More guests showing up Than Listed on AirBNB Booking

[Shmuel Gertel]

Hi all,

I was curious if people could advise on the following:

1. I am finding that when guests list the number of people that will be staying at my STR, that they very frequently undercount the number of people that actually show up - sometimes by as much as 10 guests!?!, and
2. Additionally, there are certain guests that I suspect from jump street will be breaking rules of the house (whether smoking inside the house, having too many guests, or breaking other house rules), and invariably my suspicions are validated.

I would love to be able to charge these people a reimbursable fee ahead of time, or have a credit card on file so that I could avoid the ridiculous of hassle of having to deal with AirBNB, whose customer service is horrible. Any advice on how to deal with this would be greatly appreciated.

[Ken Boone]

So I do have a big problem with too many guests.  1 or 2 ok I can deal with that, however, when they get much more than that we got a problem.  I have had one of my places trashed in only 2 days by only 4 additional guests, and the 4 additional were just kids.  People that will come with too many guests are already the kind of people that are not going to follow your rules.  Period!  

This is what I do now and so far this has worked well for me.  It is and always has been clearly spelled out in my rules what the maximum guest capacity is.  In my house rules on the OTAs it clearly states that the guest will need to agree and sign a digital rental agreement that will be sent to them after booking.  It is basically the same thing that they will see on the platform.  The difference is in my digital version the guests must initial every page, and list the names of the individuals that will be staying on the property.  We clearly state in that section, that anyone that shows up with more people than allowed on a given property will be evicted with no refunds, unless the additional people are authorized by us.

The legit people will call and say hey my grandmother wanted to come but that is one extra will that be ok.. yes of course that is okay.  

The last time this happened I had 23 people show up for a cabin that sleeps 8.  I first identified it that evening, but was dealing with my dad in ICU at the time, and was kind of pre-occupied.  By the next morning I verified it was 23 people in that cabin.  At that point you call the platform and let them know your house rules states x number of people and they have y number and that you want to evict them with no refund.  The platform should back you up.  They have done this every time I have run into this now.  At that point I call the guest tell them they clearly broke the house rules, and that they have broken the rental agreement and that they need to vacate the property immediately.  Also, let them know that any damages that may have occurred to the property during their time there will incur additional charges. I let them know that the authorities have been notified as well as the platform and they are usually gone within the hour.  

This way you get them out and you keep the money.

The reality is that the people that do this kind of thing know exactly what they are doing.  It's not an accident.  They just don't care.   And quite frankly I don't want those people in my STRs.