Airbnb said this week that it will restrict the chores that hosts can require of guests, including stripping beds and washing dishes, after complaints from travelers about cleaning duties imposed on them.
The policy, announced on Tuesday, will apply to bookings from Nov. 20 and asks hosts to set “reasonable” house rules and to disclose them in a designated section of their listing. Hosts may not introduce new requirements or requests after a guest books, including through messages, signs in the home or conversations with guests.
Checkout chores should not “require significant time or effort, or would typically be performed by a cleaner,” Airbnb said.
Hosts risk receiving a warning or being less visible on listing searches if their rules violate the new requirements, Airbnb said.
“House rules help guests understand what hosts expect, but we’ve heard from our community that they can be confusing, onerous and hard to manage,” the company said in a statement on Thursday.
Some hosts pushed back against the changes, arguing that they were unreasonable. A Change.org petition, which had about 4,000 signatures as of Thursday morning, called on Airbnb to reverse the policy.
“There is a clear distinction between preparing a property for the next guest and clearing up the consequences of the previous guest’s everyday activities,” the petition read, adding: “Washing the dishes you have used is not equivalent to cleaning an entire property.”
Changing consumer preferences and regulations have forced Airbnb, a start-up that rode the highs of the “disruption economy,” to adjust its business model. Originally founded as a platform to match homeowners to travelers looking for short-term rentals as an alternative to hotels, the company this year added independent and boutique hotel listings in an effort to become a “one-stop shop” for travel, Brian Chesky, its chief executive, said in an earnings call in August.
In a May interview with The New York Times, Mr. Chesky acknowledged that some hosts were asking guests to do too many chores. Putting trash in a bin is fine, he said, but guests should not have to take the garbage out.
“No one should have to put the towels in the washer and start it,” he said. “For hosts, it’s to remember to be as hospitable as possible. These people are on vacation and they’re on vacation from their chores.”
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