I have copied my conversations with Airbnb regarding this story.
“This is your resolutions expert from the Airbnb Trip Team. I hope this message finds you well. This ticket was handed to me to ensure you have a continued support. Please give me time to review your concern. Rest assured that I will work on this case in accordance with our guidelines and policies. I will give you an update as soon as possible. If you happen to have question, please do not hesitate to ask, I will be here to support you.”
“Thanks for contacting me. Note that only on October 27th that I will be back to that hotel and I will recheck the place. I will take some photos and send them to you. Note that I am living in Cairo, so I have a lot of things: a table for a laptop, luggage, clothes, shoes, printer, etc. I must stay in a large room, clean and comfortable. It must be perfect. Not too expensive like that one. I also need a place to study, because I am studying Arabic here.
I just arrived here at the new place and the receptionist informed me that room will be available only tomorrow and I must stay in another hotel that belongs to them, again with my luggage up and down (40 steps). I do not know what it is better, to cancel this one or try a discount here. It is up to you. Talk to them and explain my situation, please. Thanks. They informed me to come on October 27th after 12:00, but then they changed it to tomorrow after 12:00.”
“Thank you for responding to my message, and for giving me your side of the story. My apologies for the late response as I was out of the office from the time being you responded to my message. In your message, since you and your host had an agreement of you checking in on their listing starting October 27, 2019, I would like to know if you were able to successfully move in. May I ask as well if, you encountered another issue in the listing afterwards. If yes, you may proceed giving us all the documentation that you have to support your claim for me to be able to verify. Looking forward to hearing a response from you soon. If you happen to have question, please do not hesitate to ask, I will be here to support you.”
“I am so sorry but I am sure that you did not read my message to you before, so I will repeat it below. I agreed, through the site, with my host that I would arrive at the hotel on October 25th at night (he agreed and accepted through the site). I paid by my credit card. Note that I am living here in Cairo, so I have a lot of luggage and things. I came to the place, as agreed, and the receptionist from the hotel informed me that I would stay in the hotel only on that day, October 25th, but on October 26th and 27th I should stay in another hotel and that I must be back again at that hotel on October 27th. Imagine me, with all these items, having to be moved from place to place in a short time, staying here and there and having no firm destination, in a strange city and in a country which is not mine.
Do you understand everything so far? I need to be clear how much it pissed me off, how much it scared and tired me in the middle of the night, and how much trouble it brought me unnecessarily without knowing why. I did not accept all that and returned to the apartment where I had been. The owner, who is a spectacular and kind-hearted person, seeing my trouble, let me stay there without charging me anything, and it didn’t end here.
As the hotel boy had said I should return on October 27th in the afternoon, I returned at 16:00 and the same person informed me that no, that I was only supposed to come on October 28th in the afternoon. I had to return again with everything. This time I went to the other hotel indicated by the person in this hotel, where the guy who helped me carry my bags ended up damaging one of my bags… more inconvenience.
Finally, after this whole epic, I’m in the hotel, but guess what? There is no water to use the bathroom or shower. The cluttered kitchen and badly-cleaned utensils, the unhygienic, much less sterilized bathroom in the room, and the shower stall is grubby with dirt. Have you understood everything so far, or will I need to draw a picture and show how angry and upset I am with this whole situation?
Please make it clear to the Airbnb security team to review my history and note that I had stayed at this apartment several times before and that never, never, never had I had any kind of disturbance there. The host is a good person with great behavior, a super host and has had other guests from Germany, France, China who have stayed there who can prove what I am saying is true, if necessary.
Now I made the following decision, because of all the past trouble and loads of luggage and things I have I don’t want. I don’t want to move anywhere anymore. You need to get in touch with this hotel, make the situation better here, solve their problems, and not let them affect me, because I’m paying a lot to stay in this place. At this house I was paying R$1,700. Here I paid R$4,000 and it is not even close to the quality of the apartment where I was and on top of that there is this problem with the lack of water. Let them arrange a great immediate discount on my bill for all these inconveniences so far, and god knows how many more I have to face until the day I check out. We sincerely look forward to the arrangements and discounts to be taken by Airbnb for this particular case. Thank you very much. I will send some photos later. I will have some meetings today and tomorrow.”
“Thank you for responding to my message, and for giving me your clearer and further side of the story. I already reached out to your host regarding this matter, and I am waiting for their response. As I’ve checked your interaction with the host, there is nothing registered on our Airbnb Messaging platform. I would like to ask you to communicate with your host using our messaging, so that everything will be well documented. Once your host responded to my message, I will also give you an update. In case that you have question, please do not hesitate to ask, I will be here to support you.”
“Note that the host came to my room to inform me that he will refund me for those two nights (October 25th and 26th) that I was not here or another hotel. This is okay, but what about all the inconvenience, stress, and trouble caused? I need the host to give me a discount on the total paid to him. If he can do this, everything will be perfect. Thanks a lot for your prompt response.”
“Thank you so much for responding to my message, and for giving me an update regarding this matter. I also received a message from your host stating that, when you arrived on the listing, they informed you about everything and you agreed with their statements. The host added that, when you arrived on their listing, you hadn’t completed the payment, and advised them that you would complete the payment later on. Regarding the water, the host said that the water shortage was just a few hours and the city workers were fixing the water pipes, which is clearly out of their hands. Furthermore, I confirmed with your host that they are willing to give a refund for the two nights which you didn’t spent at the listing. I tried checking if there will be any additional refund for the said reservation; however, the host has the discretion to indicate the amount that they want to have on their listing as a nightly rate. Once you confirm the refund for two nights, I will go ahead and process that one for you. Looking forward to hearing a response from you as soon as possible.”
“Want to know something? I am tired of being called a liar. I am 57 years old and I have no need, after going through so much trouble, nervous and angry and bothered, taking my bags from here to here, up and down on your orders, to be lying or making up something about what happened. Whether you believe me of not, I don’t like having to be repeating myself all the time and having to prove this or that. You take so long to answer me that time has passed, the dust has settled, and that’s all.
I repeat that I have been with Airbnb for over a year and with my track record you should know more about me and my concept of honesty. I will remain in Egypt for a long time but I will certainly not be staying with Airbnb, unfortunately for the simple fact that I am being treated as I am at the moment and always discredited. I was honest even when I made it clear to your security department that I would not need Uber to make my transfer.
I will return to Cairo in January and plan to use the services of Booking.com or Expedia.com. Let this case go. Keep believing in the host. Congratulations. The future and god will show you who was right, not me. I’m tired and exhausted with all this. Enough for me. I will finish my stay here and when I return to Cairo I will use another service, simple as that. I hope I don’t have to explain myself so much, prove anything to anyone, and have more peace and quiet to finish the work I came here to do.
I hope my Airbnb friends have had a great night’s sleep, because I didn’t have this privilege. I went to sleep today at 8:30 in the morning, because there was renovation, construction, and a lot of noise – chainsaw on, hammer knocking, dragging things, a real hell on earth – at 5:00 AM near my room. Once again, if you don’t believe me, talk to the hotel receptionist, who was also here at that time. I even called him to my room to hear the noise.
We went out on the balcony to check where it all came from. He said he would ask them to stop but the work and noise continued until 8:00 AM. I woke up now at 3:20 PM with a huge migraine. My head seems to be exploding so much that it hurts. I already took three pills and they didn’t help.
I spoke again with the receptionist. He assured me that tonight the noise would not be repeated. I doubt that very much: here they do what they want, where they want, and when they want. I want to know how I cancel my reservation here and if I will not lose anything already paid, if I will receive my payment in full due to all these inconveniences experienced so far. I no longer want to go through this psychological mess and no longer lose any sleep at night or wake up startled by the sound of sawing and hammering at 4:00 in the morning. I don’t want to use Airbnb anymore. I want to cancel everything and get my full money back. Please inform me quickly.”
I find it very interesting that even though you used the platform they state they cannot find any communication.
Also I thought you always had to pay in full before moving in to an Airbnb unit so how can the host say you did not pay in full and the airbnb staff repeat that claim? That I find very dishonest of them.