I was a host with Airbnb for almost three years. I own a beautiful villa on the island of Phuket and I’m not greedy so for a 5-bedroom, 5-bathroom villa. I charge $300 a night, while nearby hotels are charging that for one room per night, so I’m fair.
Airbnb had some people stay at my villa during a violent storm. I warned these people that the Thai weather commission had issued violent weather warnings for the south of Thailand. During the night, around 2:00 AM, the power went out in the south of the island. The guests called me to complain at 2:00 in the morning, I informed them that my power was also out and I could not come over to fix anything.
The following day I called back to be yelled at for all the money to be refunded in full. I informed them that I am not allowed to do an off-site transaction as Airbnb will hold me responsible. I spoke with Airbnb and was told that storms are not my fault and nothing would be held against me.
After these guests complained that the power went out Airbnb canceled my listing and told me that any guests who have booked already will be allowed to stay at my property as I have agreed to do so. I contacted Airbnb to inform them to take their customers and put them where the sun don’t shine. All in all, Airbnb is a rubbish company and needs to change their ways. As you can see, my villa is a complete dump according to this company.
What a nice rental! I bet you could just use a local PM in your heavy tourist area!
This is a simple issue made complicated. Airbnb should still charge one night for service used … with the option to cancel for the rest of the stay. It is a loss for both guest and host and not either parties fault. It is the choice of the guest to be without any accommodation during the second day of power outage.
The problem here is that Airbnb has no customer service for any issues and they refuse to do collections or act as an escrow agent per the agreements listed on the site listings. The new airbnb model is “the airbnb experience agent” which means an answering service with no ability to mediate or make collections. Airbnb might respond after a week or two if you are lucky. They are going fo the “automated ebay model” of P2P for more profits. Airbnb charges the same fees as they did when they offered more services and collected on payments. Now with the new airbnb getting ready to do an IPO they have decided to cut services. Now they “allow optional payments that are voluntary” and screw over the hosts. Hosts have made investments (for furnishings) in time and money for operating a short term rental and are stuck with airbnb as it changes the terms.
It is nice to know that the airbnb monopoly and IPO will fail with this model and other P2P sites will have a chance at competing!
Good for you not putting up with the outrageous treatment from AirtBnB and those stupid and ridiculous guests. Holding you responsible for a major storm causing widespread power failure!
I had some guests, MBA graduates mind you, would wanted to check-out early with a refund because ‘the place was dirty’. I asked where it was dirty and they replied there were maggots in the kitchen. I told them I had noticed they had put their chicken leftovers in the uncovered recycling bin, that we do not recycle chicken in Australia and because they had not disposed of their food waste in a good and proper manner that they had infected the kitchen with maggots themselves. Their shocked expression was priceless. 🙂
I think sometimes you have to be a Basil Fawlty,
Really, all warning notices like ‘Warning: heating this product may cause it to become hot’ should be removed and let survival of the fittest take its course.
Unfortunately, that is the way Airbnb treat you. I told them where to go as well after they charged me for some students trashing my place.
The outfit is rotten to the core.
your place look beautiful and yet again it seems the airbnb quality of guests with 1st world problems continues to grow. as a host myself i have seen the increase in entitled idiots also.
best use another platform as airbnb suck