Author Archives: Love to travel

Host Enters at Night, Scaring Family with Small Children

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I am utterly lost as to what to do as I cannot get hold of anyone from Airbnb. Through Twitter they keep saying a case manager will get back to me, but no one ever does.

We booked a two-week stay at an apartment advertised as having two double and one single bedrooms plus an air mattress in living room. We arrived at night after a tiring 12-hour journey with our young children. It turned out that there was just one double bedroom and a small toddler bed available to us as the usual resident had hoarded so much stuff the other bedroom was completely inaccessible; it was a store room and there was no air mattress. It was already past our kids’ bedtime however, so we thought we should just get them to bed and see what we could do in the morning.

The apartment was utterly filthy: thick, black mold in the shower cubicle, by the windows and bed, blobs of something and pubes on the bathroom floor, the linen didn’t feel or smell fresh, piles and piles of stuff everywhere so we couldn’t unpack our suitcases, filthy kitchen facilities and caked-on food. As there wasn’t room as advertised, we had to make a makeshift bed on the floor for one of us.

We took photos straightaway, called Airbnb, and asked to move. They said that we had to give the host a chance to rectify it out of courtesy. I contacted him and he said that it was too late for him to come and clean. I said that we could go on a day trip and be out the whole day for him to clean but he declined, saying he was busy. I then suggested that if he was away, perhaps he could send a cleaner. He said no, but that we could clean it ourselves.

In between communications, I caught a severe bug and was taken to A&E. It was the biggest national holiday in the country so finding elsewhere that day was proving impossible and I wouldn’t have been well enough to move. Despite the host knowing this, he suggested I clean it. I had to clean some areas in the kitchen so that we could eat, but obviously wouldn’t scrub someone’s house on my only annual holiday and also when I was severely ill.

We asked for help from Airbnb who said on the phone and confirmed by email that as per their policy, they have asked the host to come and clean and that he will need to refund us for the nights affected and the paid period starts from when he has done so. That day we also found what looked like vermin feces in the kitchen and thought that was it – we had to get out.

The only Airbnb with enough room was one far more expensive and Airbnb did not help us with what would happen with the extra cost as it was over our budget. During calling Airbnb for advice, someone else snapped up the other apartment and I continued asking for Airbnb to help. The host was meant to come and clean the afternoon the next day, but instead, to our huge fright, he used his keys and barged in at night.

He was intoxicated, very tall and large, and had to be stopped from walking in closer to me and the children. He proceeded to shout, get aggressive to my husband, and said he wanted us out. He was angry about Airbnb’s instructions to him and our complaint. I was so frightened I called the police and would have been able to do nothing to him had my husband not been in as he was so large.

I called Airbnb’s security number, and all they did was take my number and ensured someone would ring me asap. I kept ringing and only got through some ten hours later; they still did nothing. The police came and so frightened he would return, I found the cheaper of only two available hotels. We packed, cleaned as not to affect our rating whilst the other watched the door, lifted our little ones into the car and moved to a hotel just before midnight.

We were traumatized and for a long time afterwards I had to still keep double checking the doors were locked at home. To this day, I check on our children at night to ensure they are okay and still there. The children were very unsettled and we had tears in our eyes by the time we went to the hotel. We did not want to move them again so incurred the unexpected cost of the hotel and had to get food out which was really expensive compared to cooking at home. Our son had also been struck by the bug so was laid out in the hotel room.

I spent rest of the holiday trying to sort out the situation with Airbnb and we feel like we had no holiday; we came back more worn out than when we left. The host also contacted me outside Airbnb messaging saying gross things like I have worn his partners underwear and shared my contact details with someone else to harass me to click “cancel” myself, which I didn’t as I assumed it would affect refunds.

Airbnb did not follow through on their email and I did not receive a full refund for the affected nights. I took the matter up with my bank, who made a decision that it was not as advertised and not fit for our purposes after reviewing my photo evidence and police report; they returned my money. However, the host left me a bad review to say he would not recommend our family to any host, which is unfair as despite all that happened, we left the apartment far cleaner than we found it and broke no rules.

Despite police involvement and misleading advertising and harassing messages, Airbnb is not banning him. I truly hope other travelers are safe in his rentals. We had to fork out for an unexpected hotel bill and all stay in one room for the remainder of our stay despite our whole holiday being ruined and us being left traumatized by the utterly frightening incident of a large man entering at night when we were putting our little ones to bed.

Airbnb closed my case, and the host continues hosting. They promised through Twitter to contact me but didn’t. I am still so shaken up. Had he come an hour earlier, I would have been upstairs in the shower with the children closest to the stairs and my husband out. He was in such a mood he would not have turned away. My son still has the infection he acquired whilst there, so it was the worst holiday we have ever endured.

What do I do about these issues I still have? Airbnb is impossible to get an answer from. All I get at best is that someone will get back to me, but they never do. I want to do my bit to keep other travelers safe out there, particularly people with children.

Bad Airbnb Service for Family in Slovenia

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We are having a nightmare in a guest house located in Medvode, Ljubljana, Slovenia. The host provided only three rooms for nine people instead of our original request of four rooms under a charge of 1000 euro and insisted on charging an additional 200 euro for a fourth room. He immediately started to shout at us after we questioned his service. We tried our best to comply by paying for the extra fee to settle down, as there were old people and a small kid in our group and everyone was exhausted after a whole day’s travel.

The guest house is right beside a railway track two meters away and trains pass by every 30 minutes. There isn’t any security protection between the railway and the house. Inside the rooms, there isn’t any fire alarm and every room has a stinky smell mixed with some kind of cheap perfume.

We were really worried about the security issues and tried to contact Airbnb. There wasn’t any reply from them. We tried to find a customer service number to call directly but couldn’t find any. This is the worst traveling experience that we have had in Europe in the past 20 years. I would be very grateful if this feedback could reach Airbnb.

Stranded at Taipei Airbnb after no Contact

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I recently booked an Airbnb in Taipei. I advised the host in advance when I would be arriving. I asked how I would get the keys and was advised I would be greeted. I have learned the hard way that the address on a listing does not have to be the address of the Airbnb. I have also learned that a host is allowed to give instructions on how to locate the keys and if for any reason I can not understand the instructions or they do not work, the host does not have to assist me. Here is my story.

I proceeded to go to the address on the Airbnb listing and it was not a residential address. There was no one to greet me even though I was advised in advance there would be, so I called the contact number. The person who answered did not speak english so I found a stranger to call for me. The stranger advised me that the person who answered said they could not assist me.

I then messaged the phone number and received the following reply in English: “So are you coming tonight or tomorrow?” I told him I was here now. The host then sent me a list of outrageous instructions. I first had to view a video to find the mailbox, then go a few blocks to a mailbox, open the box, get another box, enter a code to open that box and take out a magnetic strip, walk a few more blocks to another location, use the magnetic strip to make the elevator work, then watch another video to get the code to open the unit. Well, I could not play the first video so I messaged the host that I could not play the video and he didn’t reply. There I was, stranded.

I was convinced this was a scam host because the address did not exist, there was no host to greet me, I could not communicate by phone, my final communication from the host asked what day I was arriving which I found frustrating as I had already communicated this, the instructions had a video that I could not play, and when I advised the host I could not view the video, he did not reply. Airbnb advised me I was at fault because I proceeded to cancel the reservation when in fact I should have called them first for their assistance.

Nightmare Airbnb Host and Even Worse Help from Airbnb

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After using Airbnb faithfully for almost a year now, I can tell you that I am never, ever going to be using them again. Airbnb has consistently shown itself to be incapable of not only conflict resolution but protecting its guests from possible threats to their safety. Airbnb claims that they are committed to “creating a safe and trusted community around the world” and yet in this case they have failed on both terms. From the start of my long term rental, I documented and recorded the miscommunication between the host and Airbnb.

When I arrived at the apartment the house was clearly left unclean. I documented the mess and asked for the apartment to be thoroughly cleaned before I moved in. In response, Airbnb refunded me for the one night which affected my stay. They claim that this part of the case has been closed and “resolved”.

However, the problems which affected me at the start of the rental have grown into a much deeper issue. The host began messaging me at all hours of the day and night telling me that she had not been paid and was pregnant and therefore needed the money ASAP. I contacted Airbnb to ask them what needed to be done and they told me that they would prevent the host from contacting me anymore and that they would let the host know that this was neither my fault or my problem.

Clearly, Airbnb did not do what they promised as the host continued to contact me saying things such as she “expected me” to do something about her lack of payment. I decided to not respond to the host anymore as I started to feel unsafe and thought the best way to de-escalate the situation would be to not answer anymore.

The situation culminated in me receiving a message from the host’s boyfriend saying that he was going to come over the following morning to talk to me. He gave me no information as to why he was coming over. Immediately I contacted Airbnb concerned for my safety as a single woman in a foreign country. Airbnb handed me over to a case manager who told me not to worry and that I would be able to rent another apartment for two days (paid for by Airbnb) and then receive a full refund on my previous reservation. The case manager also said to not respond to the host and to avoid future communication with them.

I was on the phone with Airbnb until 1:30 AM clearly scared for my safety. As a woman alone being told that a man you do not know is coming over to your home is frightening but as a young woman in a country where I do not speak the language and am considered a foreigner is even more so. However, Airbnb promised me that I would be safe. By contacting me after business hours is enough to be a harassment case, but with the knowledge that the host is angry that she has not been paid, it makes it even more so.

Following Airbnb instructions, I did not respond to the host. Airbnb has not told the boyfriend to not come over to the apartment because the following day I received two furious phone calls from the host. This not only violates the promise that Airbnb made to me that I would not be contacted by the host but it is also incredibly threatening. The host is angry that no one is at the door and that no one told her that no one would be. I asked her to please speak to Airbnb directly and to not contact me anymore.

A couple hours later the host messaged Airbnb saying that there was a problem with the elevator and that is the reason the boyfriend is coming over. However, as a young woman who is alone in a foreign country, when you are told with no context that a man is coming over to your apartment you begin to panic. I no longer felt safe in the apartment I rented so I made an executive decision to extend the stay of the second reservation until the end of my time in Budapest as I feared for my safety in the other apartment.

Airbnb dared to follow up and tell me that “in context” this is not a harassment case and that had I not extended the second reservation I should have gone back to the first apartment. This is appalling because no one, especially a young woman in a foreign country, should be told that she should go back to stay in a place where she no longer feels safe. Secondly, it does not matter whether or not there is context; in this case, I was being harassed and felt unsafe.

The story should end there. However, I received calls outside of business hours, late at night, was told a strange man was coming to the apartment, was told I was “expected” to fix a problem that was not mine over a form of communication that goes against Airbnb safety policies. This should have been enough for Airbnb to take my case seriously and yet it was not.

I have been thrown around from case manager to case manager, who each promised different things with little to no results. Because the host (obviously) did not agree to give me a refund I had to cancel the reservation on my own volition, meaning I get almost no refund. This is completely unacceptable as I am not choosing to walk out of the apartment because the bed is uncomfortable or the pillows are dirty; I fear for my safety and needed to leave.

Now, I am being told that I have to return to the apartment where I feel unsafe to return the keys further proving that Airbnb does not care about the safety of its clients. Now, two weeks away from this awful experience I wrote the host a bad review sticking with the facts completely; the house was dirty and not as pictured, the AC did not reach the bedroom and that the neighborhood was unsavory.

The host messaged me on Airbnb again saying that I should not be allowed to write a bad review because I am a difficult guest and “falsely accusing them”. To retaliate, the host wrote a review detailing private information on the case which clearly goes against Airbnb’s Content Policy: “Content that provides specific details or outcomes of an Airbnb investigation” is never allowed on Airbnb, and I am starting to be told that I owe the full amount to the host after I was told I only have to pay the first 28 days of my long term rental.

Airbnb claims that they cannot find the case manager who promised me a refund (so I won’t get it) and the review does not go against content policy because the case is closed. Then what does “outcomes of an Airbnb investigation” mean? Help. This situation is a living hell.

Airbnb Sends Link No One Can Use to Comment

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Airbnb sent me several emails asking me to post a review of an experience/tour we booked through them. I would have been happy to do that. This is the email I sent them, when I was finally able to get a hopefully workable email address:

I would have been happy to give feedback on this experience, but your completely dysfunctional system made that impossible. I received at least three emails from you asking me to post a review. Each time I tried to do that, I encountered the same impenetrable, multi-step barriers:

  • The first step asked to me to login to my Airbnb account; fine, I did that.
  • The next link asked me to click on an “I am not a robot” captcha; also fine.
  • This led me to a page where I could book a new reservation, but not a review, with the header: “Unable to perform action. Please try again later or contact support if you need immediate assistance.”
  • Unfortunately, contacting support requires logging in, and each time I attempted to do that, I was connected back to the same page: “Unable to perform action. Please try again later or contact support if you need immediate assistance.”
  • I tried to reply to the original email but of course it is a “no reply” email address.
  • I was only able to get the email address I am using now by going to a website aptly titled “Airbnb Hell.”

That allowed me to call a phone number in Northern California, where after 7 or 8 minutes on hold I was able to reach a customer service representative. She went around and around for several minutes attempting to verify the original reservation, which was done through another family member’s Airbnb account.

Please remember: you sent me the original email asking me to review the experience. If you cannot locate or track that, that is a failure of your system and should not be my responsibility. After several painfully futile minutes wasted on the phone, I asked the representative: can you give me an email where I can share my concerns with the company, yes or no? I had to ask directly at least four times before she gave me this email address. Next time I think we’ll use one of your competitors.

Airbnb Can’t Decide how to Verify Accounts

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I tried to log in to my Airbnb account of one year. Error: “There was a problem. Please try again.” I set up a new account with another email address: same error and no login possible.

I called customer service – the guy had no idea what to do. I told him my assumption was that I had too many similar accounts. I suggested a solution because he had none: deleting all older accounts and focusing on one. He did that whilst he was yawning loudly on the phone. I told him to please not fall asleep (I had still a sense of humour in the first hour of this Airbnb “session”). Later I tried the existing account and still got the same error: “Something went wrong. Please try again…”

I told the guy to also delete my last existing account and not to hang up because I set up a new account with a third email address while he was still on the phone, not to lose the person who knew the case when I would have to call again. After one hour, I could sign in.

The next and until now unsolved problem: verification. I took a photo of my passport, within that square thing on the screen. Next step: I saw half of my my face and the question: “Does this picture look good?”

No – it was only half my face. I tried three more times to take a picture of my passport where in the end I could answer with “Yes, I can see my full face.” Although it was really small, but maybe that’s a problem for later.

Next step: selfie for verifying my passport. I took a pictured and waited 15 minutes. I took another selfie, then another before calling customer service. The guy on the phone said I should use another ID, only he didn’t know how. Then he found out after reading an article about this problem: I should click on “submitting ID”, in the changing profile category.

I clicked on “submitting ID” and the system wanted me to upload a selfie to verify my ID. That was the problem from before. The guy said he would find out how to change the ID. He didn’t. I gave up, after three hours spending my holiday time in front of a screen.

Some hours later the same guy gave me a call and asked me if the problem had been resolved. He didn’t give me a solution – I don’t have one either. No verification, no reservation, no booking… there we are. I found a place to stay at the Airbnb I wanted to reserve via the old-fashioned way: talking to people in real life. I found the address via Google because the host had a public project. I told him about my Airbnb problems and we agreed on a cheaper price and to do it without Airbnb. Great!

Will I ever use Airbnb again? I don’t know, but the first thing I have to do is delete my existing account and set up a new one. Thanks to my own problem-solving competence which is obviously better than any of the people in customer service…

Stood up out in Arctic Sweden by Airbnb Host

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Airbnb advertised availability for two nights lodging on its website for Kiruna, Sweden for June 8-10. I booked the lodging. Airbnb collected the money. It did not deliver the product, the lodging.

Airbnb’s advertised host did not give me good directions to the site. It took me 60 minutes walking to find it. When I found it, Airbnb’s advertised host did not answer the door. He told Airbnb customer service later that he did not hear me. Yet he knew I had a reservation, and that I was coming, and had received my money.

I purchased the accommodations and paid for them through Airbnb’s website on May 22nd and relied on the Airbnb advertisement on its site that its Airbnb host would provide lodging. He did not. I communicated with the Airbnb host ahead of time, telling him my flight would arrive in Kiruna at 8:20 PM.

I arrived at his front door at 10:30 PM, after asking three different people how to get to his address, as his directions were vague. I knocked on his door twice, loudly. No one answered. As I did not have a phone usable in Sweden, I knocked on his next door neighbor’s door after Airbnb’s host did not answer.

His next door neighbors confirmed that he lived where I knocked. They would not, though, call him to let him know I had arrived. I returned to his house and knocked loudly a third time. No answer. Then I walked to a convenience store a half mile away. The clerk there called him at his advertised number and handed me the phone. There was no answer.

I was stranded in a foreign city I had never visited, knowing no one, without lodging, at 10:45 PM. This was traumatic. Kiruna is in the Arctic; it was cold there. I had only arrived in Sweden that day. This was to be my first night ever in Sweden.

I had to hire a taxi to take me to two different hotels before finding one with availability, and then also find a hotel for June 10th. I had almost no wifi on June 9th as I was traveling on Arctic trains which had very spotty wifi en route to my June 9th stay in a small northern Arctic mountain community with no wifi.

I contacted Airbnb on June 10th and canceled the second night I was to stay with its host, requesting a refund of my fees paid to Airbnb as I could not rely on its host to answer the door for my planned stay there, reimbursement for the replacement lodging I had to find, money for the taxi, and compensation for my inconvenience, worry, stress, and time dealing with the problem.

After writing Airbnb customer service, on June 21st Airbnb refunded me $21 cash. They have refused to refund me or pay for my expenses beyond that, other than to offer Airbnb coupons, which I do not want. On July 1st, I wrote Brian Chesky, Airbnb CEO, an overnight letter again requesting a refund. His office received my letter on July 2nd. On July 8th I called and left a message for Mr. Chesky with his staff; I also emailed him directly on July 10th. Neither he nor any of his Airbnb staff has responded to my July 1st letter in the past 18 days.

The problem caused me worry, stress, lack of sleep, sleep disruption, and inconvenience during the trip, with a loss of 5.5 hours of time in Sweden on my trip, and 7 hours spent trying to resolve this Airbnb problem after the trip, including emails, phone calls, the CEO letter, and complaints to the California A/G’s office and the Better Business Bureau. It should not take seven hours after a trip is done to resolve a lodging problem during the trip.

Airbnb’s competition is hotels. A hotel would have resolved this situation immediately. I have averaged five Airbnb lodgings per year for the past six years. This is how Airbnb treats its long-time customers. When you need help, they show their real interest (zero) in you and your problem. It is all about the money for them, and all about ignoring problems for them.

My research shows other Airbnb scams/fraudulent activity due to no-show Airbnb hosts. These other Airbnb hosts also stood up other people using Airbnb’s web site like me. These other victims of Airbnb no-show hosts, also making advance payment for lodging as required by Airbnb, were for lodgings in Barbados (2019), Portimao, Portugal (2018), Majorca (2018), and Florence, Italy (2017). In each of these other cases the scam/fraud victims similarly had trouble getting compensation from Airbnb.

This type of continued Airbnb scam/fraud is wrong. Their lack of resolution of this problem, especially for a long-time customer, is despicable and outrageous. It seems like a pattern of fraud/scams on Airbnb’s part, to improve their bottom line. I am willing to and prepared to take them to court if need be.

Moral of this saga: You often save some money with Airbnb vs. a hotel. But if there is a problem, and you booked with Airbnb, tough luck. You are often just plain out of luck. They do not care, unlike hotels. It apparently is Airbnb’s direction from the top, from the CEO on down. Once they have the money, they do not care about helping.

Stranded in Singapore After Customer Service Fiasco

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We made a reservation over three months ago after doing careful research and reading reviews about a listing for a property in Singapore for a family vacation. We only travel together once a year; it’s important that we get this right so we took our time to do our research and booked the $1600 stay.

A day before our departure we were contacted by the host that because of an air conditioning problem he would substitute a similar property. Yesterday we arrived and this property was completely unusable. It didn’t even have a sofa; it could not accommodate one person and the host was a bait and switch master. Apparently, in Singapore this is a standard game.

We called Airbnb immediately and asked that we be moved to another property and pleaded with them not to do their stunt where a refund takes ten days to get, isn’t usable, and leaves us stranded. This would not have been the first time this has happened.

I spoke to a case manager who assured me this would be easily and quickly expedited. While I was on the phone with someone the host came to the door of our unit, started pounding, and screaming and physically threatening us. We were on the phone with Airbnb when this happened. We were assured the new case manager that Airbnb would pay for this and that we would be safe and our family would not be at risk. This of course is on the recording of the call.

We started looking for an alternate setting when the host without our permission cancelled the booking and continued to be abusive. Getting a refund in Singapore on the day that you need a reservation is insane.

For the next 24 hours we did nothing but speak to various buffoons, imbeciles, morons, and idiots. We’ve been abused, we’ve been disrespected, and most recently they blocked us. I don’t know what their training model is; it appears to be subterfuge and confidence. They were supposed to issue coupons; they didn’t. They were supposed have some college education; they didn’t. They were supposed to deescalate the situation; they didn’t.

We are stranded in Singapore with nowhere to go and now no money and no coupon. I’m in executive director of a nonprofit and a CEO. I was a psychotherapist and I can tell you Airbnb is doing nothing but harm with their greed. No one should do business with this company and of course I never will again.

They have ruined our vacation that’s been planned for over a year with countless amounts of money spent and time with activities reserved in advance that will now fly out the door. They are so incredibly disrespectful. It really sickens me to talk to Airbnb especially the most recent times where they literally kept us on hold for two hours with nothing to add to the conversation. I feel they are purposely doing so. They didn’t seem to understand that there was a time difference between Singapore in San Francisco. How is it possible that people like this exist?

Hotel Rooms will always be Preferable to Airbnb

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I reserved an Airbnb a week in advance for a six-guest stay in an apartment. The host and I talked back and forth and she was very polite. We rolled up around 1:00 AM, drained after our 4.5-hour drive and just ready to get settled in and maybe hit a few bars to get our trip started.

We unlocked the door and walked in to see this very large man on the living room floor about ten feet away from the front door we opened. We all jump back, thinking: “Is this the wrong room? No, it can’t be because the code to unlock it is working.”

The guys went inside to find sections of the living room separated by sheets/curtains and three beds on the floor for us to sleep on. These beds were a curtain away from this random man on the floor. The guys went back in to take pics and videos of this place as proof to send to customer service for a refund. There were even two rooms in the back that had people in them.

I promptly cancelled our Airbnb and immediately called customer service. The customer service rep told me he had to contact the host to get her side of the story. They contacted the host who finally woke up and started freaking out, sending me crazy rude messages. At the point we were all just so done; we just needed somewhere to sleep.

After calling around and driving around until after 5:00 AM we finally found something to accommodate all six of us (thanks to the nice front desk lady at the Comfort Inn). The crazy host kept messaging me until 4:30 AM.

Now, looking at the reservation, it does say a shared room up to eight people. This was my first Airbnb experience to I thought shared meant shared with our guests (since there were six of us). However, we were never informed people would be there at the same time as us a sheet away – scary.

In the end, the host was just as rude to my customer service guy as she was to me which, isn’t going to help her. Hopefully, she is removed from Airbnb. She refused us a full refund but we called and filed a claim with Chase.

P.S: it looked nothing like the pictures. I’m attaching the photos from the website, the guy on the floor, our “room”, and screen shots of this crazy lady going off on me. The door auto locks so we didn’t leave anyone in any type of danger/harm. You can’t break and enter if you were given the gate and door code to get in.