I contracted a flat in London. I was not that thrilled that I had to get the keys at a nearby pub but I dealt with it. When I showed up at the pub – along with a friend who was not at all comfortable with renting from Airbnb in the first place – I was told: Guess what? The keys aren’t here! They usually are here all the time, but they are not here now! I then texted AND called the host. No response. We had plans arranged a few hours later, but that was a non-factor at this point. I went to the apartment building where the flat was located and began ringing each doorbell for each flat. One young man answered, and he was so kind – he managed to track down the host and the host’s girlfriend was able to get us into the flat. So just our first day was basically ruined, but what bothered me more was that there was never any contact from the host – no “sorry about that” or anything. Not surprisingly, I didn’t get a “request for review” for that visit so I didn’t give the host a bad review (since I wasn’t asked!). It’s all water under the bridge now – it happened in October 2015 – but I just had (if you can believe it) an even worse experience, so I now decided I should report this other terrible experience. My advice: ALWAYS bring a number where you can contact Airbnb with a problem. I had the host’s number only – and was later reprimanded for not contacting Airbnb itself (even though they make it as difficult as possible to find an actual phone number to reach them!)
