Hi there, I’ve recently had an exchange for which I have not received a rating (it ended three weeks ago). I’ve looked at their profile and realised they’ve rated less then one out of ten exchanges they went on. I am fairly new to HomeExchange and was looking forward to receive some ratings, so future guests know what to expect from me.
It made me realise that from now on I am going to check in advance if people who want to stay at my place rate their exchanges, and if they don’t I won’t welcome them.
But still I am wondering, why would people not rate their exchanges? Any thoughts on that?
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Hi, whike I don’t know whuy some people don’t rate their exchange, what I find useful is writing a review myself - so if they want to read it, they need to write theirs. That worked 100% of the exchanges. Hope this helps!
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In fact if they don’t wish to leave a review yours will be published anyway after 40 days.
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Hi Annika, this question has come up before and certain members have replied that they dont like the idea of judging a members home and hospitality so they never leave reviews. If it’s important to you I’d send them a message saying that you’ve done your review and that you hope they’ll do one to as your trying to build up your HomeExchange profile. I often say ’ Thanks for a great stay, I’ve just completed our review and said how happy we were’. It seems to reassure members!
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Hi @Annika, I agree with @SusanJbrn, if I were you, I would contact them, telling that you would be grateful that they leave a review as you are new on HE.
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Thanks for the great advice, Susan, in fact I even used your wording for inspiration, because it sounds so great.
I guess it’s understandable that some people might think it difficult to judge people’s private places, but at the same time it’s one of the things we rely on when looking for a house swap. But I completely understand that people have varying approaches to this.
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I usually leave a review. However, there have been a few times I chose not to because the member was new and my review would have had some negative ratings and I didn’t want to possibly impact their ability for future exchanges. Instead, I wrote them a personal email explaining where I thought they could improve future experiences. Sometimes ‘newbies’ don’t fully realize some of the extra steps they need to take when swapping homes (ie; cleaning hair out of drains, wiping dirty fingerprints off lightswitch plates, covering large stains on the sofa, removing black mold from shower/tub seams, etc).
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I got a request from someone who has done about 40 exchanges yet very few were reviewed and he rarely leaves reviews. I asked him why and a few days later he replied “I forgjot”
I ignored his request. Seemed odd. His 2 homes are stated to be primarily airbnbs so he probably doesn’t care about his reviews and just uses them to earn some GPs.
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That’s great, and Susan’s wording suggestion is good. I hope you get your review now.
When poeple don’t leave a review, it might have negative effects for their exchange partner, as many of us read reviews and partly base our decision on them. So missing reviews might make people wonder if something wasn’t right.
It’s possible that some people don’t leave reviews because they oppose of rating other people’s homes, but I think other reasons are more common. Some people forget, some people just don’t get around to do it and some people rather don’t write reviews than leaver a bad one.
We always leave reviews, except for one case. We were quite disappointed with the host’s lack of communication after arrival, and the experience was more like coming to a rental, with nothing there (after an overseas flight), not even drinkable water, and the cleanliness was mediocre at best. Still, the location was excellent. So our dilemma was either leaving a bad review, writing a wrong (too good) review or not reviewing at all. We chose the last option.
Hi Trine, I am sorry that you had such an underwhelming experience. I know it seems easier to judge this from the outside, but in this case I think it would have been fair to leave a review that mentions both the negative and the positive aspects. I would think that a review doesn’t have to be either or, but can be nuanced.
I personally find the lack of communication the most troubling aspect of what you described. I’d think that if as a host for some reason I cannot prepare the house in a standard I would normally expect, I could partially make up for this by getting in touch and at least explaining the reasons (provided there are good ones). But not communicating is the worst. For me, being in touch and getting to know at least a little bit the people that I am exchanging with is one of the most pleasurable and interesting aspects of doing home exchange.
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Btw, I wrote to the person with Susans suggestion,and I did get a positive review after a while, which made me very happy. So thank you to Susan and everyone who suggested this. I guess it shows again how important communication is!
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Hi Annika, and thank you.
The problem was that the review would have been below mediocre on all criteria. I can’t give too many details, as that’s not allowed, but the only positive thing was the location and partly the home itself. I am aware that people have different cøeaning standards, so we could have lived with that, if there hadn’t been a very high cleaning fee, and no necessities in the home at all, without information about it beforehand.
But as you said, the worst thing was the lack of communication. Not just because connection and communication are very important to us in exchanges, but also because the host didn’t respond to any of my messages or questions during our stay.
This was a stay for GPs, and it was very different from our previous (reciprocal) exchanges through two decades. We will accept GPs from guets occasionally, if the xcomnection is there, but this experience has made us very reluctant to go on exchanges for GP. If we ever will, I have to make sure that the communication and connection is excellent beforehand. But the communication before our arrival was ok in this case as well, but then it came to an abrupt halt.
Still, we were very grateful for the possibility to stay there, so we didn’t want to give them a bad review. On the other hand we couldn’t give a dishonest review either. So therefore we didn’t review at all. If the communication had been better, I would have informed the host, but due to no response to our messages, there was no point.
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That’s great, Annika, I’m happy for you. Yes, communication is everything and solves lots pf problems!
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