Tag Archives: airbnb service fees

Avoid Airbnb in Bath That Refuses Refunds

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In January we booked an Airbnb in Bath for two nights. The venue was booked so our family and friends could celebrate an uncle’s 70th birthday. We paid £1,960.85 including an exorbitant service fee of £262.85 (for what we have no idea).

Due to circumstances beyond our control — i.e. COVID-19 — we had to cancel the booking and did so in May. The guest of honour who lives in Ireland was not able to fly to England for the party due to flight restrictions caused by the virus. Consequently, we cancelled when we did in order not to lose the full amount. Had the coronavirus not happened, our party would have carried on with the booking as planned.

We received a refund of only £849.00 from Airbnb (50% minus the service charge). Our party of ten had hoped under these unusual circumstances, the host would have given us a full refund. The owners did say that if their B&B was rented during the weekend we booked, then a refund would be issued. No surprise that this did not happen so we didn’t receive the other 50%.

Losing this amount of money through no fault of our own was devastating for our financial situation which, because of the lockdown, is precarious at best. We appealed twice to the owner’s sense of fairness and compassion by asking them to send the other 50% refund (£849) realising that the hefty service fee Airbnb charges is likely beyond their control. This did not happen nor did we ever hear from them. Consequently, they have £849 of our money for doing absolutely nothing at a time they couldn’t have rented their place anyway.

We also appealed to Airbnb but they were useless in resolving this issue. This Airbnb in Bath did not act in good faith and if you are looking to book this venue in the future, buyer beware – the owners have no scruples and will take your money and run if given the opportunity. Our advice is not to book this place now or ever.

Host Cancels and I Lose the Service Fee?

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Here is my letter to Airbnb after a recent trip to Croatia. I sent this a week ago and haven’t had any response yet. The host  has three listings in Split.

Please go back and read the email chain between myself and this host. Also, read the emails that went between myself and Airbnb. Check the times and dates on them. I booked this listing on the morning of July 12th. The host accepted my request and took my money for the booking, including all fees.

My wife and I then got in the car and drove from Trieste, Italy all the way down to Split, where we expected to check in. After paying $40 in tolls, a tank of gas, and the 4+ hours of driving, I received a message from this host claiming, “Thank you but I am so sorry, booking and Airbnb something mix. We are not free today”. But she had already taken my money.

So, there we were, room cancelled from right under us, after all this driving. This was when I started my communication with Airbnb. After a few messages between Airbnb and this host, my money was refunded… minus the Airbnb service fee. That was about $40. WTF is that?

Over the next few days, I sent several emails to Airbnb asking for my service fee back. When Airbnb did reply, they told me that “service fees are not refundable”. I heard this in all replies from Airbnb after explaining what had happened.

For an operation as big as Airbnb, this is truly a scam. Seriously, read the messages from this host. They cancelled the booking, not me. How can Airbnb think that they can take my money, when I didn’t cancel the booking? And even worse, every response from Airbnb simply restated that service fees are non-refundable. Either you didn’t understand that the host cancelled, or you are just a scam of a business.

After reading up on Airbnb hosts, I have been led to believe that this is a common scam that some Airbnb hosts pull: list the property on several different booking sites and accept bookings for that day only to cancel all of them except the highest one. Why wouldn’t the hosts do this if they don’t have to reimburse the service fees? Yet, Airbnb feels that they are entitled to keeping the service fee from the person who books? Dirty business on the host’s, and Airbnb’s part.

In the end, after several days of trying to get my service fee back, Airbnb offered me the amount back in a “goodwill credit”. Huh? Goodwill? Credit? At this point the last thing I wanted was a credit that obligates me to booking another Airbnb listing. This situation took over three days and nine messages from me to Airbnb, plus several messages to the host, to ultimately having Airbnb not give my actual money back.

Below is a quote from your last message to me. “Please know that we appreciate your loyalty and I am personally looking forward to many more years with you. We are here to support you 24/7 and can be contacted any time over email and the phone.”

24/7 support? At one point, I didn’t get a reply to my messages for over 48 hours. Please, read all of the messages that went back and forth regarding this booking. Any reasonable consumer will see how I got scammed here.

On the day that I drove to Split, only to have my booking cancelled, I ended up having to book a place at the last minute in Trogir, 30 minutes outside of Split. This was a direct result of one of your hosts cancelling my booking… and you charged me the service fee.

Airbnb wasted a lot of my time (booking, driving, rebooking, messaging, follow up, etc) and caused me to have to rebook 30 minutes away from the original booking. This made me incur more costs that shouldn’t have happened. As a consumer, I figure that Airbnb owes me money, not a bogus “goodwill voucher”. Airbnb should be going after this host to cover the my costs involved. Airbnb wants reviews of their hosts, and Airbnb. I did review this host but, of course, that review doesn’t get posted. Apparently, Airbnb is protecting this host’s listing and credibility. That is very deceptive to potential renters.

If you won’t post my reviews, I will post my own. Twitter, Facebook, etc. I don’t have to embellish this story in any way at all. I will be sure to include the host’s information and listings as well. So that is why my score is so low. If the exact same thing happened to you, you’d be pissed too.

Unhappy About Airbnb’s Refund Policy

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We reserved a place seven months ahead of time and our credit card were charged for half of the total cost. Five months before the original arrival date, we found that we no longer needed the accommodations due to an unexpected medical event, and proceeded to cancel.

To our dismay, we were charged with a service fee of $130. This seems to be exorbitant as there did not seem to be any significant service provided. It was indicated there would be a full refund if you cancelled and we assumed there would be a full refund for such an early cancellation (they will have no trouble whatsoever in getting a new renter).

Needless to say, we are unhappy with Airbnb and will think twice before using them again. The service fees are outrageous.

Beware Airbnb’s Cancellations and Currency Conversions

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I used Airbnb a few years ago for accommodation in New Zealand and it couldn’t have been better – easy to book and great accommodation. The second time I used Airbnb was to book accommodation in Perth last Christmas. I booked months in advance, but the booking was cancelled by the host a few weeks before the trip because he suddenly “wasn’t going to be around.” In other words, best of luck to the customer – go sort it out yourself.

The third time I booked accommodation in Melbourne for July and was stung by Airbnb’s trick of charging in USD (same as many others by the look of it on a “com.au” website. It’s not unreasonable to expect to pay in AUD unless it’s as clear as dog’s balls that you’re not. I requested a refund. The host was okay with it but Airbnb was going to keep over $200 for their so-called service fee. I agreed with the host to shorten my stay to reduce the pain.

A couple of weeks later, my booking was cancelled by the host as they’d decided to “no longer offer short stays.” I wasn’t even informed that it was cancelled; I saw a refund appear in my bank account and had to ask what was going on before they confirmed that it had been cancelled. Classy on every level. This has been the worst online accommodation booking experience ever.

The system used by Airbnb is shakier than my mum’s 12-year-old dog trying to go to the toilet after she’d got to those burritos she shouldn’t have had. The biggest shame is that their website is really good and easy to use. My suggestion is if you find a place you like on Airbnb, see if you can book it via a different booking agent (e.g. one with some principles) as many of these places are also listed on other sites.

To summarize, here are some analogies for you: if Airbnb was buying your Secret Santa gift, you’d get a voucher for a store somewhere in a foreign country that you’d be unable to use, and it would be expired already. If Airbnb was your girlfriend, she’d walk up to you wearing lingerie, tell you to wait in the bedroom for her, then leave you waiting there whilst she went and married someone else. If Airbnb was a rock band they’d be Nickelback.

Uninhabitable Accommodation Means Airbnb Refuses Refund

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We booked a room through Airbnb and when we arrived we found the room to be completely uninhabitable. The most pressing issue was the temperature; the room was freezing, with no heating provided. It was 7 degrees Celsius outside, and the external walls were paper thin. There was condensation on the windows and walls. Furthermore, the toilet was broken; the cistern was permanently discharging, with the constant noise of running water and making it impossible to flush. There were other issues too, including excessive noise from above.

We notified the hosts, who agreed with our assessment that the room was uninhabitable, and we had no option other than to leave and seek alternative accommodation (at 10:00 PM). Airbnb does not have a contact number, leaving us with no one to call and having to fend for ourselves. Given that the host completely agreed with us, we thought that we’d at least be able to get a full refund for the room – how wrong we were.

Airbnb will not refund their service fees, their cleaning fees, or their processing fees, so in total are only prepared to refund about 75% of the price we paid, despite the room being completely uninhabitable, the host agreeing with us, and us not having spent a single night there. Airbnb does not have a contact number, so I have been left communicating via their online message system (taking a day for them to reply between messages) with someone who doesn’t have a good grasp of the English language and is making unreasonable requests (they want photo evidence that it was cold – how exactly do they expect me to do that, unless of course they expect their guests to carry a thermometer with them).

Given this, we immediately looked into cancelling our other Airbnb bookings for this trip. Given the experience we’ve just had we didn’t want to risk it. All the bookings were listed as free cancellation, and we are within the cancellation window. However, Airbnb’s policy is to never refund their service fee, even when a room is cancelled or there is a problem. They don’t care what you do, because they get paid anyway.

I have no worries about getting my money back – it was paid using Amex and their customer service is exceptional. They’ll provide the refund immediately and claim it back from Airbnb. I’m sure that our experience here is a one off, and the vast majority of stays go without issue. However, if something does go wrong, Airbnb will leave you on your own to deal with it, will make any attempt to get a resolution exceedingly difficult and will refuse to provide a full refund. You have been warned.

Airbnb’s Unethical Service Fees

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Let me start by saying I am a host and other people have cancelled on me before. I also use Airbnb to travel to other sites. It is currently April. I booked a trip for July for work back in January. However, funding for my trip was cancelled and I am no longer able to go on the trip. I wrote to the host and asked if she would be willing to cancel my trip and issue a full refund. She said, “Yes of course! Let me just figure out how!” So I waited and waited and later got notification that she acknowledged my cancellation and issued a refund of about 3/4 of the money she said she would. Meanwhile, Airbnb kept $70 of the original amount I paid, citing that they were “service fees” and, therefore, nonrefundable. A service rep wrote to congratulate me that the host refunded the room outside of the strict policy (less than she said she would refund). I responded asking to be refunded the $70 services fees. Back and forth, back and forth. And still the answer was “no, the service fees will not be refunded.” Note that it is early April and there are still over three months before my planned check-in date. As a host, I KNOW that the likelihood of re-booking is high. Airbnb has a valuation of billions of dollars and now I understand why: keeping money for services NOT rendered and unethically keeping any money they are able to process… simply because “you agreed to” when this caveat is written in fine print somewhere. The attitude reminds me of street vendors in 3rd world countries. I’m not opening a dispute with my credit card company and hoping to find an alternative to Airbnb to both host and locate other go-to destinations.