2y ago

Airbnb is adding cleaning fees to a new 'total price' of bookings in search results after people complained listings were misleading

www.businessinsider.com Airbnb is adding cleaning fees to a new 'total price' of bookings in search results after people complained listings were misleading

Airbnb's CEO said that he's heard guests "loud and clear" that pricing on the platform isn't transparent and "checkout tasks are a pain."

Airbnb is adding cleaning fees to a new 'total price' of bookings in search results after people complained listings were misleading

Airbnb guests will soon be able to see the total cost of their stay, including cleaning and service fees, before taxes in a step towards better pricing transparency on the platform.

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2y ago

Airbnb is adding cleaning fees to a new 'total price' of bookings in search results after people complained listings were misleading

www.businessinsider.com /airbnb-cleaning-fees-added-total-price-search-results-after-complaints-2022-11

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40 comments

Good. Cleaning fees and booking fees are clearly being abused to game listings to show low prices that instantly double or even triple when you go to check out.
Frankly Airbnb is already pretty scammy.
I have maybe used it 3 times in the last decade. Run into scams at least once where a rental in Denver/Aurora claimed there was AC and the compressor had been removed. But they still had the air handler and thermostats in and turned on. They also put brand new tower fans in each room because it was hot in the house (~87F or 30C) in the sleeping area. Then when we tried to contact them they were suddenly unavailable. So we just left and filed a complaint auth Airbnb which turned into a giant finger pointing session where the owner claimed we cursed them out etc. tried to get the negative review removed with similar tactics too.
Took a lot of effort to recoup the money.
The second rental (well third in the timeline, but second scam) the renter tried to claim we left the place a mess to try and keep the deposit on top of a cleaning fee. Despite they had instructions to do everything from dishes to washing the sheets, not disclosed when we arrived, which we did. But somehow still wanted to hold a 600 dollar cleaning deposit.
Idk what Airbnb does. I will never use them again. Just a total waste of time.
- I haven't run into the same issues as you, but the prices are just silly now. Seriously, why am I shelling out for cleaning fees at a place where I still gotta do half the housework? Meanwhile, hotels pretty much got it all covered for about the same price. It just doesn't make sense.
  
  Oh totaly agree. Thats why my third visit was like "is this just how people are now?"
  I mean, it hit all the feels of a scam, but i didnt feel so much targeted as this was just how they did business. As if they were banking on us just not really having the energy to fight the BS and red tape. We even took pictures of the place at arrival and leaving. Mainly due to the first experience. But even getting someone at Airbnb to LOOK at the photos, and accept them as proof of anything was a tough haul.
  
  The economics just don't work for short stays. It's expensive to clean an entire house, particularly if that involves washing multiple sets of sheets and towels.
  Hotels are set up to be efficient at that with commercial laundry equipment and lots of identical rooms with no travel time between them.
  Airbnb is almost always better value if you need multiple days and multiple rooms, but if you need one room for 2 nights then it can only really compete if labor costs are really low
  
  For me, the benefit of Airbnb comes when traveling with a couple of younger kids. The added space and roominess + full kitchen is worth its weight in gold vs a hotel. And I say this coming off a recent vacation where we tried hotels again (including Embassy Suites). But if I’m solo, a hotel is often a better option.
- Agreed with all your points. I used to love Airbnb because it was so much cheaper than staying in a hotel and would give you access to stay in areas much farther off the beaten path. But the last three times I have stayed in an Airbnb I or someone else from my party ended up on the phone for hours with them because the host blatantly lied about something in their listing or otherwise was inhospitable during the stay. Hotels are just way more consistent and when something does go wrong during your stay, you can at least count on a decent customer service experience.
- I’ve never used Airbnb, but I’ve read enough stories like yours that I never will. It seemed okay for the first few years, but then people learned how to take advantage of the system. Now you never know if you’re doing business with an honest, fair person or a scammer… and you can’t count on the company to have your back.

"Hey, what if we did Uber but for Hotels, except that we make it so its as expensive as a hotel and impose lots of ridiculous rules and expectations of our guests?"
I don't even look at AB&B anymore when I travel. It used to be a bargain, but between ruining local real estate markets and the general asshattery of most AB&B owners, I'll just stick with hotels.
- One time I shared an Airbnb to try to cut costs on a trip. I got there around 4pm and hated it so much that by noon the next day I had already booked a hotel.
  I just do king suites now since they're about the same price as a double but include free breakfast, a kitchenette, extra pullout couch, etc. Cheaper than an Airbnb with the same (or more) amenities.

I travel a lot and used airbnb for a year or so during their heyday, I greatly preferred them to hotels. I would never go back to them now though. Ever since they started going crazy with the fees and chores, I prefer hotels where you know what you're getting.
- Yeah, it used to be great.
  A while ago I got an email about my "planned trip" where I was added as a guest by someone I don't know to a house on another continent... Because they speak another language there, everything in my email was also in that language I don't understand as a bonus
  It's been years since I used Airbnb, just never deleted my account.
  Apparently anyone can add anyone as a guest to their booking. There's no way to decline being a guest, it just automatically accepts. There's no way to cancel on the app yourself. And customer support kept alternating between "there's no way this could have happened" and "anyone can do it, just block all emails from Airbnb if you don't want to see it".
  Like, I still can't get over how they could suggest the fix was just block all emails from their company.
  So now my account is fully deleted, and Id advise anyone else with an old account to do the same.
  The last thing I need is Airbnb coming after me for damages to a property someone unilaterally decided I was a guest at.
  
  Yikes, that's scary. I haven't logged in in years, better see if I can dig up my password and delete my account.
- Airbnb, uber and doordash are all just attempts at market cornering.
- Indeed. Loved the concept and have had some really great properties. If I can sus out the specific property now, I'll see if they have a direct book and use that instead. I don't mind the simple stuff on exit, that's just polite, nor a small cleaning fee if the nightly cost is low (I think of it as a turning fee), but I hate having to play whack-a-mole on the site to find a property in budget when half of the fees aren't included in the top line.
  Except for large parties (me and the parents, or another family joining) in the same location, or the need for a full kitchen, there are few places where ABnB/VRBO has better pricing than major hotels with suites.

I travel for work. Just stay at a Hampton Inn. Always coffee, breakfast, clean. Not to mention its usually close to whatever you want to go to. The garden Inn is good also, as well as holiday express. I don't like double tree, even though they give you cookies.
Also Hamptons have a shuttle to theme parks in Orlando. Its really easy to wake up and eat breakfast then get driven to the park. Done need to worry about parking, where to get breakfast or how to get back.
It seems I went on a little rant. Oh well.
- I'm a fan of the Holiday Inn Express. Always consistent.
  
  And those cinnamon rolls too, so tasty.

Why would you want NOT to see the total price anyway? That is so shady...

Nothing can fix Airbnb. It used to be a cheap alternative to hotels but now they are around the same price range (especially with the cleaning fees). If you are going to stay a couple of days then Airbnb starts to make sense but for short stays it's just pointless. The biggest difference (and the reason why I stopped using Airbnb altogether) is that if you stay at a hotel or even a motel, you are treated like a guest a customer. But Airbnb hosts treat you like they are doing you a favor by letting you stay there even though you're paying for the place. They make up 20 chores like you have to put the towels in the washer, you have to put the dishes in the dishwasher. Then what was the whole point of the cleaning fee. Just stay at a hotel.
- Airbnb really needs to crack down on chores, and start treating hosts the way ebay treats sellers. If you wanna run an unregulated hotel you'd better fucking act like a hotel manager, not somebody's mom. They've got people climbing over each other to be hosts, so they can afford to give bad ones the shaft.

I’m glad they’re doing this! I hate finding AirBnbs for less than hotel rooms only to discover the $200 in hidden fees bumping them above the hotel’s cost. I wanna see the all in, taxes and fees included, always.

I’ve been using airbnb for month-long rentals across Europe and I still haven’t found a good alternative.
There are no hotels that offer even remotely similar apartment size/price ratios. And I prefer apartments specifically, living in a hotel for a long time is just weird. All my airbnb hosts for the last two years have also been great. Btw, all were actual apartment owners, so none of that corporate crap. Many were helpful showing interesting places or best restaurants/shops around the neighbourhood.
On the other hand, local rental services and websites either have listings that start at 3+ months, or are completely unreliable, either taking weeks to reply or changing their mind on price or availability a few days before the arrival date.
And airbnb in Europe had that checkbox to display the final price since forever, so you’re not getting unknowingly ripped off anyway.
Is there something usable besides airbnb for 1–1.5 month long rentals across EU? At this point I’m not sure if it’s even a good idea to look for one.
- It is different in Europe because of stronger consumer protection laws.
- Vrbo is another option but more geared towards vacation rentals.
  Personally I've had good experiences overall with Airbnb but it takes research to find the good ones from the suspicious listings.

This is partly because they have to do this by law in Australia, so you can go to the Airbnb.au site and use it to book rooms today with these settings.
They are just making the "hack" official to try to end run more laws compelling them to do so.

Why is it an “option” to show the full price? So like assholedesign stuff to me.
goes to see if c/assholedesign exists…

And why not include taxes? It's not like you're not going to be on the hook for them.

I've been looking for a place for the past couple weeks, doesn't it already do this? It does in the UK at least. The price you see is the total price.

Been using airbnb for years- never ran into what you guys are complaining about. Nobody required any extra steps/chores... I do agree that the prices can be wonky- but you see it before you pay...
- I'm not sure the prices even are that wonky. The cost to have someone drive to a property, clean it, and wash/dry all the bedding is by far the highest cost of anything related to running a property rental (at least in the US). That's naturally going to make it abnormally expensive for short stays (compared to a hotel) and much cheaper for longer ones.
  The problem really is that AirBnB is trying to position itself as an expedia competitor and not a vrbo competitor, and changing that will change how they are valued.
  Edit: I think tiering pricing makes more sense here too. A host could easily say that the first night is $350 and subsequent nights are $150 (or something like that) and then it'd represent their cost structure better without explicitly calling out a high cleaning fee.
  I think AirBnb screwed up in the same way that eBay did, where they let the price not be the price. In my opinion eBay should have made sellers enter their location and the weight/dims of the item and it'd work out a fair shipping price and not let that be changed.

40 comments