I think the idea of pushing everyone to respond quickly is idiotic. Let people take their time. Weāre not all online all the time. We might be on vacation or just away from our phones for a while, and you are penalizing people for that. It seems like young people are working for HE now, and seem to think everyone wants or needs an answer asap. But most people on HE are older and we donāt mind waiting. In my experience often people who take a few days are double checking with family because they are seriously considering an exchange.
Leave well enough alone, and stop trying to make everyone rush all the time.
Yes itās probably a generation thing. You say āwe Can be in holidaysā but Iām always on my phone in holidays to take pictures, to pay in shops, to use the maps or gps etc. So having a notification is not a problem, itās even easier than when I work personnaly and my phone has internet in more than 100 countries etc. And the goal is to launch the conversation, no need to decide in 4 days, just say ālet me think about itā and then give news later for example
Personally, I would rather not receive any response at all than the famous phrase: 'Iāve received your proposal and will think about it in the coming days.ā Itās often just a way to buy time and avoid being penalized for not replying. Iām afraid that, from now on, in many cases it wonāt lead to anything, not even a subsequent rejection, leaving you in a sort of limbo. In the past, receiving an email saying they would consider it implied there was likely a chance for collaboration. Now, thatās probably no longer the case.
I absolutely agree with this, but I also completely understand where the person is coming from, who said they need this automated āmaybeā reply to handle the sheer number of requests.
If you think about it, the combination of having automated reply options (even those that exist at the moment) AND needing to reply quickly eliminate each others benefits. If you get 20 requests and reply to all with them with a maybe, that gives you a good response rate, but does not help with finalising exchanges at all.
In addition, the amount of time you are able to wait for a reply differs depending on the trip. I might be looking for a few days in Paris at the end of July, and Iāll need a much shorter response time for that than for my trip around New Yearsā Eve, which I am also planning at the moment. So there really is no point in implementing an algorhythm that calculates a āone size fits allā rating.
This is absolutely NOT more clear than the old percentage system. Itās much LESS clear. No one understands how the new response rate is calculated, and how to improve it. The four day automatic calculation was released unannounced, and now many people are incredibly frustrated with it, and donāt have a way of improving their response rate. The old response calculation was much clearer and easier. This was not well thought through or tested, and is very much less user friendly. You didnāt test this before you released it, and it shows. Bring back the old calculation. This is frustrating the community, it is not an accurate representation, and it is not working well.
Also, the new four day auto cancellation sucks. Many of us donāt want to limit requests to open calendar time, especially when you live in an area that does not get many requests - but it now means that you are punished by requests that do not fit your schedule.
It was announced on Facebook months ago several times, here in the forum too, by email, was tested by us volunteers, so what you are saying is a little wrong, just you were not aware.
A large portion of Home Exchangers do not use the forum or the Facebook group. I havenāt received any newsletter or e-mail announcing the change.
The previous percentage calculation was much more clear. The new calculation does not change based on response rate (I currently have 1 āunrepliedā message and a ālowā rating). It calculates based on the automatic refusals. I had a few automatic refusals based on times my house was unavailable and I was out of the country when the feature was launced, and now I have a low rating and no way to improve that. How exactly is that better than the previous system?
I can also find a lot of prove of disgruntled and unhappy HE-ers on the Facebook group with this feature.
Donāt wish to be a negative Nancy but I am something of a well paid expert on data gathering processes for AI and bias in data.
You donāt give enough detail but how do you get around the bias that this rating system gives to members who are not contacted much in say rural Bulgaria or Belarus, versus people with apartments in Manhattan who must get several enquiries every day.
If my home is low demand and I am contacted once every six months and someone wants to exchange with me then it is easy and in my immediate interest to be super responsive and I will have a high rating. If, however, I have a Manhattan loft or a beautifully appointed 5 bedroom town house located in Notting Hill London, then keeping my response rate high is going to take 1 to 2 hours per week because I will be snowed under with messages.
The very properties that are in the highest demand may well be disadvantaged by this rating system.
You should therefore add in a fudge factor to compensate and make the score relative to other users in the same area of high/low demand. A super responsive Manhattanite, might be someone who responds to 50% of their enquiries (the sensible 50% that donāt wish to swap a $5m loft for a council house in Stoke-on-Trent or Middlesbrough).
I get enquiries from people with one bedroom apartments who want to swap for my 7 bedroom house in SE, England 1 hour from Central London. Itās abundantly clear that I have 6 children. Where am I going to put them?
I always answer these enquiries, even if they are silly, but if I listed a midtown Manhattan loft I doubt I would have the time to deal with them as I would have an order of magnitude more requests than the 2 or 3 per month I get currently.
There was an email in the newsletter recently. Maybe you donāt receive it ? Newsletter arrive generally once a week. And yes seems logical to me, the goal is for members to answer faster. And that answers arriving months later donāt allowed to get back to 100%. Members who are very commited will be more careful to update or block their calendar when they will be away. And for you it will go up with time, when you āll have New requests. It may take some time but itās a way to have more answers and faster. Members who donāt answer promptly will be down in the results, they will need to assume that.
I admit that I thought changing the response rate from a percentage to āExcellentā etc was a terrible idea. Then I noticed I was getting a much faster response to my exchange requests than Iāve seem over the past 2.5 years. I cannot say that the new response rate was the cause but I can say definitively that am much happier with my user experience.
I would highly suggest allowing members to set up their own, individual response template. I am not crazy about the canned version provided to us now and I would like to set one that is customized as I get tons of inquiries to visit for instance Canada in the winter and I donāt want to block my calendar, but itās taking too much time to reply individually. Thanks Holly
I would also love to be able to customise my response templates! Iāve asked HE about it on a few occasions, but without success so far. I know we can keep them in a document and copy and paste them, but itās not very convenient. Ideally, we should be able to have them directly in HEās messaging system
to take pictures, to pay in shops, to use the maps or gps etc. So having a notification is not a problem, itās even easier than when I work personnaly 
