Airbnb is a Useless Service

This occurred back in 2012. We made reservations for a place in Brooklyn, New York. Upon arriving at the agreed time, the host was not present to let us into the place, back and forth calls were made. The host repeatedly told us that they would arrive “in a couple of minutes”. All were empty promises, making us wait for almost 4 hours (still without resolution). Day was turning into night and to be standing in the middle of a Brooklyn neighborhood… well you get the idea. We had lost faith in the host and could not wait any more as it endangered us and made arrangements at an actual hotel nearby. Only then we get a call from AirBNB that the host has finally showed up just under the cut-off time when it would be considered a “no-show”. FORGET IT. Why continue to do business with an unreliable host and ruin the rest of our vacation? Calls to AirBNB customer service was of no help to get a refund for the prepaid week. The saving grace was requesting a chargeback from our credit card company which they granted after explaining our situation. So Kudos to our credit card company! If you will be doing any business with AirBNB defend yourself as a consumer with any credit card that gives some type of insurance for your purchases.