industry has taken quite a hit from these often grotty, dirty & untidy holes whose owners think they are beyond the rules of hospitality, I avoid them like the plague & direct book almost every hotel or pub I stay at.

 

[offshore171]

This news from Air BNB has kept the meme creators busy this week.

 

[Shpitzo]

Airbnb are now prohibiting hosts from making unreasonable requests of guests.

This includes asking guests to do cleaning such as mopping, sweeping, vacuuming etc and stripping of beds.

As hosts ourselves (of a largish holiday home) we don’t ask guests to do any of this as a core part of what our cleaners (or sometimes ourselves) and indeed most hosts are in agreement with this aspect.

However what has raised the ire of many hosts of holiday homes and self catering apartments is that asking guests to wash dishes and take rubbish out to outside bins (eg wheelie bins outside the house) are also considered by Airbnb to be unreasonable requests.

From our perspective as host, these are just basic hygiene and respect items and given the timing of most bookings (weekends) and limited cleaners in the area to for the workload it could be a few days or more for them to get to the place - leaving dirty dishes will attract pests and leave odours.

Long before I was a host and in fact long before Airbnb, I’ve rented holiday houses and never even crossed my mind to leave a sink full of dirty dishes for the owner to deal with.

We have. 2 sets of cutlery/croclery for 14 people - so 28 of everything- k and so politely request that they load them into the dishwasher and turn it on before leaving (in fact all guest have done this).

What are others thoughts? Can’t work out if my views of this our out of touch because I’m a host, or because of my generation or because I (and many owners concerned about this) have medium-largr holiday houses rather than corporate city studio apartments (which is the business Airbnb seems to care most about now).

esseeeayeenn nailed it, one or the other, not both. A rental still wins for groups like dajop’s 14 person house, longer stays and trips where you’ll cook, since the cleaning fee spreads out. For a couple doing 2 nights a hotel usually comes out ahead once the cleaning fee lands. FWIW Vrbo lists a lot of the same holiday homes with the fees in the total. For the hotel side look up Arbitrica, which checks the same hotel from about 195 countries for free since prices and inventory differ by country and finds kinda the lowest price in the world. Compare checkout totals per night per person and the answer usually picks itself