Airbnb boss responds to guests’ gripe about being given chores at checkout
Airbnb says it is on travelers’ side when it comes to guests being given a list of chores to do on check out.
A major issue travelers have with the popular accommodation booking platform is requests from hosts you just wouldn’t get when opting to stay in a hotel.
One tweet from an engineering director at Google went viral earlier this year gaining almost 90,000 likes and 8.3 million views when she shared that her Airbnb host was angry at her for not vacuuming.
She said they already stripped the beds, and took the trash to the local trash center, and paid a cleaning fee.
Many frustrated social media users took it as an opportunity to share similar experiences.
Now, Airbnb Australia is making its stance clear.
“We believe guests should not have to strip the bed, do the laundry, or vacuum when leaving their Airbnb,” Susan Wheeldon, Airbnb’s country manager for Australia and New Zealand, told news.com.au.
“But we think it’s reasonable to ask guests to turn off the lights, throw food in the rubbish, and lock the doors – just like they would when leaving their own home.”
In May, Airbnb introduced a “before you leave” section on listings, so guests can view checkout instructions on a property’s listing page before booking.
“As part of a recent product update, we introduced transparent checkout instructions, which differ from house rules, and are clearly displayed on the listing page before a guest books a listing,” Wheeldon said.
“Hosts also remind guests of the listing checkout instructions the day before departure.
“We updated our processes so guests can give feedback on checkout instructions, and listings with repeated low ratings from unreasonable chores will be removed from Airbnb.”
Airbnb did not disclose to news.com.au if any listings had been removed because of unreasonable chores since the update.
Overall, more than 12,000 listings have been removed globally since April this year for various violation-related reasons.
Change in travel behavior
Ms Wheeldon’s comments come as a report from Oxford Economics, commissioned by Airbnb Australia, found an interesting shift from international to domestic tourism, and from city to regional areas.
About 79 percent of total Airbnb guests spent in Australia in 2022 (the 12 months to March 2023 to better reflect a year without travel restrictions) was by domestic tourists compared with 64 percent in 2019, before the pandemic.
The analysis also showed the dispersal of travel beyond traditional holiday hotspots.
Oxford Economics Australia’s head of consulting Kristian Holding explained: “Domestic travelers have been crucial to the tourism sector’s resilience over the past three years as Aussie guests saw opportunities in domestic travel as a substitute for international holidays, with self-drive and regional trips increasing in popularity, which leads to a wider dispersion of tourism spend outside the traditional or ‘popular’ destinations in Australia.”
Michael Crosby, head of public policy at Airbnb in Australia and New Zealand, said they were seeing a particular trend in farm stays.
The states with the highest share of money spent on non-urban Airbnb accommodation in 2022 were Tasmania (52 percent) and Western Australia (43 percent), followed by New South Wales (37 percent), South Australia (37 percent), Victoria (35 percent), Queensland (26 percent) and the Northern Territory (21 percent).
Michael Shoory, who specializes in tourism for Oxford Economics, said they weren’t expecting the regional shift to be permanent but there was potential for these areas if regional tourism boards put the effort into marketing.
He also drew attention to the fact cities were popular for business travel, which took longer to recover.
The report stated Airbnb had contributed $13.6 billion to Australia’s Gross Domestic Product in 2022.
