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Missleading distance on listing notice

When the listing is presented, it says it is 15 miles from a well known town.  This is true as an airplane flies. The algorithm fails to take into account there is a big river in between.  As the car drives, it is more like 50 minutes.  This is very MISLEADING as it implies it is only a short drive from big town to rural place.  How can this be fixed?


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Thuild - Your … 5 years ago

Dear Csharp,

It is displayed correctly. What if someone comes by helicopter or by foot?

There are various means of transport, therefore they take the distance as on a map, not as by road.

If this is in your property description, you can ask BDC to change it. If it's not there, then it will most probably stay the same.

Best regards,

Zsolt - www.thuild.com

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Csharp 5 years ago

The Yuba River is between here and there, and a lot of very rough mountainous country. The notice is wrong and misleading. Undertaking to hike between the two points would be like a Lewis and Clark Expedition, and still you would figure out to cross the river. The only helicopters flying around would be those trying to rescue you.

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Leandri Klopper 5 years ago

Hi Csharp,

Very entertaining description! Thanks for the giggle.

Okay I get that you want it fixed because it's misleading. But surely the people looking at the map when they plan their trip there should notice the massive river? (Hopefully). If I go on holiday I use google maps to get directions to the property (via Car) and it works everything out for me.

Hopefully your guests won't try to travel to your property via donkey cart or scooter. They can probably see the landscape and they ought to research your property before booking?

If it keeps bothering you though, maybe just have a chat with Booking.com.

Have a lovely weekend!

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Ellie 5 years ago

I have the same problem! I asked booking.com to change the distance on my page. They told me to look here, in the community posts to see how it's done! They are really not being helpful at all.

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Brian 5 years ago

I'm with the hosts that think it is wrong & misleading. Mentioning helicopters & hiking are bit of a far reach albeit not impossible.

The closest airport distances on my listing are about 70k'ms shorter than it should be, which on our roads is nearly an extra hours travel. Image getting off a 24 hour flight from the other side of the world to find out where you booked was 2hrs away not 1 hour. I'd be a bit annoyed.

Although people can research directions & distances on google maps etc, those using the website to book accommodation I would probably like to think they can trust the information they can see on the listings. If they can't this could lead to mistrust & cancelled bookings.

While guests are planning their trip they & myself workout travel distances maybe splitting a weeks trip into segments so if they trust these distances & then find after making their booking that it is actually twice the distance or time to get to the accommodation they may well cancel & book somewhere closer.

And although they might arrive a the same destination a day later they might not rebook with the same provider because may wonder what other information on their listing is misleading.

And that's my 2 cents worth.

I plan to contact Booking.com about this shortly.

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Tiina 5 years ago

Interesting topic!

We have this same problem. It is showing an airport as the closest, that is not closest and not even that close what it is saying. This can lead people booking flights to that airport, which is actually in another country and from where, you have no bus connections here.

I would really like to get that changed, but I have no idea how to do that?

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Brian 5 years ago

Yes, I've been in contact with Booking.com.

There is NO way to edit this yourself, it is automatically generated, even their support team cannot edit it.

The team member I spoke to said the only way possibly get this changed is if we all use the Suggestions Button at the bottom of the webpage & make as many submissions as possible. It may take a while but the more suggestions they get may get it done. So pass the word around & get suggesting everyone.

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Tiina 5 years ago

I would start right away, but I can't find that suggestions button. Where can you see it?

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Brian 5 years ago

Sorry use the "Share Your Feedback" button

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Tiina 5 years ago

Found it, thank you!

one feedback sent, another mention about it sent with description change request.

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Leandri Klopper 5 years ago

Hello Brian and Tiina ,

Thanks for both your inputs, I've also sent feedback regarding this. I've also emailed them and hopefully we will see more options soon!

I've also added in my suggestion a category where you can explain more about the trip to the proeprty. For instance, we have a really bad piece of road about an hour's drive from the property which I would love to point out to guests before hand. I was unable to add it to the Fine print, so I'm now forced to send it to my guests via the messages on the Extranet or email. But not all of them read it.

So yep, hoping for great changes in 2019!

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

Hello all! Had many problems with location and description. As for the location I send booking.com my coordinates and finally my location is in the right point and guests can find my property easily.

As for changing the description I send a message through extranet requesting changes in distances from airport, nearby cities etc. and after a couple of days they changed them.

Changing the property description is not so easy since they explained to me that it is automated but suggested to write the changes in bullets and maybe changes will be modified.

Leandri perhaps is you message booking.com that you need to add a bullet "really bad piece...." they will added to your listing description.

I will let you know if they change my property description.

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Tiina 5 years ago

I have also asked about the description because the automated system doesn't really pick the relevant things. No one travels to the northernmost Finland to barbeque, I guess. But we did write a long and nice text in "host information", I just hope people read it.

About the airport, I got an answer too: "Thank you for contacting us. I have not made any changes to your description in this instance, but I have forwarded a request to change the closest airport, since I can see this was measured with bird's fly, and does not correspond the real distance. This will be processed by our contents team as soon as possible."

And I agree also about the how to get here part. Just picking up an airport and gelling which bus route you need to take, does not give that much information. Especially when it is quite remote area where they are coming to.

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Csharp 5 years ago

They are lying about not being able to change it, booking.com invented the algorithm, it can be changed. What they are really saying is: “please don’t bother us, we don’t want to spend the time and money to fix this.”.

Suggesting people overwhelm them with the suggestions button is a way to avoid actually addressing the root problem, the faulty algorithm because someone never thought of how to handle this case when they wrote the code.

This is where laws could be effective, make vendors obligated to change code that is wrong and inconvenient. The computers should do the bidding of the people using them, not the other way around.

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

Unfortunately the automated system doesn’t really pick the relevant parts of the property and it’s senseless to read that a whole house is accommodated with a kitchen when there are so much more things important to refer to. I’m trying to change somethings using bullets. I am awaiting for the results.

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Leandri Klopper 5 years ago

Hey M Adamopoulou ,

I've tried adding it. Booking.com said No. I was crushed.

Here is to hoping for better directions in the future.

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

Hoping Leandri. Even though booking.com gave an explanation about having experience and they know better I don’t agree at all. Have a nice weekend!!!

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Brian 5 years ago

Yes, I've been in contact with Booking.com.

There is NO way to edit this yourself, it is automatically generated, even their support team cannot edit it.

The team member I spoke to said the only way possibly get this changed is if we all use the "Share Your Feedback" button at the bottom of the webpage & make as many submissions as possible. It may take a while but the more suggestions they get may get it done. So pass the word around & get suggesting everyone.

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

Hi Brian and welcome to the forum. I will certainly send a feedback on this.

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M Adamopoulou 5 years ago

I just added my feedback. Cross fingers. Who knows maybe booking.com will understand our problems.

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Achu1013 5 years ago

Dear All

I know this post is old but does anyone know if the problem have been fixed?

I am struggling to change the details for the closest airport as it is incorrect.

I look forward to hearing from you all.

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Aaltje B. 5 years ago

Just for now: take a photo of yourself with a sign saying how far the closest airport is and add that to the list of photos and not at the far end, since people don't always look at all of them.

And make it a fun photo, be creative, put a wig on, or do something unexpectedly humoristic.

And they will understand it. Most people on this planet can read English. :)

Try it and let us see the result, then we all have some fun too.

Greetings

Aaltje B.