Airbnb: Worst Customer Service In The World

Posted on January 9, 2017

I was a host with Airbnb and for whatever reason they disabled my account with no explanation. I tried contacting them over 100 times, and all I got was a runaround and no explanation as to why they took the actions they did. Airbnb is making billions of dollars right now so I guess they feel like they can treat all their guests and hosts like pieces of trash off the street. I want to do everything in my power to try to shut them down, or alter their income in any way I can. They have the worst customer service I have ever experienced in my life, I don’t understand how a company making billions of dollars can’t spend a few extra dollars on their customer service to accommodate their guests and hosts. I only found this site out of the frustration I was going through after going through Airbnb customer service hell. I knew there had to be a platform like this, as I thought I could not be the only one going through this experience. It is only a matter of time before a real competitor steps up to the plate, busts Airbnb’s bubble, and they float back down to earth and realize what they are doing is not right.

All of you that have been through the Airbnb nightmare: we have to unite and somehow stick it to them. After all, they do say there is power in numbers. I love hosting and I will not let Airbnb dictate what I can and cannot do, with no good reason or explanation as to why they terminated me. The best thing we can do as frustrated and pissed off guests and hosts is to bring the business to their competitors; I see that being the only way to stick it to them, and hit them where it hurts in their pocket books. Please, everyone that reads this post should check out Homestay, FlipKey, Tripadvisor or Homestayin. Out of all these sites I find Homestay to be the best alternative to Airbnb; they are still upcoming and not that well known, but the more exposure they get and as the word gets out they will be just as big as Airbnb, minus the horrible customer service and lack of appreciation for their hosts and guests. Please everyone who has gone through the nightmare with this overpaid unappreciative company: please do your part and spread the word about their competitors.

Airbnb Built on Institutionalized Fraud

Posted on January 9, 2017

Airbnb takes the full payment amount from guests when bookings are made. Then they keep the money for however many days, weeks, or months before the guests actually arrive and are supposed to pay the host as follows: “Airbnb releases your payout about 24 hours after your guest’s scheduled check-in.” What actually happens is that Airbnb sends an email to the host at the point when they should pay and suggests that the bank will take time to pay. This is a total lie. In New Zealand, payments are processed very quickly. The banks may sit on interbank payments for up to one day and do not process interbank payments on weekends and public holidays, but they do not just sit on the money for days as Airbnb suggests. What is actually going on is that Airbnb sits on millions of dollars of guests’ and hosts’ money for days. Meanwhile the guest has checked out and often even left the country before the host is paid. This is just another way that Airbnb is screwing the market. Remember, Airbnb does not have any property. In fact, they have nothing except an APP which causes frustration in communications, so they can keep the guests and hosts at arm’s length until they have got their money. I would strongly suggest that guests instead find a property outside of Airbnb, especially if it is a hotel or guest house and they can check the price directly. When there is no commission to Airbnb, hosts can often offer a better price. If you pay money out to a host who owns a hotel or guest house that has been in business for some time, you at least know where they are; they have a physical location. Whereas you struggle to even get Airbnb on the phone in some random foreign country. Best wishes from a host still waiting to get paid.

Airbnb Nightmare Before and After Christmas

Posted on December 30, 2016

I didn’t want to repeat my entire nightmare, but I do not wish this drama upon anyone. This was the nightmare before and after Christmas. We feel very upset about all the effort we have made to try and accommodate this family. So here is the letter I have written to them instead of an entire story.

I hope you are having a wonderful day. From the beginning you have made it very difficult for us, firstly by arriving earlier than the time you said you would. When we tried to reach you to confirm what time you would be arriving, we were unable to get a hold of you and then you arrived two hours earlier. You left your bags outside for my friend and I to carry inside even after we told you it would rain. We have driven four hours both ways in traffic to come and remove a field mouse from the house over Christmas and our only holidays. As we have stated before, we do live in the Kogelberg Biosphere, a very sensitive and fragile environment. We do have animals passing through our property, including three-striped field mice, baboons, leopards, mongooses, and many species of birds. This has always been something our guests have loved about our home. For you to have put poison down disturbs this natural habitat (and risks killing our endangered owls). When traveling to Africa, things like this happen. These animals’ behavior are beyond our control. This is why people choose to live in my home – to be closer to nature. We do not have vermin in our home as you have suggested. We have a little field mouse that frequents the house.

This is our second time hosting with Airbnb and we were not prepared for these circumstances: namely, your son’s musophobia. You have insulted our home, and accused us of having vermin. You have ruined our Christmas with your complaining and making us drive back. Each time we have driven back to the house, you told us repeatedly that you are happy in our home and all we need to do is remove the mouse (which we still haven’t seen). You have caused us to damage our own property in search of an invisible “mouse nest”. We have cracked a hole in to my cupboard to show you that there is nothing there. We have offered as much help and assistance as possible and each time you have told us everything is fine.

We are very upset that two days before you have to leave, you now suggest that we must refund you or give you a discount. When we asked whether you were satisfied you answered “yes”. Had you brought this to our attention earlier we may have been able to come to another arrangement. However, we are very close to the end. You have stayed over peak season in our home, we have gave up our Christmas to come, help you, make sure everything is okay, and spend a lot of our time and money in doing so. We are not talking about a dirty rat, vermin, or a plague. We are talking about a little field mouse that has never before caused any problems or made himself visible when we or other guests have stayed in our home. We are happy for you to contact Airbnb as we will be doing the same. We do not wish for anyone else to endure what we have over their holidays or festive season. Unfortunately, we cannot poison the animals that live in the garden as we are at the foot of a nature reserve and with this come animals that may come into the house by accident. I have suggested that if you are so unhappy, we can collect the key. You have chosen to stay on.

Guests Refuse to Use our Plates, Cup and Cutlery

Posted on December 29, 2016

We have been hosting with Airbnb for two years now and have had over 400 guests (we live near an airport in the UK) from 30 different countries. There have been mostly very good experiences but obviously with over 400 guests you do meet a few weirdos. This one booking was for six weeks for a guy living in Australia coming to the UK for a training course. He was an aircraft engineer and very nice guy in general. However, I noticed from the first day that he seemed to have an issue with using the cutlery, cup, and spoon provided in his room and was downstairs in the kitchen, i.e. washing the items then cleaning them quite thoroughly. I thought this was very strange as we make sure everything is spotlessly clean. A couple of days in and he was asking for more toilet rolls to be put in the bathroom as he was going through at least one a day. It seemed like he had a cleaning fetish of some kind or a compulsive cleaning disorder.

Anyway, we had to go to our property abroad for a month and left him alone in the house (our part of the house we can keep locked so he only had access to the kitchen, bathroom, and garden). On our return he was due to leave in a few days but on the last day asked me if I wanted to keep the cutlery, plate, bowl, and mug that he had purchased new because he did not need to take them back to Australia. He obviously did not want to use our items and we found this to be incredibly rude, to say the least.

Another time we had a young girl arrive for three weeks with a large suitcase and a big box full of cooking pots and herbs, spices, and food. This girl was cooking Indian food twice and sometimes three times a day because she didn’t want to eat food from the supermarket. The house stunk of Indian food for the whole three weeks and I was having to apologise to our other guests (as we rent two rooms in our home) every day due to the smell. Lastly, we had a girl stay for a couple of weeks and she had to be told to stop using the kitchen at midnight. She was always cooking (like a frying pan full of eight chicken legs) late at night and the smell would move throughout the house, even into the bedrooms. Since the last guest, we added “no cooking after 8:00 PM” to the house rules.

What has happened to Airbnb? Why are guests so bad?

Posted on December 29, 2016

I’ve been hosting for three years. The last guest turned up at my house drunk, took his shoes off to release a cheesy foot odor that I could taste but still declined a shower and drank another bottle of wine while I sat with him. Then within one hour after I went out, he broke my ceramic toilet lid, left his light on, went out, and wouldn’t respond to calls. Unfortunately, I have to say, though this person was a little extreme, most guests lately are just rude and horrible. Is it because Airbnb encourages through their advertising that people ‘make themselves at home’ at another person’s house (read, hog the bathroom and splash water everywhere, sit around in the open-plan kitchen all day, help themselves to condiments from the cupboard, get packages delivered that hosts have to pick up because it’s their address, get drunk in their room, slam doors while people are sleeping, etc)? What is the solution? My house rules are comprehensive. Should Airbnb politely ask guests to mind their manners while they are in another person’s home?

Airbnb Cancelled My Account and All Bookings

Posted on December 28, 2016

I was a superhost. My listing was always booked which means I was making Airbnb the 18% commission they get from each booking. My reviews were amazing, averaging to 4.7 Stars. My location prevented getting 5 stars. I am 6 miles from the local attractions and most found that 6 miles was worth not giving 5 stars, but that’s okay. Many of my guests just raved about how I was the best Airbnb experience they ever had. I was listed with instant book, meaning that I welcomed anyone into my home that booked. I never cancelled the first guest. My criminal background is clean as a whistle and I never did anything that would go against Airbnb’s Terms of Service. Hurricane Matthew came around and I had many guests cancel. That was all good. Of course this applied as extenuating circumstances and guests received full refunds. The Hurricane was on a Friday. On Monday I checked my inbox and saw nothing but cancellations. I was panicked, scared, and in disbelief. So because I was a superhost I had a direct phone number for Airbnb that got priority service. I was panicked but I knew that Airbnb would help me fix this right away as I figured it was just a glitch in their system. The customer service representative who answered the phone was also shocked, said that they would escalate it, and a manager would call me in a few hours.

So I waited. The call never came so I called back in four hours. I was then told that I do not exist in the Airbnb system and they could not find my account. However, I was told not to worry; they would take care of this and a manager would call me back. We played this phone tag game for three days. Finally I received an email from Airbnb and told me I had been dismissed from Airbnb and this decision was irreversible. I was told that no further support would be available for me and that they were under no legal obligation to provide a reason. They cancelled my account.

I was devastated. I was in love with hosting. It was the best experience of my life. I never received any bad guests or reviews. I had one guest whose father in law passed away a few hours before boarding a flight to come and spend the weekend with me. Needless to say, calling Airbnb to cancel was not her highest priority. I offered her a full refund and she refused. So I told her when she is ready to rebook, the trip would already be paid when she arrived. I advised I would just credit her the money towards a future booking. The greatest sadness I felt through all of this was that I could not honor that lady’s booking. I do not have her contact information as all of that was removed when Airbnb cancelled my account without warning or explanation. One guest cancelled six hours before his arrival time and Airbnb gave him a full refund and a $100 credit to stay elsewhere. I feel abandoned and just saddened by the loss of hosting and all that the Airbnb community stood for. Despite all the horror stories you may read I was in love with the program. I still do not have anything negative to say about the company other than the way they cancelled the guests with no explanations and no warnings. I live in a major city so the chances of finding last minute accommodations are slim to none.

Airbnb Refuses to Pay, Still Wants me to Host

Posted on December 21, 2016

I am new to vacation rentals. I signed up for Airbnb and VRBO in October but then had to suspend bookings as we were completing renovations; I needed time to get my affairs in order with them. When I signed up for VRBO I was instantly helped and hooked up. Ever since then my problems were resolved immediately when I called. When I tried to sign up for Airbnb I first realized that my personal travel account had been hacked. It took three weeks of horrible calls and emails to get it fixed. Once it was resolved, I built my host site and begin taking bookings. The response from travelers was very quick and efficient. After about four weeks of taking bookings I realized that I had over $3000 on my payout screen so I begin setting up a payout method. That’s when it really begin to hit the skids. When I first reported my issue, they said it would take a couple days and they would resolve it. That was three weeks ago. After eight phone calls and emails, two computers, four browsers, 50+ attempts to add a payment method, and three different payout methods attempted, there has been no resolution and they are now up to $5700 in payouts. I am proactively telling my guests that we might have to cancel because I feel like it will be at a liability to me if I proceed with their bookings. It really has been a horrible experience.

Guest from Hell’s Complaints Neverending

Posted on December 17, 2016

I accepted an instant book for six nights starting in a few days time. I have hosted on Airbnb for nearly two years with great reviews (even from other hosts). My mobile home is based in Florida and is offered for sole use. Recently a guest brought in some bugs not native to the US and we had the unit treated several time to kill them. The guest that arrived started complaining the moment they walked in the door: “It’s dirty, the locks didn’t work, there were hairs on the sheets, the light bulbs weren’t working, the sink was blocked.” The list went on and on. However, as soon as we “corrected” an issue, even if there wasn’t one, suddenly there was another. We then got an email from Airbnb saying the guest wanted a refund! That’s when the resolution center came into the picture. I requested the guest leave, with Airbnb’s permission (she said). It took two days to get her out. I still have not been paid and now I have to deal with a case manager who has no supervisor to whom I can speak. I am so disappointed that Airbnb is so bad at customer service. I am thinking of cancelling all future bookings, telling the guests why, and getting them to contact Airbnb.

Stupid Policies Keep Payment from Hosts

Posted on December 16, 2016

I am a host with Airbnb. I set up an account as a host, but I forgot to set up a payment method. I did not have a guest until November 30th, a 60-day stay. They told me that I would be paid a day after the guest arrived. When I did not receive payment I called Airbnb and they said I didn’t have a payment method select. I was instructed to go into my account and set one up. I logged in but forgot my password since I rarely used it. I was talking to an Airbnb agent who walked me through the procedure of resetting my password. I logged in only to find that I was blocked from my account. I could not go into my settings to set up a payment method. I called over seven times; all the agents were apologetic but they said this was out of their control. A case manager had to deal with me. It has now been over two weeks. I am still blocked, they still have my money, and my guest is still at my house. The policy of blocking someone out of his account without just cause is outrageous. All companies – credit cards, etc. – call, text, or email if they suspect fraud. They verify charges with the customer before cancelling their card. Airbnb does not. To wait more than two weeks and counting is unheard of. To hold back a payment is unlawful. Airbnb should change their policies or a new player in the rental business should take over. I posted a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and found out Airbnb has a 92% negative rating.

Airbnb Laundered Over $100K into Unauthorized Account

Posted on December 16, 2016

We are a corporate housing provider. One of our employees opened up personal Paypal accounts under their own name and Airbnb deposited over $100,000 into these accounts. It has been two weeks, several phone calls, and follow-up emails with still no response. We will have to engage a lawyer as Airbnb has shown no initiative towards a resolution in recouping our funds. If anyone else has experienced such fraud, and negligence on Airbnb’s part there should be a class action suit.

I have discovered a person who was working for me opened an account under his name with Bank of America and Airbnb through utter negligence was sending my payments for my company into this person’s account through Paypal. The result of this egregious negligence on Airbnb’s part is that over one hundred thousand dollars of my money went to someone else’s account. There was grand theft committed against me and my business solely due to lack of any security by Airbnb. In the past few months I called Airbnb multiple times and asked if there were using any other account for my company except the two authorized accounts I have. Each time the Airbnb representatives assured me that there were no other accounts being used except these two. I continued digging into all my Airbnb transactions and bookings as I was going over all of our company bookings and many tenant payment methods were missing. I thought it somehow linked back to Airbnb, yet they continued to have no answers.

Finally, on November 30th, I called Airbnb yet again and I asked them to go over every single payment they have paid me. When we got to the last few payments they weren’t in either of my accounts and the representative couldn’t tell me into which account they were deposited. After putting me on hold to research this, the representative came back to me and said that the payments went to a Paypal account. Not only did they never realize this in all my past conversations with them, they also – to my shock – had no information on this Paypal account and they asked me to call Paypal for more information. After I called Paypal I found out that multiple accounts had been opened and closed through my company, using someone else’s name since 2014, with Airbnb being the sole source of deposits. This was shocking news, again leading to what I have found to be well over $100,000 in theft.