Am I worrying unnecessarily?
I’ve taken a booking via Abritel (family of 3) and I’ve asked our guest to fill in our booking form so that I have more details than Vrbo provides. (They only give an email address and a telephone number.)
I’m surprised that she has only given me her work address, because it’s “more convenient”.
For me, that sets off alarm bells.
I’d welcome thoughts/suggestions please.
Should I insist on their home address?
Hmmm married to someone else?
I LOVE that your mind immediately went there @KarenLot 
All the things I was thinking seem very dull in comparison 
Hmmm does make my antennas twitch a little! Can you look them up online and see if they are real?
I’m very suspicious since I had one of the properties I was looking after have a huge group of Germans show up. The managers were expecting Brits otherwise they could have shown them in unknowingly. they had booked a fake booking of the house from that website, turns out it wasn’t the only one that season!
Good point. I’ll report back. Just need to do a bit more gardening while there’s light.
But for 3 people - now that is open minded!
Are they French? As otherwise you can use that you have to fill in the “fiche individuelle police” as a reason as it requires everything practically down to inside trouser leg…(which you probably know, sorry!)
We often use the power of google, linked in and streetview to authenticate potential clients. If there is areal company at that address, with real employees then prob ok. We get quite a few people booking using work emails - which I find odd as that wasn’t allowed in my jobs. And even asking for receipts which mention company name. I take the view that I am not a police person, or even tax person, so it is not my business…
Google them.
Probably a pair of gangsters who have lured an unsuspecting victim whose organs they are going to steal. Did they ask if there’s a freezer?
Thanks Jane, I can rely on you to stop me flapping. I too use google to verify someone is bona fide. In fact (as you say) she’s emailed from her business and I’ve checked the address does exist. So I’ll stop worrying.
No but they did ask if there was a table tennis table! 
Presumably needed to lay out the bodies before chopping them up!
We had that once, just a work address and email. 6 poles turned up at 3am, had a job doing solar panels on a barn locally. The woman who "booked " (the day before) was an agent but as we hadn’t received any money, and they didn’t have it I politely told them where to go… beware!
Well…opposite me was a large luxury gite last year. The house being up a long drive into the grounds. A traditional family did a stay there. They arrived in a very swish car driven by Dad.
All perfectly normal except most nights at times like 10.30pm or 11.00pm the pere de famille was down my end of the drive under the big tree a bit off the drive near the gate talking into his mobile phone. It didn’t seem like business, was done very quietly and I don’t think it was his mother he was keeping in touch with.
A business partner in the Southern Hemisphere perhaps? One thing I have learnt from having a gîte is that the range of people’s behaviour is remarkable…
This is not acceptable, Sue. However, much depends on the set-up you have with Abritel. This essentially comes down to ‘Who do you have a contract with?’ If Abritel are contracted under their T&Cs with you to be responsible for the renters (for damage to your property, as an example), then you should have no need for direct contact with the renters. But if (as I suspect) Abritel will wash their hands of any liability, then you need a residential address as the basis of enforcing your contract.
Apart from that, if ever you have a situation with a tenant that requires the services of the gendarmes or pompiers, they will expect you to have accurate information on the occupants of your property.
Tread carefully.
@Michael Do you have gîtes? Sometimes the ideal world is just that, and in running gîtes you have to decide what your priorities are. We always ask for home addresses, and phone numbers, but don’t always get them. But as yet we have never cancelled a contract because they have not filled in all the details.
On reflection, I have just sent her an email asking if she could give us her home address - we’ll see.
@JaneJones good point
Just tell them if she queries it that it is a legal requirement here for all hotels / gites etc to have everyones correct details.
Which, presumably, is true.
We have a rental business which has included both our own and other properties owned by friends and contacts.
There is no ‘ideal world’. There is only the ‘real world’ - and the ‘what if?’
In the real world, the buck will stop with you, if ever you get hit by something unexpected.
I am just being realistic and practical, Jane.
“What if . . . . . ?” and the insurers are on your doorstep?
Since she’s French and works in Bordeaux I’m assuming she knows exactly how far she can push it.