Tag Archives: airbnb host no show

Stood up out in Arctic Sweden by Airbnb Host

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Airbnb advertised availability for two nights lodging on its website for Kiruna, Sweden for June 8-10. I booked the lodging. Airbnb collected the money. It did not deliver the product, the lodging.

Airbnb’s advertised host did not give me good directions to the site. It took me 60 minutes walking to find it. When I found it, Airbnb’s advertised host did not answer the door. He told Airbnb customer service later that he did not hear me. Yet he knew I had a reservation, and that I was coming, and had received my money.

I purchased the accommodations and paid for them through Airbnb’s website on May 22nd and relied on the Airbnb advertisement on its site that its Airbnb host would provide lodging. He did not. I communicated with the Airbnb host ahead of time, telling him my flight would arrive in Kiruna at 8:20 PM.

I arrived at his front door at 10:30 PM, after asking three different people how to get to his address, as his directions were vague. I knocked on his door twice, loudly. No one answered. As I did not have a phone usable in Sweden, I knocked on his next door neighbor’s door after Airbnb’s host did not answer.

His next door neighbors confirmed that he lived where I knocked. They would not, though, call him to let him know I had arrived. I returned to his house and knocked loudly a third time. No answer. Then I walked to a convenience store a half mile away. The clerk there called him at his advertised number and handed me the phone. There was no answer.

I was stranded in a foreign city I had never visited, knowing no one, without lodging, at 10:45 PM. This was traumatic. Kiruna is in the Arctic; it was cold there. I had only arrived in Sweden that day. This was to be my first night ever in Sweden.

I had to hire a taxi to take me to two different hotels before finding one with availability, and then also find a hotel for June 10th. I had almost no wifi on June 9th as I was traveling on Arctic trains which had very spotty wifi en route to my June 9th stay in a small northern Arctic mountain community with no wifi.

I contacted Airbnb on June 10th and canceled the second night I was to stay with its host, requesting a refund of my fees paid to Airbnb as I could not rely on its host to answer the door for my planned stay there, reimbursement for the replacement lodging I had to find, money for the taxi, and compensation for my inconvenience, worry, stress, and time dealing with the problem.

After writing Airbnb customer service, on June 21st Airbnb refunded me $21 cash. They have refused to refund me or pay for my expenses beyond that, other than to offer Airbnb coupons, which I do not want. On July 1st, I wrote Brian Chesky, Airbnb CEO, an overnight letter again requesting a refund. His office received my letter on July 2nd. On July 8th I called and left a message for Mr. Chesky with his staff; I also emailed him directly on July 10th. Neither he nor any of his Airbnb staff has responded to my July 1st letter in the past 18 days.

The problem caused me worry, stress, lack of sleep, sleep disruption, and inconvenience during the trip, with a loss of 5.5 hours of time in Sweden on my trip, and 7 hours spent trying to resolve this Airbnb problem after the trip, including emails, phone calls, the CEO letter, and complaints to the California A/G’s office and the Better Business Bureau. It should not take seven hours after a trip is done to resolve a lodging problem during the trip.

Airbnb’s competition is hotels. A hotel would have resolved this situation immediately. I have averaged five Airbnb lodgings per year for the past six years. This is how Airbnb treats its long-time customers. When you need help, they show their real interest (zero) in you and your problem. It is all about the money for them, and all about ignoring problems for them.

My research shows other Airbnb scams/fraudulent activity due to no-show Airbnb hosts. These other Airbnb hosts also stood up other people using Airbnb’s web site like me. These other victims of Airbnb no-show hosts, also making advance payment for lodging as required by Airbnb, were for lodgings in Barbados (2019), Portimao, Portugal (2018), Majorca (2018), and Florence, Italy (2017). In each of these other cases the scam/fraud victims similarly had trouble getting compensation from Airbnb.

This type of continued Airbnb scam/fraud is wrong. Their lack of resolution of this problem, especially for a long-time customer, is despicable and outrageous. It seems like a pattern of fraud/scams on Airbnb’s part, to improve their bottom line. I am willing to and prepared to take them to court if need be.

Moral of this saga: You often save some money with Airbnb vs. a hotel. But if there is a problem, and you booked with Airbnb, tough luck. You are often just plain out of luck. They do not care, unlike hotels. It apparently is Airbnb’s direction from the top, from the CEO on down. Once they have the money, they do not care about helping.

Airbnb Host Left us Outside in Cold Weather

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My Airbnb host was responsive at first but suddenly became weird and unresponsive. I noticed the host rented an apartment on other sites. After making the reservation, I noticed the host became unresponsive. I was told the check-in time must be later because she must clean. I didn’t expect the cleaning would take 4-6 hours. I would never have booked if had known.

Previous guests gave positive feedback to this host by saying she was honest and always on time, which was not true for me. Then I found another page in which some guests had complained the host was late. She was a foreigner living in one city and renting in another.

We were waiting many hours and agreed to arrive in the evening. I thought it would be okay. I was wondering why the host didn’t have any time to respond; I thought she was cleaning and had no time. In the evening, I noticed the location was not 150 meters from the station – it was 1 km walking distance to the apartment. It was a cold evening and the host turned off her phone. I received a message saying I “can’t call this number right now” even though we agreed on the arrival time.

It’s so easy to lie because most holiday apartments don’t have a reception desk. It made me think the host only wanted to get money and has no responsibility. I tried to knock on the door but it was locked and no one was there. I also had the wrong code. I couldn’t wait outside the whole night so I had to spend the night in a hotel.

Around midnight, the host started to respond, asking where I was and if I was coming. I thought it was rude and crazy. The host agreed the check-in time would be in the afternoon, then changed it to the evening. Then she thought it would be okay to ask us to arrive at night.

The host tried to make stupid excuses like she was shopping for breakfast food for us in the evening (we didn’t ask for any breakfast and it would not take three hours to buy breakfast items). The keys would be just enough but we didn’t get keys. I’ve met angry and weird hosts before but this one was incredible; it felt she wanted to leave us outside. I froze and this is one of my worst travel experiences. I’m pretty sure I don’t want anything from Airbnb because I can’t trust them. I could end up being left outside and frozen without a key again.

What did customer service do? I’ve been waiting days to see if I will get a response but mostly they believe the host. The host says she has called multiple times (even though she did not) and gave an incorrect code. It’s difficult to prove the host closed her phone. I don’t have a conversation record of this because I had no chance to speak to the host.

I wonder how on earth could anyone think that guests can wait outside all afternoon and night and how any service could accept this behaviour. I booked just one night and the host expected me to spend hours outside without a key or expected me to wait until the night or morning without a response.

Nightmare Host Has No Time to Deliver Keys

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I booked an Airbnb flat but suddenly the host didn’t have time to answer me and give me the details. The waiting time turned out to be a nightmare in cold weather. After I made the reservation, the host acted strangely and didn’t give anything more than her address. All other information was missing. I tried to ask couple of times how to arrive, what was around there, etc., but got no answer.

Then the host told me she was abroad and guests had to search for the keys in the cellar. I was thinking the host was in the same city, especially because she brought keys before to other guests as I saw her positive reviews. She didn’t have “time” to bring keys to me at all.

Then we agreed about an arrival time in the evening but the host suddenly changed her mind and sent me only one message, telling me she would be busy for 2-3 hours and couldn’t give me instructions to find the keys. It is incredible behaviour which I haven’t experienced before. The host knew I was already in the corridor waiting but suddenly she just became busy. The host didn’t ask her friend to bring the keys; it felt like the host only wanted money.

I tried to contact customer service but had to wait many days before getting any help. Then I got help and the host already lied to customer service by saying that she had given me all the instructions and she couldn’t be available for guests 24/7.

I never asked host to be available 24/7, only for the time I told her about my arrival that had been agreed upon. It seemed like she didn’t want to rent out her property. I think the real truth could be the host is living at her flat, kept the key with her, and there was no respect for guests. There were not any keys left in the cellar; I searched for them.

I felt terrible, especially because I walked 1 km to the apartment on a cold evening and ended without a key to the corridor and stuck outside. The host tried to ask customer service to remove her feedback so she could still do the same thing to others.

I know when people are really busy they will tell others “I’m busy” but not just suddenly change their mind and say they’re busy when guests told them their arrival time. I had to pay for an expensive hotel that same night because the host didn’t want to bring her keys.

Terrible host didn’t bring the keys and closed her phone

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This Airbnb host didn’t tell me anything and had no information. All I got was the address and that the host also had some positive feedback (probably from her friends and colleagues). Immediately after I made the booking, she started to be rude. I tried to ask her how to arrive but got no instructions from her; I had to search by myself.

The apartment was also expensive, a similar price to 3-4 star hotels – I would have expected more customer service skills. Then when I was looking for the apartment, I had to call and ask which street it was. The host didn’t know any shops or banks near the apartment even though she said she was “living there”. Then suddenly the host told me she was in another country or place for a work and the keys were in the bike shed.

That’s when I knew things were not as they should be. She told me I had to look for the keys in a bike shed in some box that I didn’t see there. I had to ask for the door codes multiple times. If she had any advice for me, she wouldn’t share it. She expected everyone to have an iPhone or similar smartphone to use Whatsapp. I believe I’m not the only one who doesn’t have Whatsapp for messages. It was possible to send information through Airbnb but she played phone games and didn’t want to.

In the evening, I found the apartment (but no keys in the bike shed). She sent one message with a smile emoticon: that she was not available in the evening for 2-3 hours. Then she turned off her phone.

What a rude and impolite person; she just wanted money. The host knew I was coming and at what time but she decided to hide and turn off her phone. There were a lot of people coming and going in her building and I could not wait in the corridor for 2-3 hours until she would open her phone, assuming she would.

I would never have booked a place on Airbnb if I had known the host would ignore her phone and that she wouldn’t bring the keys. I also think a bike shed is not a safe place to keep any important things such as keys. It would be easy and simple to ask a friend to bring the keys; it would take about 5-20 minutes, which apparently she didn’t have.

This happened in Sweden. I don’t know if I’ll get any refund or not but the host has already tried to get more money: 180 euro because I cancelled the reservation. I had to go to a hostel because I didn’t have the keys.

Host didn’t answer the door when I arrived at midnight

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I booked a ferry set to arrive at an island at about 8:00 PM. I noted this when booking my reservation. Two days before I was supposed to arrive, the host asked me to confirm my arrival time. I thought that my message went through, but apparently the wifi didn’t load and the message didn’t send. Regardless, the host didn’t ask for a follow up and I assumed that he knew and all was well (the listing noted that the check-in time was flexible).

My ferry ended up running three hours late. I let my host know as soon as I could… and then I realized that my initial message didn’t go through. There was no response from the host during the three-hour ferry ride. I got to the apartment at midnight, but no one was there. I had to show up at a random hostel to find a place to stay. It was not a great situation to be in as a young solo female traveler. My host said that he assumed I was no longer coming because I didn’t respond to the message. I asked the host if he could refund my stay. He hasn’t responded. Is there anything I can do about this or do I just have to cut my losses?

Host Never Showed up for Check-in and Phone was off

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I am a Cypriot who traveled to Hungary with my family and wanted to make a complaint about an Airbnb case as they are failing to accept their responsibility regarding cancellation of a reservation and failure to deliver an apartment. This left me and my family – including my six-month-old daughter – on the streets without notice in the early hours.

We arrived in Hungary on September 4th at 11:55 PM and found out that host’s phone was off. They didn’t appear to give us the keys to the apartment we paid. We contacted Airbnb and they were wasting our time promising that they would resolve the issue and get back to us. They said that they found us room at two different hotels and sent us there to find that they never called the hotels and that there was no available room.

After complaining again at the call center and asking to be assigned a new case manager because our first one was lying and playing with us, we were assigned a new case manager. He only found us a room that we paid for at 10:30, spending all the night with a six-month-old kid on the streets calling the international center’s number and using mobile data over roaming. The reservation was done through their website for one day less now but we had to pay even more this time because the apartment that they suggested and was available was a higher price per night. I paid again with my credit card.

Initially they wanted to refund us just for 71 EUR which was the additional money (to return to my card after a few days) but after I asked for compensation they proposed giving me 200 USD maximum, including the 71 EUR. Airbnb wants to refund us for this (including the extra money we paid for a more expensive room through their website) with the ridiculous amount of 200 USD.

I explained to them that this was disrespectful and not acceptable as compensation. After this I asked to escalate the issue and was told that someone else took over our case; he is not responding. In the chat box it doesn’t show the name of the person to whom you are talking so I can’t know if the issue was really escalated or it’s just the same person who served me as case manager who is pretending to be the supervisor.

In similar cases when there is a flight cancellation the airlines compensate passengers up to 300 EUR while on this occasion we were not waiting in the lobby of a hotel or an airport lounge but on the streets, including my six-month-old daughter. We didn’t know where we could sterilize her bottles, charge our phones, etc. In addition we were played by this case manager and sent from hotel to hotel. He lied, said that he called the hotels, and said there was room available; when we arrived the receptionist told us nobody called and the hotels were full.

Can’t Get My Money Back After We Didn’t Stay

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We booked a flat right on the outskirts of Barcelona for five nights in August 2017. The flat allegedly belonged to the host. Due to work happening on the underground system, we got there about an hour after he was expecting us. We didn’t have his phone number but we got into the apartment building with someone who was entering. There was no answer at his door. We sat on the floor outside his door for about an hour and then someone came out of the flat next door, so we showed them the address and he said, “Yes, that’s definitely here, but there’s [no one by that name] living here; it belongs to Pedro.”

We went to sit in a cafe while we thought what to do, and a local told us it wasn’t legal to rent flats to tourists due to all the scams. I phoned my partner who managed to find the host’s phone number and our Peruvian friend phoned. The host said that if we didn’t come, there would be a cancellation charge of 25 euros. This had all taken us five hours and we were exhausted so we went to stay in a hotel.

On our return home, we applied to Airbnb resolution centre to get our £296 back. The host kept sending messages saying he had been there all day and that we had never arrived. We were there for at least an hour, but we left because we were told he didn’t exist. Airbnb gave us the name of a resolution investigator who said on September 13th that she would investigate. We never heard anything at all from her. The Airbnb site now says that the claim was resolved three months ago (which would be the end of August 2017) but we have never heard anything at all from them, and I have still been billed for five days for a property I never used.

Terrible Host Leaves us Stranded in Montreal

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We arrived at the designated apartment building in Montreal on a Friday evening around 6:45. The person at the front desk knew nothing about Airbnb and called the building manager. He searched and advised us that there were no keys left for us. I texted, then called the host at the number she provided – only to hear an answering machine message in French. I proceeded to call various numbers for Airbnb including the one listed under “In case of Emergency” to no avail. I called Corporate Stays to learn that this reservation was not made through them so they couldn’t help. After much frustration and exhaustion I proceed to look for available hotel rooms, which I finally had success with at 10:50. We booked a hotel room for three nights for twice the price we already paid for Airbnb. I texted Airbnb asking for a refund since I couldn’t use the apartment and their response was that the host’s cancellation policy was “strict”; my refund would be zero. After this experience I will never use Airbnb again. Their customer service sucks so they must attract a lot of scammers. All the numbers provided had automated messages that never led to a human being. The building manager at the apartment house stated that the host is “very sloppy” and he would never do business with her. I will give her a negative review, and also get American Express involved in the dispute if I get no satisfaction on a full refund. I also expect to be reimbursed for my hotel stay. A woman from Australia was stuck in the same situation as we were and she’s an employee of Airbnb. She tried to help us but to no avail. However, she assured us that refunds and a free hotel stay would be ours.

Ripped off in Brussels after Host’s False Claims

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Recently I had an experience that will make me reconsider ever using Airbnb again. I have been coming to Brussels for work on regular basis, usually renting a room and meeting a real Airbnb host. I never had a problem, and always exchanged positive and genuine reviews. Recently I had to stay longer. Therefore I brought my little daughter with me and an au pair, and to play it safe decided to splurge on a nice apartment in a safe neighborhood. I paid 1000 EUR for 11 days in a one-bedroom apartment, and chose a nine-time verified host.

When we arrived there was no host – just a key in a safety lock. There was no bedroom either, just an alcove off the main living space that contained a kitchenette in one corner and a bathroom in the other corner of what once was a very grand parlor. The apartment had stale air, a lot of grime and dust, electricity provided by extension cords as the wall sockets did not work, a door handle falling off, a non-working stove, and no real bed frames but sort of collapsible beds in the middle of the room (the parlor had ornate, curvy walls – there was not a clean line long enough to put a bed against it).

The host warned us in advance very politely that the stove was not working; after one look at it, it was obvious that it had not worked since the 1980’s. It was a big hassle to have it repaired or replaced, so the host tried to shift the responsibility on us, via phone and email. We never really met him. I had the impression he was running the place, or rather several places (as he said in an email), on behalf of someone else. In the middle of the first week the legs on one of the collapsible beds started falling off – probably because they did not fit the frame and were fastened with the plastic tape. Foolishly I just propped the bed with my suitcase, not willing to enter into another marathon of email excuses which took, in case of the stove, three days. The host was relentless in his correspondence.

Working from 9:00 to 18:30, with two people depending on me for everything, I had no energy or time to look for another apartment. We left very early on the final day, not having seen our host. A couple days later, I received a request for 15 EUR for the new bed legs. I refused, and got myself into trouble. Next came the request for 80 EUR. I refused again, pointing out that the damage was already done and patched up with sellotape. The host then blamed it on a previous guest, claiming he had not noticed, but did not retract the claim.

To make a long story short, the Airbnb dispute resolution board sided with the host. Which makes me wonder – how do they verify the hosts ? Who deals with the disputed issues – is it some real guy or an algorithm? There were obvious loopholes in our host’s arguments. He proved to be not completely honest from the beginning, but also very polite and knew how to use the right words (“never in my life”, “hundreds of happy guests”, “in all of my apartments”, etc.) or rather how to work the system. What also made me angry was the fact that the damage compensation was charged to my credit card by Airbnb UK Limited couple of hours before the dispute decision arrived from the Airbnb Sydney unit. This seems to have gone very far from the notion of a simple platform linking authentic hosts and guests together.

Double Booked, Impossible to Contact Airbnb Support

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I have used Airbnb 20 times to stay in Charlotte on business with no issues. Two weeks ago I landed in the morning and had a packed day of meetings ending with a dinner meeting with clients. I was wiped out and ready to relax. I noticed I did not have an email from the host. I had stayed at this Airbnb before and they used an electronic keypad app for your phone. I called the host and he said I needed to call another guy to check me in. I called the other guy, who said: “Who are you? The home is already rented. Someone is staying there now. You can try the Comfort Inn… maybe.”

I called the other host back and he said: “Let me call the guy and see what is up.” Keep in mind it was 9:30 PM and I was sitting in my rental car in front of the property. All I wanted was to check in. Thirty minutes went by and there was no call back. I called again and was told that the “other guy messed up, he’s not quite sure what was going on,”

He never said anything like “I’m sorry, let me help fix this”… nothing. I scrambled to find a hotel room (the downtown area sells out often) and I paid $700 for three nights after I had paid Airbnb $425 for those same three nights. It has been two weeks and I have been chasing the guy to get my refund. Today he said Airbnb thought it was fair for him to give me back half. Are you kidding? You need to give it all back and cover the additional $275 I have now paid for the hotel. It is too bad. The idea is great but Airbnb has almost no customer service; it is like the wild west.