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Absolutely Insane Email Harassment from Airbnb Host

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Never have I been more wrong judging a book by it’s cover. Here’s the scoop: this past weekend, my friend and I were outside Philly for a Harry Potter festival. She was covering the festival for work (she’s a reporter) and I was there because… Harry Potter. We booked a room in a house with a private entrance and shared bathroom. Most of the reviews were positive, but one raised a few red flags, complaining of overwhelming animal urine smells and poor cleanliness. I chose to disregard this, thinking it could not be that bad. Was I ever wrong!

The room itself was fine, relatively clean with a comfortable bed, but the hallway and stairs smelled like the pound. The floor was covered in dust and dirt; this was not the best for two people with allergies and asthma. We were using our inhalers constantly. I had emailed the host the day before our stay to inform them that due to my work schedule, I would be late and the other member of our party would be arriving first. I asked a number of check in questions and others related to parking, the area, and transportation. I received no response, which was disappointing and a little frustrating.

When we settled into the room, we noticed the window was braced open with an odd screen. The host told my friend that they had just removed the AC unit; when we tried to close the window, we could not. The host had given us no contact information and was very explicit about not entering or disturbing the family rooms on the first floor, so we emailed again asking about the screen; there was no response. In addition, the room was not as described or depicted. It looked like the wall of shelves and the desk were covered with sheets and being used as storage. That night, we went out to interview the festival hosts and coordinators as well as attendees, had a quick beer, came home at midnight, and immediately went to bed.

In the morning, we saw that the door stopper for our room was not actually brown, but orange and so coated in animal hair and dirt that the color was virtually unrecognizable. We were disgusted, but just left for the festival and were out all day. We returned by 8:00 PM and decided to stay in, watching Netflix on a tablet and drinking two beer bottles each, which we immediately put in the trash can (this is an important detail). We were freezing all night, because we could not get the window closed and the single quilt on the bed was not warm enough; we had to sleep in layers of clothes. The next morning, we packed all of our items, made the bed, collected all garbage to put in the trash, and even wiped down all surfaces with lysol spray; we’re neat freaks and whenever we stay somewhere other than home, we like to leave no trace.

Our hosts posted the following review:

Rebecca was great to host. She left the room spotless. We would welcome her back any time. Cheers!

My review was polite. I did not want to bring up any of my major concerns on the public review in case it impacted their business. They seemed like a nice younger couple renting out rooms in their townhouse for some extra cash.

The room itself was exactly what we paid for/expected, with a surprisingly comfortable bed. The location was great, and our room was very neat. The only issue we had was with the condition of the hallway stairs we used to get to our room. They were a little grimy and as someone with chronic dust allergies, it was rough. Despite this, check in was easy and the room was just fine.

I also sent a private message telling them I had three main concerns I did not want to air publicly:

1. They had not responded to my message.

2. The dirt, grime, smell, and dust. I know older buildings get dusty but as someone with allergies/asthma, the hallway should have been a little cleaner.

3. The open window. We could not get it to close, they had never responded to an email, and we were really quite cold.

As someone who frequently uses Airbnb, I expected the usual response of thank you for your concerns, I’m sorry to hear that, we are fixing it, etc. Instead, we received this crazy email:

SUBJECT LINE: You never sent a message! You tried to burn our house down! You are a loud drunk! You left the window open while the heat was on! What is your problem?

“You are an idiot. I have absolutely no email from you. The last time I heard from you was the day you reserved the listing. Did you take the screen out of the window to close it? I was pretty upset that we were running the heat and you were so rude to leave the window open. We are very responsive. Didn’t you notice that when you tried to burn the house down with the curling iron, we immediately unplugged it and turned the light off? Thanks for leaving a room full of booze bottles and food and trash. The stairs and hallway were mopped. You guys drug in all of the dirt from outside. Way to bang the doors all night. It sounds like you need to work on some respect yourself!!!!!!”

Needless to say, I was shocked. I responded with the following:

Your response is shocking, unprofessional, immature, and absolutely not what I expect from someone offering hospitality. Please see below- it is a screenshot of the email sent to you on 10/20/2016- note the time stamp (here I inserted a screen shot of the emails sent) I will be forwarding this correspondence to Airbnb as well. We tried to close the window multiple times- seeing as neither of us owns this home or is familiar to the peculiarities of your windows, we didn’t dare presume to remove a screen. I can only assume based on your response we would have received another nasty email about removing it. For future reference, if the screen can be removed, please inform guests- good ones will not rip things out of your window without permission. The room was completely clear and we have pictures to prove it. As a precaution, I always take a picture of an Airbnb room when I leave. We made sure the (4) empty beer bottles and all trash were put in bags, which is again proven by picture. There was minimal cleaning for you- we made sure of it! I find it shocking that you would make such false accusations, but then again, you probably did not realize we actually protected ourselves. Regarding a “curling iron”- we did not bring one. Neither of us used a curling iron. Perhaps you had another guest who used it? If you find yourself unsure, please see all of the photographs from Friday and Saturday depicting us with straight hair. We drug in no dirt- I was hesitant regarding the cleanliness, as I had read a previous review that discussed the smell and dust. I was trying to be helpful, not attack you. I understand older houses get a lot of buildup, but I also have numerous snapchats of the hair, dust, and dirt in the hallway and stairs, as well as the horrific buildup on the door liner for our bedroom. Frankly, your response seems like one to come from a defensive teenager. I’m sorry you feel like you need to respond to an honest review with such vitriol, and I hope in the future you can take a minute and find a calm, rational place to respond to guests. I’ll end with best of luck, because based on your attitude, you need it.

P.S. Opening a professional correspondence in the hospitality industry with “You are an idiot” is perhaps a little unwise.

I know it was snotty, but frankly I was pissed. This was completely insane, and as someone with a lot of experience in the hospitality industry, I was horrified. I got no further response, and made a report on Airbnb. No one responded to me, so I made a second, more detailed report and called the number someone thankfully posted online. I was told my case was being sent to the correct department and offered a refund. I didn’t really want one. I just wanted this handled so this couple does not flip out on anyone else in response to an honest discussion of their filthy house. I was told I would receive an email, but got nothing. The next day I called again and am currently waiting for that response. My haunting concern is the comment we “left booze bottles all over”; we drank four 12-oz bottles of beer in the room, and all four went into the trash before we left. Either they went into the room when we were not home and looked through the trash after we left, or just tend to make up baseless accusations. I’m not sure which one terrifies me more.

Anyway, watch out for Sarah and Charles Adams in the West Mt. Airy part of Philadelphia. It turns out they could rival Donald Trump when it comes to shooting off ill advised, combative messages. Thanks for listening.

Airbnb Nightmare: Dead Bugs and Crazy Host

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All seemed fine until we arrived at our destination in Ocean City, NJ . The pictures showed this wonderful view of the ocean. They showed a pristine sitting area and kitchenette. Well, our first clues that this image might be different were the filthy walkways to the unit. The second clue: a dirty door. Then we opened the door and were stunned to find a carpet with so much filth it could not have been vacuumed. I went to the bedroom to turn on the light and the light fixture fell apart; the cord had been cut. Next, the cups in the cupboard had a brown goo on them. The stove had food crusted over and nothing short of filth. I contacted the host who responded “Well, I will get back to you.”

The next day I left for my morning walk, and grabbed the keys provided by the host from a lockbox. The key did not work, and she accused me of switching keys. When the host showed up at the door, I showed her the dead insects in the fridge and the filth on the carpets and table. She told me this is normal. Then told us to vacate the premises. We did, since she looked very unstable. We called Airbnb and they recommended for our safety we leave. This was at 1:00 in the afternoon. By 8:00 PM that night she posted a review that claims I damaged the wall and screamed at her. Then she said Airbnb recommended she ask us to leave. I did get a two-night refund but still had to pay a cleaning fee. Then Airbnb told me to contact the host about getting an additional refund for the cleaning.

Beware of using Airbnb; they obviously do not screen the hosts. I am attaching a few photos of what was in the fridge and on the stove. Yes, there were dead insects in the fridge.

I Lost $1500 After a Weird Airbnb Stay

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I booked a few weeks at an Airbnb in Frenchs Forest, Sydney. From the start the host was plain weird: she wanted me to text if I was going to be home later than 9:00 pm, she complained if I had more than one light on in a room, she said I couldn’t use my laptop in the lounge, and she played a gong and bells in the middle of the night, waking me up. Once she did this at midnight. She even smoked right next to the bedrooms even though she advertised the place as non-smoking. To top it off, she had a three-hour raging argument with her adult children one night. I left the next morning but, as I paid in advance, only received a refund for two nights from the 25 I booked. Airbnb even had the gall to say they were kindly not charging me two extra nights. I am short $1500. There’s no way for me to post a review so that others know about it. The host is a bit weird: a few days after my stay my credit card was tapped and the only person to have the details that were used on the fraud was her. I believe she got my card details from my room.

Airbnb Host Disguised as Guest Screams

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We organised a trip to Singapore to surprise a dear friend and booked an Airbnb for four people which apparently had 400 positive reviews. When we arrived, we were greeted by a friendly Filipino lady. She explained to us that there is another guest staying so we just need to keep our volume down (fair enough). The aircon was also leaking. Not long after, we heard loud noises of someone seemingly playing video games coming from the living room. We ignored that, though we were told to be respectful and keep our volume down.

While waiting for our last remaining friend to arrive, we were getting ready to head out. One of our friends then came over to the apartment to wait for us while we are getting ready. The person who was playing video games earlier started to go berserk after seeing our friend appearing in the apartment (we had booked for four but there were only three of us in the apartment at the time of our friend’s arrival). Although we tried to explain to her over and over that our friend is not staying overnight, but just here to wait for us to get ready and go out, she went ballistic and shouted: “Get out of my house! Get out now!”

We only found out she was the host after this whole incident (we always thought she was just another guest staying in the place). So the person who insisted she didn’t want any noise in her place was shouting at the top of her lungs. The nice Filipino lady was actually not the host (we suspected she was the housekeeper made to do business for her by the way the host talked to her). We didn’t want to leave before she refunded our money, but she went ahead and switched off all the electricity, wifi, and anything else that she could.  After that we were left with no place to go, in a foreign country, having to find other accommodations at 7:00 pm.

The next day we continued to receive threatening messages saying that we were disrespectful and she would pursue legal action if we posted anything online. What a wonderful first experience with Airbnb! The problem is, no one is allowed to leave any feedback before completing a stay. Very often the reviews would be skewed towards the positive. So people like us who got chased out for a small matter were unable to leave any feedback on Airbnb. Although the host cancelled our stay on the day we arrived, this was not shown on <a href=”https://www.airbnb.com.sg/rooms/3775738″>her page</a>.

Airbnb’s Model is Designed for Scammers

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We booked and confirmed a two bedroom apartment in midtown Vancouver four months in advance. Everything seemed fine except the host told us she did not have “front desk” privileges and access would be via the side entrance. The host’s name was Ashleigh P. A few weeks before leaving for Vancouver, I noticed her listing had disappeared from Airbnb. I messaged her and she said she had to take it down because she was getting too many requests. She replied using the name Nicole P. One week before leaving for Vancouver I contacted Airbnb to discuss my rising doubts. I was told there was no need to worry. They were confident everything was above board. Why were they so dismissive?

Five days before arriving I got a message reminding me she had no “contract” with the management at her condo for concierge services so she would meet me personally to let me in and show me around. At 8:30 AM on the morning of the booking I was boarding a plane to fly to Vancouver and I got a text saying to meet her at a different address in Vancouver. I called Nicole/Ashleigh and she told me she could not provide the apartment to which she agreed as her access pass had been blocked but she moved us to a one bedroom in a different area of town. She was not prepared to explain or “argue with you about this.” The booking had been changed and she had no obligation to do more.

What transpired was that she had been subletting an apartment illegally in a building and the owner/building management found out and blocked her access. She had been doing it successfully for some time and had good reviews but now had been caught and barred. Obviously, the assurance she had given Airbnb was false. When I raised this with Airbnb they said: “We have hundreds of thousands of hosts. We can’t verify all their claims.” Airbnb cancelled the booking and helped us find another that we had to accept with just four hours’ notice. It was a long bus ride out of town and the unit was on a very busy highway. Our holiday was completely ruined.

What is my complaint? Airbnb said Nicole told them she had a last minute hiccup and they accepted her excuse. They agreed it was unacceptable but they had absolutely no plan to do anything other than help me find an alternative accommodation; after all, she was a successful host (i.e. she made big money for Airbnb). I was told this really did not happen often and I was unlucky. I was told four times that Airbnb took great care to look after their customers and that my experience was unusual. The bottom line is that Airbnb will keep Nicole/Ashleigh. She is a valuable source of income to them. They understand what has happened but if she tells them she is okay to offer an apartment then they will take her word for it. Airbnb’s model is set up to facilitate scamming and they know that, believing they can “manage” victims when they inevitably emerge. It’s a “let the buyer beware” portal. So beware.

Crazy Host POUNDS on the Door for a Simple Message

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Airbnb sent me a review reminder stating clearly that I had through September 9th to post it; I tried to do so and the website wouldn’t let me post a review. When I spoke to customer service on the phone the agent said that there is absolutely nothing they can do to help: the company’s program code is the code; this is just the way it is and there’s nothing anyone can do to change anything in it (and it was more than clear none of them care to, no matter what problems it results in). The email reminder I received gave the wrong information, since in reality, customers only have 14 days on the clock to submit reviews, starting from some nebulous time of day that was never made clear to me throughout the entire 24-minute conversation. In short, their website actually shut off the possibility to post my review sometime part way through the 9th. When I said that sending emails with dated statements like the one I got is plain misleading, the agent repeatedly weaseled out of agreeing and kept either referring to the company’s terms of service – which according to him mean we agreed to everything and anything the company does – or saying the meaningless phrase “I respect your opinion” and nothing else, in an annoyed tone that made it more than clear that he absolutely does not.

There isn’t even any option to file complaints at this company; they only “take suggestions.” You can probably guess how likely I think it is that they ever do anything about any of these suggestions. In short, sometime back in the dark ages they had programmers do the original code on their website, and ever since then everything is set in stone. They just don’t feel like paying anyone to do any additional work to fix anything, and never will.

Why do I want to post this review so much? I had a hellish experience that ruined nearly my entire vacation, and I wanted to warn other users from suffering the same fate. It was so bad that I needed a lengthy mental break after this so-called vacation and didn’t feel emotionally ready to compose my review and go over the whole traumatic experience again until the last day – what should have been the last day I could post it where it rightfully belongs, on that host’s listing.

Below is the original review I was going to post with a 1-star rating. However, I’d like to add something here I didn’t write in the original review because it seemed almost too crazy to be believable, given that this host (somehow) has a very high rating on Airbnb. About a day before I was scheduled to leave the place, the host came up and suddenly started pounding on the suite’s door, shaking the wall so strongly that I thought she must have been using a bat or a brick. As I was in the bathroom at the time, I was unable to come to the door for 4-5 minutes. She kept pounding on the door nonstop the entire time, so violently I was certain she was going to break it down; it seemed she really intended to do so. The noise and duration of it, even through my earplugs, was sheerly unbelievable. The experience for me was like unexpectedly finding myself in a scene from a movie when police are trying to break down a reinforced door. Just about the last thing you want or expect to experience on any vacation. I thought for certain there must, surely, be some terrible emergency going on to justify her doing something so unprofessional and frightening to a paying guest.

When I answered the door (as soon as I humanly could and wearing only a towel), I was first shocked that the woman turned out to not be holding some sort of blunt object with which she’d been performing that violent pounding, and secondly that her hands were not bleeding from it. I asked her if there was some kind of emergency. She said “no,” with an oddly matter-of-fact tone and facial expression of the kind you’d expect to get from a neighbor who’s politely asking to borrow a cup of sugar after having daintily and briefly knocked on your front door – as if what she just did was absolutely normal and she does it all the time. She claimed she was only “concerned” that I hadn’t answered her numerous calls, texts and emails. She didn’t apologize for the insane pounding or seem to realize that she’d just done anything odd.

It became clear during the following conversation that this entire scary episode was only because she wanted to know exactly when I was leaving; she wanted me to clear out as early as possible the next day so she could have time to bring in cleaners before the next guest showed up. She told me that the check out time was 11:00 and I should leave by then, even though her listing clearly states that it’s 12:00. Apparently it was my problem that she had back-to-back guests and scheduling difficulties. The weirdness and unprofessionalism was plain astonishing given the very large number of years she’d been renting out the place, and just how much money I’d paid for this rental in a private residence. She sent a terribly phony sounding apology a full two days after the incident (half blaming me for not answering her mountain of calls and messages on my vacation), clearly because she was wary of a very justifiable negative review or even a complaint to the website.

This incident was just the icing on top of an entire cake of unpleasant things that filled my stay at this place. The original review:

Well, it is a beautiful house, and it is actually within close walking distance of Middlebury town center, the university, etc. (unlike many other Airbnb offers in the area that claim to be close and turn out to be miles away.) & the 2-room suite looks nice. The bathroom also looks nice but certainly not close to hotel standards, as some of the plumbing is noticeably old: the toilet has to be flushed multiple times. Shampoo, conditioner & bodywash are provided, but the towels are the most harshly starched, wooden pieces of fabric I’ve ever touched anywhere – bringing your own is a must. More significantly, if you’re looking for a restful vacation, you’re highly unlikely to get it staying here: – The bedroom has no blackout curtains like in hotels and the windows face east: in summer that means you get to wake up around 5:30 am and be tired all day, every day. – The house is on a heavily used road and traffic starts up early: heavy, noisy trucks and the like drive by all day. – There are frequent emergency sirens heard as well – surprise: the place is near a police station. – There’s a very active business running in this house: employees and customers are in and out all day during the week, including on the 2nd floor right next to the guest suite; the acoustics and creaky wood floors of the house mean that you get to hear non-stop noise anytime you’re there morning to evening.

After I left I discovered a small mountain of emails, calls and texts – some sent before 6:00 AM; I’m glad I had my cell silenced – that the host sent me during the last two days of my stay, most of them desperately wanting to know when exactly I was leaving (apparently they’re not even aware of their own listed check-out time). I didn’t see these at the time as I don’t check my phone or email while I’m on vacation – being as it is, in fact, vacation. But you can judge for yourself how pleasant that kind of thing will be when you’re meant to be resting and relaxing on your rare time off. I would have thought that a note under the door would have sufficed for any urgent communication – like they do in hotels – and been more sensible and professional.

Crazy Airbnb Host in Bologna Keeps Calling

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Recently my boyfriend and I stayed in an apartment in Bologna, Italy. We had a rather unfortunate start with poor communication from the host about arrival times and confusion about who would be greeting us, leaving us stranded outside the apartment block for over an hour in 34-degree Italian heat with no water, no access to a toilet, and no contact from our host in response to our phone calls and messages. The stay itself was relatively good once housekeeping had let us into the property, though we had some slight issues with the area around the apartment being quite dodgy; this left me in particular feeling quite unsafe.

We returned home yesterday and I wrote a review about my experience. This afternoon my boyfriend received a missed call from our host. Confused by this, I emailed the host asking why he had been calling my boyfriend from Italy. At around 10:00 PM English time I received a barrage of messages from my host, whereby he advised he was calling to “thank us” for the bad review and continued to shout at me about my review, how he felt it was not accurate. When I tried to explain I felt I wrote a fair assessment of the situation that happened he then called me a “ugly little princess” and told me to “stay away from my balls.” He stated that I was not attractive to him and never will be and he has better things to do with his time than talk to me… when he took the initiative and went to the effort of contacting me from the start.

I have since had to contact Airbnb to ask them to intervene as the correspondence is becoming prolonged and making me feel uncomfortable. They say they will investigate. However, I don’t have high hopes after a brief dalliance with their customer service department while staying in a moldy apartment in Tokyo; at that time, they essentially told me that the host had such amazing reviews they felt my opinion went against this and they didn’t personally agree. Even though I had photographic proof of the endless black hairs in the bed and the mold in the bathroom.

Unstable Host and Airbnb Turned my Vacation into Hell

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My first and last experience with Airbnb pointed out a fundamental flaw in their business model: hotel, motel and even most B&B operators are professionals; Airbnb hosts are amateurs. Because of that, they may not understand they are in the hospitality business, and Airbnb guests can be the unfortunate guinea pigs. As soon as our family arrived at our condo, our host came around and seemed to be spying on us. That evening she chased down a group of us out for a stroll; she asked them how many were staying at the condo told them she suspected more were staying there than she permitted. Later that night she pounded on the door and loudly proclaimed the same accusation. We explained that we had only six staying there (the two-bedroom unit was advertised to sleep six) and two people visiting who were staying elsewhere. She demanded we leave. When we refused, she picked up her phone and dialed 911, claiming she was the victim of assault! When asked if she had been physically assaulted, she replied “no, but I have been verbally assaulted.” When that apparently didn’t impress the operator, she claimed she had “nine drunk tenants and I want them out.”

We told her if she wanted in the unit she would need a warrant. Eventually the police arrived, and she demanded through texting that we come out and meet with the officer. When we didn’t respond, she called Airbnb. To my shock, Airbnb texted me that they had a serious complaint against me and that they had cancelled the reservation and ruled that a refund was not permitted! The next morning, this obviously emotionally unstable host opened the front door and pounded on the wall, shouting: “Your reservation has been cancelled and you need to leave!” We knew she had no legal right to evict us, so we stayed; however, the stress ruined our vacation. And the fact that Airbnb supported her madness only added to the nightmare. Beware of Airbnb… you will be subject to the whims of your host and the company will not have your back!

Airbnb Theft: Montreal Penthouse Hell

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Guests beware: you are not protected by Airbnb if your host enters unannounced and without consent. I had the left the residence for a few hours only to return to find out the host had entered the property while we were away and had gone through our belongings and left a visibly noticeable mess. My first reaction was to take photos of everything, email Airbnb and then text our host to notify him of what we had occurred. The reaction from our host was blasé; he had forgotten some of his belongings and was in a hurry so he came back to his apartment to find them. After confronting him about why this was unacceptable, he tried to justify his actions by telling us that he also came home to give us quilts…. the weather for that scorching July summer day was 33 degrees Celsius without considering the humidity and the lack of any central air conditioning.

We were robbed of our money and a few pairs of ladies underwear according to my female friend. What did Airbnb do? Nothing! I consider myself to be fairly progressive with my use of user driven business applications such as Uber, eBay, and Stubhub, and for the most part have had extremely positive experiences. However, in the rare case when I, the consumer, have needed assistance to protect my well being, they have always been incredibly responsive and empathetic to my customer experience. I have yet to hear from Airbnb, and its been three weeks and counting.

Airbnb Hell-sinki Apartment Nightmare

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In early June 2016 we chose a apartment in Helsinki for three months and I decided to rent in the Hagaa Area (pictured). Normally, this would come to €130 but because it was a long term arrangement the host offered a discount of €100 and told me she couldn’t make this deal through Airbnb; I should pay cash at arrival. Usually apartments in this area rent at about €1,000 a month: they’re very old and under renovation. Some people even block the entrance; my kids had to leave by the emergency exit, which was surrounded by dangerous equipment and tools.

Anyway, I had to pay €3000 a month plus a €70 cleaning fee. When we arrived, the host told us the renovation had been finished and they would clean up the stairs soon. However, the next day we realized the real situation and complained. The host told us she didn’t know anything about it but cut off the electricity and water for many days following our arrival. When we checked out, she sent us a list of damages and quoted us €1,200 for a small kitchen table and €240 for a cleaning service… I had thoroughly cleaned the apartment before we left. Now she’s threatening to report us to the police and slandering us by saying that I committed a crime by damaging the kitchen table. Be careful from whom you choose to rent. You never know what will happen to you.