GoodGirl

Vacation Rental Guests Annoyances

Dear Diary,
I just want to vent this and put this out there for others who stay in vacation rentals.

Dont be a jerk with reviews. Dont complain over stupid stuff. Dont ding people ratings and scores over idiotic things. Preferences are not reasons to ding a persons score.

When you do that, you cause their ranking to go down for visibility where their listing shows, you also can take away some of their rewards they get from the site they use.

I just got one today, and problem is you cant read their review until you leave them one, so you have no idea what they will say, you may leave them a glowing review saying they are welcome back anytime to find something unkind left for you.

We just had 3 guests, one are brand new, from a foreign country, no reviews on the site, and they dinged our value and communication scores and then left us a comment saying our Vanity sink placement is akward and to put it in the closet???? WTF?????? Seriously? I sent them all the info, check in, they asked about local things and I gave them a link to the visitors center and a website, and we leave a binder with activities in our area on the desk in the rental. Mind you, we bought this place, its a tiny house and there are full photos of it inside showing the placement of the said sink they find awkward. ANd the closet they suggested we put it in? Is where the water heater is??? WTF?

:::bangs head on table:::

People seem to think they can just do this with vacation rentals and its frankly annoying.

Another one, she was also from a different country and she dinged me for cleanliness!??? Ack Im anal about my place being clean, Seriously and Ive been in many vacation rentals with sub par cleaning. Mine is spotless. ANd guess what her complaint about that was?? THE BEDDING? SHe said that having a sheet between the cover sheet and comforter was unsanitary??? I did write her back over that one as she had PMd me when she stayed and I had a chat already to work with. I asked what exactly was she referring too? She said something about the comforter and the top sheet. I said "The top comforter is a duvet is that what you are referring too?" Meaning we can take the outer shell off to wash it. No she was referring to the sheet below it??? I still dont get how that is an issue, we have fresh clean sheets on every bed, and a mattress cover, and a duvet covered comforter that can be washed.

Once again notice what I mean, really this is the cause to write in a review and ding a score?

Another was a gal, wow, she left a doozy, complained about the distance to the sites in our area, complained about our mattress firmness, saying hard as a rock. (We have had over 50 guests, its a nice new mattress and I hate hard mattresses, we even test slept in it ourselves) and its a perfect middle ground mattress, actually we get compliments on the bed comfort often. She left such poor scores and wrote this stuff in her comment on the site publicly I called the site and they actually removed her comment saying that I laid out the distance(actually our listing gives how many miles to each attraction, but she booked in this city and then complained we werent closer to an event that is clearly not here) and the bed, the phone rep said "Thats a preference thing, thats not a reason to ding a host" and they removed it no questions asked, but seriously, what is up with people? Do they go to hotels and complain like this? Cause I sure as heck havent always had the nicest mattresses, or the softest towels, etc. Our place is simple, tiny house, listed as such, full photos, and yes majority are just fine with it, but its really damn annoying you know?

You are always waiting to the review and nervous what it will say. And it makes me want to stop leaving feedback sometimes because Ive given praise to these people. I didnt write you left the place smelling like eggs and all closed up, you used our good plus bathroom towels to put all your wet dishes on instead of the dish drying rack, or you rearranged all our furniture and didnt put it back, or you peed on the floor or front of the toilet. I mean cmon??

Okay there is my vent for today, and most of all, if your not happy about something, write the host first, dont blindside them with stupid shit and hurt their bottom line over this nonsense.

Reminds me of Ebay and how it was in the beginning, it was for the Sellers, and then it became more about the buyers and took away all of the sellers privileges and started to penalize them and keep their hands tied.

For now we are vacation rental hosts, but I do know I can turn this place into something else down the road, have thought of a spa room for facials and massages, or even a mini cookie or cupcake shop. Lots of options, but this is it for now and Ill mumble to myself how annoying people can be