Listen along while reading the podcast transcript.
Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform.
Transcripts may contain a few typos. I work alone and publish daily, so it is hard to catch all typos. Enjoy!
I got scammed on Turno (Turnoverbnb). Avoid my fate Transcript
(00:11):
Well, hello there. It’s John from Vacation Rentals with John. Today’s storytelling time. I had a horrible experience hiring an emergency cleaner on turno.com, turnover Airbnb, and I want you to avoid the same fate as me, and let’s get into it, right? So I didn’t have a cleaner because my cleaner got very sick and I needed to find someone in Atlanta, Georgia, very, very last minute. So I went on this turno app to see how it worked, and the actual functionality was okay. So I had no issue looking up bids, but it basically allows you to put your property and then find cleaners in the area. It’s a marketplace. So I found a cleaner, and the cleaner actually said, okay, it’s going to cost you this much, $200, okay, all is fine and dandy. Then when she got to the property, she started huffing and puffing that there was an extra bathroom.
(01:09):
I didn’t put that bathroom in the bid request. It’s okay. How much more will this cost me? Well, she tried to jump her quote from 200 to $400, and she told me if I didn’t pay up right now, she would walk away and the guest can check in dirty. And I said, wait, this is against platform rules. Can you just help me out here? I can pay an extra $50, but I’m not going to pay double for a cleaning appointment just for an extra 50 square feet. That doesn’t make any sense. So she said, you know what? I’m not going to clean it. I’ll be here if you want to pay me. Here’s my cash app account. Once I receive payment, I’ll keep going. If I don’t receive payment in 30 minutes, I’m going to be out of here. Well, I was desperate, so I sent the payment, but I also contacted the platform and basically went over what happened.
(01:57):
It took them a while to get back to me and actually resolve this issue, but they did resolve it for me, and they did come up with a solution that would work for me. So I give them applause for that. They actually comped me a little bit because of all the trouble I went through, but it wasn’t enough to make me whole. And I just want you to avoid this fate. I mean, if you’re going to use a marketplace like Clean Sir, or Turno or Turny or any of those marketplaces, you have to understand that some cleaners will underbid just to get your business just to get in front of you, because those platforms have way too many cleaners on them. For every one house, there’s like 10 to 15 people who want to clean it. So when you put your house out there, they’re going to bid as low as possible just to get your attention.
(02:44):
So maybe you’re thinking, Hey, my clean fee is $175, and somebody’s putting a bid of $80, a hundred dollars to you, that looks really attractive because you’re saving money. They look happy to do it, so you hire them. Then when they actually show up, they said, Hey, your property’s a little bigger. I didn’t know you had a bunk bed. It’s going to be $400. Well, this is a common tactic. I talked to a lot of my hosting friends that used Turno, and they said the same exact thing has happened to them because cleaners, they’re desperate for work at this moment because it’s slower, and they will do anything just to get their foot in the door. So they actually tell each other on Facebook groups, Hey, the key to turn success is the bid low. And then once you get hired, then you revise the quote with the owner.
(03:29):
That’s just bad business practices because in my book, that’s called a bait and switch. Bait and switch. Now, if you do decide to hire a cleaner in a marketplace, just ask the very clear question, is the price that I’m paying all in, are there going to be any extra fees, any extra hidden costs that I need to know about? Because if this is not the estimate you’re going to give me, I just need to know that upfront. I don’t want any surprises on cleaning day that you’re not going to clean it unless I pay so much money. I understand there could be a variance, but I want to know more or less for this square footage, for this bedroom count, for this bathroom count. How much am I going to be charged for this? And then that way you can already set that expectation that you want to know what the cost is going to be.
(04:09):
You don’t want any funny business going on on the backend. You want to know the cost before you have someone come into your property. It’s very important to you. So any marketplace you use, I advise you to not use a marketplace for this reason, because there’s so much variety and randomness that happens when you hire strangers. Try to hire a local company that comes referred from other hosts. The best way to ask is on Facebook groups with other hosts on them. Now, on your comment, you do want to say, Hey, I’m looking for referrals only from other hosts who have actually used the cleaning service, but I do not want any solicitations from cleaning companies. Now, why is this important? It’s because there’s so many cleaners in those groups that you’ll get slapped with 50 different solicitations, and it will be so many that you’re not going to be able to reasonably sort through all of them, call all of them, text all of them, and it’s just going to become a really overwhelming process for you.
(04:59):
So you’d want to say, no solicitations, please. I just want referrals from other hosts. And that means the host is actually using the service. They’re actually happy with the service, and they’re happy to give you the referral. And nine times out of 10, that cleaning team is going to really work for you. You do want to make sure the person referring the cleaner to you is not in any way getting compensated from them, any kickback situation, any referral fee, or they’re not a relative, a sister, a brother, et cetera, because then, yeah, they’re referring them because they want to help their friend out or their family member out. You don’t want that. I’ve seen it a lot. You just don’t want it because it’s going to result in a really poor experience for you as a host, and you’re going to have to fire them or coach them, and it’s going to take a lot of time, energy, and headaches, and you just don’t want to deal with it.
(05:45):
So when you ask for referrals in Facebook, just say, referrals only from experienced host. Thank you. If you like this episode and you want to help me create more content, please just leave a rating or review on Apple Podcast or Spotify. Doing that helps me get the show in front of more listeners, and that helps me keep making content just like this. Okay, and if you haven’t joined a Facebook group yet, here’s your invite. You’re invited in the show notes. There will be a link to the Facebook group. Please give us a join. We’re looking forward to having you there, and until next time, friends, take care and stay booked.
Vacation Rentals With John is one of the fastest growing short term rental podcasts. The show has been growing in popularity because of its no BS, to the point lessons on how to grow and operate a vacation rental. Join the facebook group. To listen to any of the past episodes, check out this page.