Tag Archives: airbnb verification

I Just Want to Talk to a Human at Airbnb Customer Service

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I feel that all this is related and I have not been able to get anyone to confirm that my account is secure. I am going to post this here and also follow up with the suggestions above. About ten months ago I was told that my app and account were not working correctly because I had multiple email accounts; probably because I accidentally signed in by phone or Facebook or both so this support person had combined the accounts into one and closed the others. I have never been able to use the app the same since.

I have received multiple emails requesting me to verify my personal information and download my identification and forward them to Airbnb only to be told that they were not clear so I needed to send them again (this was done after I had used Airbnb several times and paid through Airbnb several times). Then I was told that none of this actually happened and “I was confused”… yes, those were the words of a support person. Another one said that they assured me that the accounts were closed and the history that was supposed to be merged was just lost.

I stayed at another host’s home, though it was quite difficult to reserve because Airbnb kept saying to try again later. Finally it worked and everything was great. It was their first Airbnb and I was happy to help them out by cleaning up a few things and such. We had made arrangements to stay with them again in a few months. After about a month, I received an email from Airbnb stating that they weren’t happy with our stay and asked what I could do to make it better in the future. I immediately went to text them to see what the problem was and it said that the host was not accepting messages right now.

That was over a month ago. I have tried everything to get ahold of them and every support person has given me every excuse in the book. Keep in mind that the host has not left us anything negative, only positive reviews, and there is no reason for them not to want to explain even if they didn’t want us to stay there again. I have not been able to get anywhere with Airbnb and even requested a full refund for our stay there because we had to clean up from the people before us.

I didn’t mind before all this mess but I still have heard nothing. Some of the support message simply say “this support case has been closed” without any other response. I just want to know why without guessing, someone to confirm that my account is secure, and all of this is actually being done by Airbnb even if it is very unprofessional.

$1500 Gift Card Funds in Deactivated Account

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This is a copy of the email I finally wrote out of utter desperation to hopefully get the attention of someone with some authority to resolve my issue. The letter is self explanatory. At this time, I haven’t heard anything back. I’ll repost and hopefully have some good information to share whenever I finally get some attention and a resolution. I addressed it to Aisling Hassell and Brian Chesky, CEO of Airbnb.

Here is my issue in short: Airbnb is holding $1500 from gift cards in my daughter’s disabled account and I have not been able to get these funds transferred to my account after four calls to your customer service reps for over a week. A year and a half ago, my then 15-year-old daughter opened an Airbnb account with my knowledge and permission. She entered her information correctly and accurately, and supplied a picture and information from her passport as her identification.

Nowhere in the process was she eliminated as underage. She was allowed to proceed and went on to make two reservations for trips she and her father, and she and I took. At no time was her age an issue. If it had been, she would have told me and I would have opened an account for us to use.

Last Monday, June 11, she was attempting to make a reservation in Chicago for our trip in July, and entered $1500 in Airbnb gift cards for the planned two-week stay. She was promptly contacted and told her account was deactivated due to her age. The $1500 is locked in this inactivated account.

I immediately called your customer service number on Tuesday and explained the problem. Your rep said she was unable to resolve my issue and I was assured that someone with that level of authority would call to rectify the situation. When no one had contacted me on Friday, I called again that morning and was advised to open an Airbnb account so the funds could be transferred. Again, I was told that the person on the phone had no authority to help. She said another, higher-level person would contact me within the next half-hour and help resolve this problem.

Once again, no call or email came, and I called back Friday afternoon. For the third time, the rep said she had no authority to help, and the situation had been communicated to another department and I had to wait to be contacted. There was no way for me to contact them, and they would contact me at a later undetermined time. I finally called again today, Tuesday, June 19th, and got the same story from yet the fourth customer service rep.

He had me add a payment method to my account. I’m hoping that is only to have a way for the $1500 to be transferred to my account. Beyond that – same song, 4th verse – he cannot help me and has referred my issue to this mysterious department that can resolve my problem, but just never does it. On top of that, he insinuated that my daughter had been dishonest in the information she originally entered to open her account.

This infuriated me; she used her passport information. Airbnb allowed her to open the account and successfully make two different reservations for stays in New York in February and Chicago in April this year. This is due to Airbnb’s oversight in not recognizing her age. Please look into this. I now have had $1500 tied up in an account for over a week that I still cannot access.

It is unbelievable that there is no one in your first line customer service representatives who have the authority to truly help your customers and not just have to pass us along to another, unreachable, unanswering department. I would appreciate any help you can give me in resolving this issue as soon as possible.

Driver’s License Photo Looks Different Than I Do Today

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I only wanted to make some reservations for our first family vacation to Hawaii this coming June. I was so excited. I made the first reservation with no problem – a fabulous little condo in Maui for a week. We also needed some accommodations for the Big Island, so I proceeded. When I clicked to book them, I was told that I needed to submit a photo of my driver’s license and then a selfie to verify my identification. Sounded reasonable.

It’s not an exaggeration when I say that I must have submitted those photos 17 times – I lost count. My license photo was taken either years ago – I’m pushing 50 now and have aged… well, normally, but I’ve aged. I had a significantly different hair style and color back then, in addition to the age difference. No matter how many times I took that selfie using different lighting, taking my glasses off (even though it made it so that I couldn’t see the phone), putting my hair up, leaving it down, smiling, not smiling – oh my goodness. I could not get it to match my license.

My reservations were cancelled and my money was refunded. So, I found the customer service number (no small feat) and called. I spoke with a polite and helpful rep, but his ultimate answer to my concern was that I needed another driver’s license. Well, no kidding. It happens to be up for renewal this year and of course that will happen. Even if I could get to DMV today, there’s no way it will be in my hands for two to four weeks, and time is of the essence in making these reservations.

The rep told me that he couldn’t get a person to look at the difference between the two photos, that it was all done by algorithm. He is going to escalate the issue, but I don’t have a lot of confidence at this point. Keep in mind that I get through airport security with this identification. The photo doesn’t look dissimilar; it just may take a second glance. Honestly, what does a person have to do to give Airbnb money? I’ve already started looking at other sites, such as VRBO, but I was really happy with the selections that we made with Airbnb. I am so frustrated and discouraged.

Bounced Between Customer Service and Trust and Safety

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I’m in the U.S. and have a local co-host who manages the bookings for my house in Belize. Things have always gone smoothly with other booking sites. Then I signed up with Airbnb. They deactivated my co-host’s account. I’m not sure why. I think it may be because they sent her a verification code to my number in the U.S. and she didn’t receive it.

We have tried endlessly to get her re-activated. They told us she needs to call the U.S. office directly. She has racked up a hefty bill being put on hold. Calls from Belize are expensive. Then they told us they would send her an email with a link to a site to activate her account. That didn’t work. Since her account is deactivated there is a hold on my account too so I can’t respond to requests for bookings; they just expire.

Each time I call (after a lengthy stretch on hold) I get a different story, or I get cut off. I have spent hours on the phone. Customer service doesn’t have access to records of calls, and can’t do much. They bounce everything up to a department called Trust and Safety. They can’t be reached directly and only share limited information with customer service. The last person I talked to said I should just remove my co-host then I could do the bookings myself. This is not what I want.

In addition to lost bookings, there is a safety issue. There was just an emergency email from an arriving guest which my co-host couldn’t access. Fortunately I received it and was able to get the guest’s direct email from Airbnb so I could get her in contact with my co-host. The next suggestion from customer service was that I “snooze” my listing at times when I am not able to manage it. Why can’t they just work on re-activating my co-host? Why can’t I communicate with Trust and Safety?

First-Time Airbnber Realizes Customer Support Doesn’t Care

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Last week we decided to use Airbnb due to the size of our group and the need to have our dogs go with us. After I tried contacting potential hosts who never bothered to reply, We finally found a great host in Miami, accommodating and flexible.

On to sign up and verification. I went through the process as required, submitted everything via their app, even more than once for the ID after I received a message saying that it was a blurry pic. I paid, got back a confirmation and I said to my family, “That was easy!”

…not so fast. After about thirty minutes I got a refund to my card. I called, and they could not tell me why, but said they would look into it. The agent said I couldn’t reserve anything until the verification process was complete. Why did the system allow me to? I waited for verification with the clock ticking, and… nothing.

I called Airbnb and a representative answered after a +25 minute wait. I explained multiple times what I was trying to accomplish, that the reservation had been made and I was waiting for verification. The phone connection was bad and not easy to understand. Once he understood what was going on, he said “I will put you on hold and reach out to the verification group.” He asked for a contact number and promised to call me back if we got disconnected.

As feared, I got disconnected. I waited almost an hour for a call back. After a long wait, nothing. The clock was ticking and I feared the potential loss of my reservation. I called again: long wait, same terrible connection. I explained to Airbnb the exact same things I had already said plus the connection issue and the additional hour – now taking over 2.5 hours to wait for verification. The answer to this was that I needed to wait for the first representative to call me back because the resolution is in their hands.

So I did. I hung up and waited for another 45 minutes. This went on for the next three hours after calling back, getting disconnected multiple times, and so on. Everyone had the same answer: nobody wanted or could escalate the matter; I simply had to wait for that first representative. No one could tell me what the issue was or how long their resolution time was supposed to be. What if his shift ended? Or went on break? Or worse, just did not care?

Over 3 hours late, and I still had not heard back. In the meantime I received a message from tech support that “someone will be calling me in about 10~15 minutes”… I was not about to hold my breath for that one. I had already lost confidence.

During this time I had communicated several times with the host explaining the nightmare. He kindly said to not worry, he would wait. I continued waiting for that call back, so I called back. Another wait, another explanation, and again – I have to wait until the original representative resolves it, from whom I still have not heard. Wait, call again… another wait, another voice.

Then I was told that the picture I had submitted was blurry and they could not tell who I am, which is really not true; it was perfect clear. I was told to resubmit. This was fine with me, except there was no way to do it. When I tried to resubmit, on the app or the website, the system said “OK you are all set” because I had already done this step. I explained this to the agent who did not have an answer or solution. No escalation, no other person to talk to… simply wait for that first guy. What kind of policy is this?

After I called back in the fifth hour, the representative was a bit more helpful, suggesting to try to make the reservation again because sometimes it works. I tried, but was not so lucky. I was told that I could not reserve anything because I was missing a step. I’m so tired and pissed at this point, ready to give up.

After almost six hours of this, I was finally verified using the last picture. I was able to finally pay again and got another confirmation. I waited before calling victory just in case. Finally the host contacted me a said he got the reservation also. I only hung in there because the host was accommodating and the place was what we needed. Over six hours of an Airbnb nightmare to verify and reserve. That’s it. There may be some bits of missing details, but that’s the core of the issue.

Airbnb Account Confirmation: An Exercise in Frustration

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Using Airbnb has been an exercise in frustration from the very beginning. Just signing up with them involved multiple headaches: confirm this, give us this ID, confirm that, wait for two deposits to arrive in the bank (I don’t remember if the deposits ever arrived). Finally my account was set up with them, so now I could book, right?

Today I tried to book my third Airbnb trip, and what do you know: “We have to confirm your account, so we’ll deposit two small amounts in your account. They should arrive immediately, but it may take two or three days.”

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t this website supposed to provide service to travelers? If I need to book a room and have to wait 2-3 days (or longer, or forever) to confirm my account (which has already been confirmed) before I can book a room, what’s the point? By the time my confirmed account is again confirmed, what if the room is no longer available? Seriously, the concept of people renting out rooms in the homes is great, but Airbnb’s execution is awful.

For a company valued at over $30 billion, can they really not find an efficient and effective way to let their customers book when they need to without running into roadblocks (server error, confirmation messages, etc)? Maybe have customers enter their password – wow, what a concept – to confirm who they are, or the last four digits of their credit card number. Do you really need to confirm an account that’s already been confirmed, or see my bank statement (the other option, which is even more intrusive)?

When I tried to contact the company about this, I got sent into an endless loop. After hitting the “Contact Us” button, it took me to my last booking, as though that must be my problem. Is there really not a customer service team member that I can contact? You’d think for the 15% commission Airbnb takes from the hosts and customers (which is robbery, by the way), they would be able to hire a customer service team that could be available to personally address customer issues. I don’t know who is making the big bucks at the top, but I’m fed up with the “server errors,” confirmation messages, and very poor customer “service” this company provides. If you’re going to charge such high commissions to both hosts and users, could you at least provide a system that is effective, efficient, and consistently functional, and a little customer “service” when it isn’t?

Airbnb Wants to Collect All Your Private Information

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I will never use Airbnb again. They try to collect all your personal and private information, and there is no guarantee that you will get the booked apartment. Yes, hotels and apartments from sites like Booking.com are not as cheap as those on Airbnb but you are not treated like a criminal.

Yesterday, my husband and I found cheap flights to Malaga and decided to spend some days in the South of Spain. So, we bought plane tickets and booked an apartment on Airbnb in Malaga. We paid the total amount in advance. Today we received an SMS from the host telling us that the reservation had been cancelled because he forgot to update his Airbnb account. On November 1st, his apartment was not available.

We chose another apartment. When we started to reserve it, a message appeared asking to upload a copy of an ID. My husband uploaded a photo of his driver’s licence but it was not enough. The next message asked him to take a selfie. Airbnb insisted he take selfie with their mobile App but we ignored this recommendation because we didn’t want to have any spyware or malware in our mobile phones. My husband took a selfie using the webcam on his desktop.

In less than an hour we received a new message from Airbnb asking to upload one more selfie because the uploaded selfie was not clear enough. The uploaded selfie was more than clear. What games are they playing? Why do they want to collect all your private data? We agree that for security reasons Airbnb may ask for some information but… it’s too much. First of all, we also live in Spain. We paid with a Spanish credit card. We have Spanish mobile phones. We don’t use Proxy, TOR, or VPN when making reservations. Why are we so suspicious? Can’t they find us on Facebook?

Sorry, Airbnb, but we are not stupid and don’t want to expose our private lives, friends, and photos to the whole world. We don’t want to install their app. They already have enough information. They have our names and surnames. They have our credit card number, that is saved on their servers. They have our mobile phone number (in Spain there are no anonymous mobile phone numbers). Even all prepaid SIM card users must identify themselves when buying one. They have our email address. They have our IP address. Is this not enough? A copy of our driver’s licence… okay… is this still not enough? A selfie? Okay. Still not enough…? Another selfie? Now we are waiting for new messages from Airbnb. What will they ask for next? A nude photo? Childhood photos? All family member photos? Bank account information?