It must be fairly recent because it wasn't on my listings earlier in 2021 including one I put up in late October for a January 2022 listing. I'm not sure I would have used it if I'd known. To be honest, when I put up my Maui listing just about a month ago I didn't see it on there initially but it's there now. I'm wondering if that's why they've changed the listings to show per day prices rather than per week prices, so they can 'hide' their fee?
I don't think you would have known unless you actually went through the process of booking. That is the only place it used to show up. I had someone contact me trying to get me to pay that fee (reduce my price). I told them that I paid a fee to list and to have it verified, which redweek did to verify that I am the owner and that the reservation is made. The protection is basically the credit card fee and the escrow which holds the money until check in. If they want to send me the money through zelle or friends or family paypal to me now, they can avoid that fee. If they want the protection that Redweek provides than they could go through redweek's booking process which includes paying their fee.
The new part is they no longer list the weekly rate on the listings page. My listing is for $3,000 and was shown that way when I listed, but now it shows $429/day and only shows $3,000 + $180 when you click through to the booking page.
I've always gone through the process of 'dummy booking' my own listing to make sure it was listed correctly and don't remember ever seeing it before (I may be mistaken) but I do agree it probably covers their CC and escrow fees and gives both renter and lister peace of mind. In the past when I haven't used it I've used an escrow service (around $100) and split the fee.
