We have used Airbnb for almost a year now. We’ve had several issues with prices randomly changing and people booking our home for holidays at an off-season daily rate. That is not what this story is about, though.
On Memorial Day Weekend 2017 we rented our house out to a party of ten. Our house rules are very clear: no smoking, no parties, and no more than ten guests. As many people do, we count heads with a ring doorbell. We noticed a party developing as group after group showed up.
Saturday morning, we called Airbnb to ask if we could evict the renter without issuing a refund. We intended to keep the deposit as well. We also did not want negative feedback. We spoke to an Airbnb representative who was absolutely clueless and seemed to want to make our call about himself. We were told, “they can leave feedback if they stay at your house. They can request to be refunded.”
Not wanting to lose over $2,500 or get a bad review, we left the guests alone. We were told that the Trust and Safety team would contact us as this was urgent. They continued to promise there were no more than ten people. Over the next two days we gathered videos of probably 100 people coming into our house. Still, we waited for Trust and Safety to contact us. They didn’t, so we called back. This time we spoke to a supervisor who told us the same thing as the first representative.
On Monday, I came to my house to find carpets ruined, furniture broken and stained, and the decks trashed; everything appeared as if there had been a wild party. We have videos of the partygoers, the drinking, puking in our bushes, and other deplorable acts.
We want to submit a claim, but how? Trust and Safety won’t tell us what to do. Why? Because after more calls than I can count, they have not reached out to us. We have 14 days to submit a request. We don’t know if that means a request to the house violator (guest) or through resolutions, or through the host guarantee. Airbnb told us to “submit your request for additional guests and cleaning first. That goes to one department. Then we have another case for your damage.”
I don’t have a case number to refer to. We have many thousands of dollars in damage and Airbnb just refuses to lift one finger to help us. They have many unqualified people to answer their phones, but all they can do is BS us about how important our call is. I will upload files after I have some resolution. However I am thinking if Airbnb does not want to involve themselves in this, maybe it’s time for an attorney and perhaps a class action suit.
I am in AirBnB voicemail and CSR hell. Our guest checked in last Thursday and our money should have been released on Friday afternoon. It was not released to PayPal until Saturday at 1.40 am in the morning. I checked my PayPal account and as of today Tuesday June 13 2017 it is still not in my PayPal account. That was the reason for my initial call! I am now told that it is PayPal’s problem. The man Melvin I spoke to had a thick foreign accent and did not understand English at all – especially if it veered from the script.
This holding on to money is an old fraudulent trick that many companies used to practice. Release money at the weekends so that it doesn’t get processed by the receiving party until the following Monday. This is out and out fraud. Compounded by the fact that the money is still not in my account as of 3.00 pm on Tuesday. If they do this for everybody, can you imagine how much extra interest they are earning on customer payments.
Melvin wouldn’t let me speak to a supervisor and kept repeating the party line. I am not sure what to do about this because it’s going to take so much time on the phone to get this worked out. I hate dishonesty and bad customer service.
Renee
You should have just cut your losses and offered them a refund instead of clinging to your greed. People get hotels for less money than that, which defeats the point of using air b n b. We no longer use air b n b because prices are often not competitive with hotels for our team.
Good luck submitting a claim with air b n b. Hope you have good insurance.
Airbnb doesn’t pay for cleaning expenses (it’s buried right there in their fine print)
Trust this from someone who knows it to be true after I had to pay for the 16 hours/2 day cleaning bill my LAST guests EVER of Airbnb left me.
After 42 days of being run into the ground by them – contacting appropriate entities to go after them and daily social media beatings they finally paid out close to $2000 for replacing damaged furniture (but I was not made whole for this)
All in all I lost $1000’s due to the mess left behind by the group that rented to celebrate their aging Grandma’s birthday. I haven’t found HER yet, but I am doubting she made it out alive.
Good luck friends – then run as far as you can from Airbnb.