Comments on: Long term cancellation policy disaster

By: Amy Durham

Amy Durham — Wed, 23 Nov 2016 09:46:18 +0000

In reply to Bryan. I'm pretty sure this same thing just happened to me. What ever happened?

By: Rob Bach

Rob Bach — Sun, 13 Nov 2016 05:58:09 +0000

Tara, I absolutely agree.

By: Tara Thiory

Tara Thiory — Wed, 09 Nov 2016 18:18:54 +0000

I am in the same boat – I will check with the lady who I rented from and see what she says. I have not cancelled the reservation yet. I am very disappointed this is not made more explicit before your click “request to book”. I selected 29 nights and there were no bells or alerts that the policy discretely changed on the listing. WTF?? This is a major difference – I would not have reserved if the policy was to be locked in. If I had reserved 27 nights then the moderate cancellation policy would apply – what a pain in the arse! I hope she will be willing to refund according to her moderate cancellation policy which she has for all other reservations. If not, I dunno what I am going to do. AIRBNB I LOVE you but this is crazy!!! You need to make this very apparent once you change the dates to be 28 days or more – BEFORE the client clicks “Request to book!” Why is this not indicated super clearly as an alert??? Sheesh!!! Crazy

By: Rob Bach

Rob Bach — Fri, 07 Oct 2016 23:32:54 +0000

In reply to Rob Bach. I want to add that I have used Airbnb dozens of times..with a few "long term" rentals..but was unaware of this.. until recently. All my experiences thus far have been positive.

By: Rob Bach

Rob Bach — Fri, 07 Oct 2016 23:28:34 +0000

I think you are fine if you cancel before they “accept”.. I am not an expert on
Airbnb.. Like you, I was about to book a place for December.. but I thought I would
just double check.. & was very surprised to learn all this. I would expect a small penalty,
cancelling out over a month prior.. but definitely not paying the full amount.

By: Izan Omar

Izan Omar — Thu, 06 Oct 2016 12:52:41 +0000

In reply to Rob Bach.

Rob

I did send a reservation request just awhile ago to a host but I cancelled straight away after I saw “long term policy” applied eventhough it was clearly stated “moderate refund policy” on the page. I gave almost no time for the host to accept my reservation but am I safe? I was not taken to the long term policy that I have to agree to before clicking Request to book! I have never doubted Airbnb until what I have just encountered!

By: Rob Bach

Rob Bach — Sat, 24 Sep 2016 10:14:46 +0000

Airbnb states on their Long Term Reservation policy page.
“The Long Term cancellation policy is automatically applied to all long-term reservations of 28 nights or more and requires a 30-day notice of lease termination.” “If you cancel prior to 30 days you will be refunded accordingly”. This is all they say.. and you need to research further to find out what this means.. There is no hyperlink for “refunded accordingly”

This would still leave a reasonable person to think that there is a reasonable refund given to cancelling over 30 days prior. They are deliberately vague..and therefore misleading. You have to dig a little to confirm what should be very clear before entering the “agreement”. which is .. HEY!! BEFORE YOU CLICK YES, to any 28 day or longer reservation, you need to know YOU ARE STUCK FOR THE FULL PAYMENT (1 MONTH)… YOU HAVE GIVEN ALL POWER OVER TO THE HOST TO REFUND. doesn’t matter if it is 1 month or a year in advance. (terrible policy)

THEREFORE… If someone has made this error and falls out of their “extenuating circumstances” I would still advise NOT clicking the cancellation button… What this does,
is cancels your reservation and you’re STILL STUCK FOR THE MONEY. It would be best to feel out the host, with some questions regarding refund or changes to see if they would be in agreement & to determine whether they are a shit or not. If they answer with “too bad” or “buyer beware” bull, you may as well keep the reservation, so at least they cannot rent it out again to double their income. And you can at least warn others of their behavior with a review.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Wed, 07 Sep 2016 03:06:45 +0000

I just became a victim of this Airbnb scam – losing alomost AUD3000! This policy is probably against the law in many jusrisdictions including Australia. I will take the site and the host to court if a refund was not given.

By: Ling

Ling — Wed, 01 Jun 2016 15:49:53 +0000

In reply to Emily Gunner.

Hey Emily,

I am in a similar situation with $3500 on the line. Was yours a long term rental and no refund? I called my credit card company and they are saying that if that’s the cancellation policy, there’s nothing they can do.

By: Emily Gunner

Emily Gunner — Thu, 07 Apr 2016 10:55:13 +0000

I has almost the exact same thing happen to me. I tried to work with their customer service, but they were useless. They tried to charge me $734 to cancel a double booking that was created by an error on their app.

Eventually, I called my credit card company to dispute the charge and got all the money back. If you have a problem like this get your credit card company involved.